Family Promise

April 21, 2013 Timothy Price7 Comments

What does homeless bring to mind? Indigent street people, addicts and alcoholics with mental issues that are not to be associated with, like the Samaritans in the first century CE? While many of the homeless individuals you might encounter on the street have serious issues that contribute to their often perpetual homelessness, there is another, almost invisible, side of homelessness — homeless families. Homeless families tend to be “normal” people who have had some kind of catastrophic event that caused them to become homeless. Fortunately, there is Family Promise of Albuquerque (FPA) to help. FPA is made up of churches that temporarily house homeless families and volunteers who help support the families. Instead of ignoring these families, FPA, offers them life sustaining water.

Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon. When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? (John 4: 4-11 NIV).

Central United Methodist Church hosted two families this past week, and Laurie and I volunteered to help yesterday afternoon. When we got to CUMC, we had a pleasant surprise — there were four students from UNM playing with the kids as part of the 11th Annual Spring Storm Event put on by the Associated Students of the University of New Mexico (ASUNM) who volunteer in a one day service project. The students, Katarina, Jackie, David and Rudy, were wonderful. They played and played the the kids, and had a lot of fun. I was really impressed that they took a day off from their heavy class loads to play with kids — the kids were so happy, and their mom got a nice break. By giving up some of their precious time yesterday, Katarina, Jackie, David and Rudy helped make earth a little more like Heaven.

Old Trucks and Tulips

April 5, 2013 Timothy Price2 Comments

A couple of old trucks and a pair of tulips dancing. Speaking of dance, tonight at 7:00 pm we are having our monthly salsa dance with classes at Central United Methodist Church, 201 University Blvd NE. The dance and classes are free and all ages are welcome.

Easter Sunday in B&W

April 1, 2013 Timothy Price7 Comments

The Easter Services at CUMC were beautiful, with the young people acting out the resurrection narrative, a live bunny at the children’s sermon, fantastic music by the Chancel Choir and a wonderful Sermon by Reverend Scott Sharp.

Great Getting

March 31, 2013April 1, 2013 Timothy Price8 Comments

The “Great Getting’ Up Mournin’ celebration” with the CUMC Chancel Choir and Fellowship Baptist Unity Choir was fantastic. Jazz a la Carte played Dixieland Jazz before the service, between sets and after the service, and they were very enternaining. Pastor Scott Sharp (CUMC) and Pastor Dennis Dunn (FBUC) both delivered short, but inspiring sermons. The music, choirs, musicians and congregation were very lively. It was a great service and moving experience.

I’ve been looking for a second full-frame Canon body, but new Canon full frame bodies are expensive, so I started looking at used bodies. I saw a Canon 1Ds advertised on Amazon as “Like New, little use” for $650 with no other description. I emailed the seller and asked what it came with and the shutter count. Canon 1D bodies are the hard core professional bodies that start new for $6000 and run up to over $8000 depending on the model. Normally used 1D bodies with low shutter counts are priced higher than 5D and new 6D. 1D bodies in the $600 range usually have very high shutter counts (80,000+), and are normally very well used.

The seller emailed back and said the camera came with all the original accessories, in the original box, and that the shutter count was 1846. My 5d that is only a year old is ready to turn over 20,000 clicks on the shutter. I ordered the camera and it arrived on Friday, and it is really “like new”, so it was “great getting” on my part.

All the photos, except for the photos I took of the camera sitting among Laurie’s cookies, were taken with the 1Ds. The sky was overcast and very bright when I took the outdoor photos, so it was a good challenge for the metering system. The auto focus is fast and accurate and it focused on black (Rosencrantz) immediately without searching like the 5D. The shutter is much quieter than the 5D and is super quick and responsive. All the photos are how they came straight out of the camera with little manipulation (of course, the panorama of the sanctuary was stitched together). The service tonight was a good test for indoors, under low light. While it focuses in the shadows very well, I discovered the autofocus searches on bright white, so it’s not perfect.

I got a photo of the first butterfly of the season, and it looked pretty ragged, so it either wintered over locally or migrated. One of the peach trees is blooming, as are the wild plums, and the honey bees are enjoying them.

After the service, we gathered in the ‘Life Center” for fellowship and cookies. The couple in the last photo asked me to take their picture. They are a handsome couple, and my first portrait with the 1Ds. I put on the super-wide angle lens and got a photo of the trombonist in the jazz band with his “le long trombone!”

HoneyBeeBlossom

Tenebrae

March 30, 2013 Timothy PriceLeave a comment

The Tenebrae service at Central United Methodist Church last night was beautiful and moving. Tonight is the “Great Getting’ Up Mournin’ celebration” with the Chancel Choir and a Baptist Gospel Choir. It’s supposed to be fantastic and not to be missed. The celebration is at 7:00 pm, 201 University Blvd NE. 243-7834.

Palm Sunday

March 25, 2013 Timothy PriceLeave a comment

I photographed all three services for Palm Sunday, but with everything else I had to do, I didn’t get start looking at the photos until late, so I processed a few of the more abstract photos that represented the story. One of the boys played shadow guitar in the play.

Dust Off Your Dancing Shoes

March 1, 2013 Timothy PriceLeave a comment

Dust of your dancing shoes because we are starting Salsa Dance at Central United Methodist Church, 201 University Blvd NE across from the UNM March 1st from 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm. We will teach basic steps and style for Salsa/Mambo, Merengue, Cha Cha Cha, Samba and Swing then practice, practice, practice. The dance is free, and Laurie is bringing triple chocolate espresso cookies to liven up the party. The dance and lessons will be similar to the dance classes we held on Friday evenings at First United Methodist Church from 2004 to 2007.

Lions and Tigers and Bears! Oh My!

January 20, 2013January 20, 2013 Timothy Price5 Comments

Laurie and I volunteered for Family Promise at Central United Methodist Church this afternoon. Family Promise is a ministry where various churches take turns hosting homeless families for a week at a time while the families are getting housing. Church members volunteer to help by bringing food, or staying and doing things with the families, or staying overnight or driving family members who don’t have cars to work and school. The local denominations participating in Family Promise include the mainline Protestant churches — United Methodist, Lutheran and Presbyterian — Catholic churches and Synagogues.

If you are asking “What’s with the lions, tigers and bears then if we helped with family promise this afternoon?” We took the families to the zoo. Besides the obvious photo ops, we had a great time, the Albuquerque Zoo is in good shape, the animals are healthy and they seem to be as happy as they can be for being in a zoo.

The Messiah Has Come

December 9, 2012December 9, 2012 Timothy Price5 Comments

If you missed Handel’s Messiah tonight, performed by the Central United Methodist Church’s Chancel Choir with the NM Philharmonic Orchestra, David Felberg, Conductor, and soloists Cammy Cook, Soprano, Jacqueline Zander-Wal, Mezzo-soprano, Javier Gonzalez, Tenor and Ivan Conrad, Bass — not to worry, there is a second coming of the Messiah tomorrow afternoon, Sunday, December 9th, 3:00 pm at Central United Methodist Church, 201 University NE. If you live in the Albuquerque area, you really shouldn’t miss it — there will be tickets available at the door.

Before the concert began, members of the Albuquerque Girl’s Choir were singing in the hallway as people came in. Most of the girls were very young, and they didn’t have a director. They were all very cute, but as they tried to sing, especially with recorded music, they were so rhythmically challenged that they were difficult to listen to. After the Chancel Choir had warmed up, Jerrilyn Foster, the director of the Chancel Choir, came out and started directing the girls choir, which completely transformed them — they all of a sudden sounded good and were “in compás”. I think Jerri has a magic touch, because she takes all comers into the Chancel Choir and gets the best out of all the singers. She is really amazing.

Tonight’s performance was wonderful. Even though I’ve been listening to the choir practice every Wednesday night and Sunday afternoon, and to Laurie sing with her CD daily for months; and even though I sat through the rehearsal with the soloists Wednesday night and the dress rehearsal with the orchestra and soloists last night, tonight’s performance still sent chills up and down my spine and brought tears to my eyes — it also brought back memories of listening to the Messiah in a 15th Century Cathedral in Madrid, Spain in 1996. The cathedral was packed and we had to stand through the whole concert, but the sound and the atmosphere was so beautiful and mesmerizing, you felt like you where in the 18th century, and there wasn’t a dry eye in that old cathedral when the Hallelujah Chorus was sung. I had much of the same feeling listening to the Messiah this evening and I believe, like Handel, that we see Heaven before us and “the great God Himself” when we listen to great performances of the Messiah.