Finding God in Every Place and Time

Continuing February 22, the spring season of the beloved Discovery series explores how Christians can stand for justice today, grow in faith across a lifetime, and experience the divine through music.

On Sunday mornings between worship services, Trinity parishioners join a lively discussion series to ask real questions about faith and its role in our world today. Led by experts and deep thinkers, they set off to embrace the complexity of our lives, and Christianity, and step away from simple answers that too often lead to the dehumanization of our neighbors — and ultimately ourselves.

“We’re living through an extraordinary and difficult time, and we’re grappling with what all of this means for us as people of faith,” says Summerlee Staten, executive director of Faith Formation and Education. “Yet Christians have always been called to live in the tension of becoming — to stay busy with God’s work in the here and now while remaining in prayerful hope for the world to come. That liminal space among past, present, and future is what we’re exploring this season.”

How we stand for justice, right now

What if being a prophet has more to do with seeing things as they really are, right now, than predicting what’s ahead? In the Christian tradition, that’s what prophets do: speak truth to power and follow their words with courageous action.

It starts with Jesus, who came not to seize power but to give up his life to serve poor and marginalized people. Beginning February 22, we’ll step into the stories of modern-day prophets who followed Jesus’s example and led justice movements amid political turmoil.

“We want to help parishioners make connections between their Christians beliefs and real-world problems, like violence, racism, and economic injustice, and to bring those learnings back to their communities, and into the world at large,” says Staten. “Our faith should influence our lives beyond the pew.”

Participants will look to the legacies of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who worked tirelessly to end apartheid segregation in South Africa; Dorothy Day, the 20th-century activist who founded the Catholic Worker Movement in New York City; and Óscar Romero, who advocated for human rights in El Salvador and later canonized as a saint by Pope Francis.

To round out the series, on March 22 parishioners will explore the role contemplative spirituality plays in grounding our social justice work. We’ll see how mysticism is not about retreating from the world but instead deepening our connection with those around us, specifically fostering solidarity with oppressed people.

How we grow in faith, today and tomorrow

How is faith shaped, and reshaped, across the phases of our lives? What opportunities for growth do we find as children, young adults, and older people? 

Beginning April 12, experts in Scripture, faith practice, and psychology will lead compelling conversations on what Christian culture values about each life stage — from the innate wisdom of children to the unburdened courage of teenagers to the gift of growing older. 

“In Scripture, the language of faith is that of something that’s living,” says Staten. “Faith is a seed that grows in our communities when we nurture and practice it.”

We’ll broaden our perspective beyond present-day cultural values and see how rich spirituality can be cultivated in every season of our lives.

How music connects us to the divine

Music plays a pivotal role in our worship, especially in The Episcopal Church. And it’s for a good reason: “Oftentimes, song is a vehicle for resonance,” says Staten, “those indescribable experiences that connect us with something both deep within and vastly beyond ourselves.”

Beginning May 3, participants will explore how music helps us grow our imagination to transcend our present difficulties; examine the overarching narrative of Scripture, expressed through an original piece of music inspired by John of Patmos’s writing in the Book of Revelation; and consider Olivier Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps, written while Messiaen was imprisoned in a German war camp during World War II, and what it might say to us today.

“The stories we tell, through Scripture, song, and tradition, form our present reality,” says Staten. “They shape our imagination and influence the future we might build together.”

Join Discovery on Sundays through May 17 at 10am. See the curriculum and register to join, in person or online.