We're All Winners (But Especially Miriam)

Shivaun Nelson Wilkinson is a candidate for Holy Orders in the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego, which is a fancy way of saying that she's going to be a wonderful priest. Her parents, Monte and Robin Nelson, and siblings, Rand and Brienne, are longtime St. John's members. A graduate of UC Berkeley, Shivaun is finishing up this spring at fabled Virginia Theological Seminary and will be ordained as a member of the transitional diaconate (which precedes ordination to the priesthood) in June at St. Paul's Cathedral in downtown San Diego.

Preaching at St. John's this morning, Shivaun warned us against thinking that Christians are winners in the great salvation race and everyone else losers. Better that we all journey to God together. That may well be, but before the first service it looked as though Shivaun and Chris's daughter, Miriam Hope, who's turning one later this month, was going to beat mom to the pulpit.

Thurifun

At St. John's, the epitome of what Episcopalians call broad church (a little Protestant, a little Anglo-Catholic, mostly in the Anglican middle of the road), if there's incense, it must be Easter, Pentecost, or Christmas. Our longtime acolyte master, Monte Nelson, was trained for his work at by-the-book parishes back east. When our acolytes carry the cross and candles in stately formation, when the thurifers swing the thurible with cathedral elan, we thank the young ministers and Monte, too. He's shown getting Hannah Schuh, Garrett Williams, and Steven Hayden ready for Easter Sunday.