PLEASE NOTE: The Clothing Closet is no longer accepting donations. You can check here for alternative donation locations. We appreciate your generosity over the years with donations, and ask that you please show that same generosity to other organization’s clothing closets.
Very exciting news for Haywood Street Community Development — we have closed on the property where 45 deeply affordable housing units will be built. Funds are still being raised and you can help with a donation to Haywood St. Housing.
The Haywood Street Respite has an Amazon Wish List of items in need. Please check it out and help out as you can.
Please join us this week for:
– Bible Study Sundays at 11:00 in the sanctuary
– Prayer Group Tuesdays at 12:00
– Card Ministry Thursdays at 10am
COMPANION CORNER:
God’s Outfitters Clothing Closet – The clothing closet is no longer accepting donations and will be officially closed May 8th. For more details on clothing resources in Asheville and where to donate click here.
Art Room Companions Needed! – The I Am Home Art Project is in need of weekly companions.Click here to learn more about the project and how you can get involved! See the attached flyer regarding an upcoming Art Show in honor of one of our late friends, Blue.
To provide a meal for our friends and staff in Respite, sign up on the Meal Train. With current COVID rates as low as they are, companions are now invited to eat dinner in Respite with residents. Additionally, Respite is continuously seeking companions to be in Respite and spend time with our friends. If you are interested, please let me know!
Face Masks at Haywood Street – Masks are currently optional for all friends, companions and staff.We will continue monitoring cases in our area and if they were to rise again, we would reevaluate and shift if necessary. Please know you can do whatever you are comfortable with and know we are thankful for your flexibility throughout this process.
Next Companion Orientation this Monday May 2nd at 5:00pm in the sanctuary – invite your friends to become companions at Haywood Street! Register here: https://fb.me/e/1B5vIrdlG
A Reflection from Chas:
Friends, for me, Haywood St. has been a gift & a stretch … (As a former yoga teacher for older adults, I know how good stretches are!)
Back in 2018 (maybe), Cappy Tosetti offered a tour of Haywood St. & its programs to folks of the Jubilee Community on Wall Street & I took her up on that. I was impressed by the range of direct services Haywood St. was running, especially since (like Jubilee), Haywood St. is a Methodist mission church (& so much more!)
By 2019, I was already visiting the Wednesday Welcome Table & eventually, after orientation as a Companion, I was serving food there twice a month. In 2020 when the Haywood St. building shut down due to the pandemic, I helped by distributing boxed meals from the parking lot & later did some kitchen prep work. These endeavors, together with Wednesday services I attended in the months before the shutdown, helped me see & feel what this mission church is about: Welcoming everyone to the table, Listening to all kinds of stories we humans tell; Seeking & Embracing our shared humanity regardless of circumstances; & Honoring life’s spectrum as an expression of Divine Love’s radiance. Right off the bat, my heart opened SO much, magnifying the compassion I felt.
Now as a weekly host for fresco visitors, I see in the fresco the panorama of relationships Haywood St. brings together, relationships which artist Christopher Holt has folded so carefully into his considered & skillfully rendered icon. More than that, I’m blessed to see ways this mural in our sanctuary has continued unfolding …
… An unfolding brought by its initial wide reproduction in print media which has connected the here-&-now graces that Haywood St. brings to every child of God to a representation called Christopher named “The Beatitudes.”
… The unfolding (I’ll never forget) when many of those whose portraits are included in the fresco joined in a special opening ceremony for the fresco’s 2020 exhibition at the North Carolina Art Museum;
… The unfolding that happens when I’m sitting in a pew & see anyone pass close in front of the fresco. Whether performers or witnesses during services, ministers, or people just passing through, they all become part of the ongoing stories of the Haywood fresco. Real people moving among the life-sized, painted figures that project the dynamic Spirit of the fresco (& so they become part of a tableau vivant);
… And now an unfolding made possible by the documentary film “Theirs Is The Kingdom” which Public Broadcasting will soon show nationwide, sharing both the processes that brought the fresco into being & the Haywood St. mission it so capably shares, an unfolding which may make the church a destination for many who will want to see this good artwork & the good work done at Haywood St.
Of course as a fresco host talking with fresco visitors, I’ve seen fresh sensitivities & awarenesses unfold in many faces. I have the delight of ferreting out why they have come to see the fresco & the privilege of drawing them into its stories. At some point when we’ve gotten to an easy back & forth, I often ask visitors how they’d feel or what might they say had the artist – a stranger(!) – invited them to be included in the fresco? Many find this difficult to imagine & don’t know what to say. Some answer with questions of their own, like: why would you ask me? To what purpose or what effect? Or, What part would I have in conveying a message as profound as “The Beatitudes”? (Or, What IS the message of The Beatitudes?) Or, what would fresco visitors want to know about me & how this would be shared? (All good questions!)
But when I ask how visitors might feel or what might they say had the artist invited them to be included in the fresco, some have answered more directly. “I’d be SO honored,” or “Then people would want to know my story!” or “My mother would never believe this!”, or “I could be a stand-in for my cousin…” or “… as a ‘companion’”. Some have replied, “I am unworthy,” or “I’d like to join the others around the fire,” or they just exclaim, “Jesus!” or “OMG!” (‘nuf said.)
