A gentle reminder that any donations you wish to be made to our restoration need to be made out specifically to : Trinity Restoration Fund.

Checks made out to Trinity Church or combined with your pledge may not be separated properly and may not be deposited to the correct account. We welcome and need your generous donations, but please make out checks specifically to Trinity Restoration Fund. Many thanks for your understanding and cooperation.

What we say and what we hear are not always as it should be!

“Moses died before he ever reached Canada. Then Joshua led the Hebrews in the battle of Geritol. The greatest miracle in the Bible is when Joshua told his son to stand still and he obeyed him.” “The people who followed the Lord were called the 12 decibels. The epistles were the wives of the apostles. One of the opossums was St. Matthew who was, by profession, a taximan.” “Jesus enunciated the Golden Rule, which says to do one to others before they do one to you. He also explained, “Man doth not live by sweat alone.” (Excerpts were taken from National Review magazine.)

Some of my favorite children’s sayings are the interpretations of the Lord’s Prayer by children.

“Our Father, who art in Heaven, how didja know my name...” Sometimes we can get caught in the rut of reciting prayers without much thought to what those prayers mean or to what we are actually saying. This summer let’s take apart and examine the Lord’s Prayer and, perhaps, open ourselves up to a new appreciation of this gift from Christ.

Jesus said, “This is how you are to pray: Our Father who art in heaven, ...” (Mt.6:9)

When we say “Our” Father, it is not to mean that He belongs to us; rather, that we belong to Him! Through Christ, all who are baptized and believe in Him, become the “children of God”. We call upon our Father, not individually, but as a group, excluding no one. We must also mentally include and bring before Him, all those who do not yet know Him, or else we oppose the entire mission of His Son!

We dare to call God our “Father” (Abba) and only through Christ, His Son, are we able to do so! It is by Christ’s revelations that we realize we are the children of God, adopted by Him. This adoption does not come without cost, however. When we say Father, we must behave as His sons and daughters, as Christ His Son, with the identifiable conduct of a true Christian. We must also have the heart of a child, expectant and humble. As St. Augustine said, “What would he not give to his children who ask, since he has already granted them the gift of being his children?”

“Who art in heaven” does not refer to a place beyond our reach. He is not untouchable; God is within us and around us. We do acknowledge the existence of Heaven as our homeland, the place to which we belong and toward which we are eternally drawn. By His

very nature, however, God brings Heaven into the earthly life we live everyday. It is our obligation to assist Him in doing this by our deeds and actions.

We’ll continue this series in the next Times. May God grant you a safe and healthy summer!

“The Lord’s Prayer is the most perfect of prayers...In it we ask, not only for all the things we can rightly desire, but also in the sequence that they should be desired. This prayer not only teaches us to ask for things, but also in what order we should desire them.” St. Thomas Aqinas