First Congregational Church of Palo Alto

On Sunday, we’ll celebrate All Saint’s Sunday, and in our tradition we remember more than those who have officially been canonized as Saints by churches. We use the word Saints in the context that Paul did in the Bible, to refer to holy people who have lived out God’s will and been signs of God’s love in the world. During our Nov. 1 service, we’ll light a candle for each of these people who have been connected to our congregation who have passed away this year.

"Hypocrisy in anything whatever may deceive the cleverest and most penetrating man, but the least wide-awake of children recognizes it, and is revolted by it, however ingeniously it may be disguised." Leo Tolstoy

"Driven by the forces of love, the fragments of the world seek each other so that the world may come into being."

Shortly before his death, Henry David Thoreau finished an ode to autumn in his essay, Autumnal Tints.

FCCPA was delighted to host Sermon in Song today with music from television series about community, friendship, and welcome. Inspired by the Brady Bunch vibe of Zoom gatherings, as well as the current trend of binging nostalgic TV shows that bring us comfort and familiarity, Pastor Dave Howell reminded us to be aware of the way we reflect on the past with rose colored glasses and emphasized the fact that we are not alone we are all connected.

"It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important." Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, from "The Little Prince"

Two girls discover the secret of life in a sudden line of poetry.... I who don't know the secret wrote the line. They told me (through a third person) they had found it but not what it was not even what line it was. No doubt by now, more than a week later, they have forgotten the secret, the line, the name of the poem. I love them for finding what I can't find, and for loving me for the line I wrote, and for forgetting it so that a thousand times, till death finds them, they may discover it again, in other lines in other happenings. And for wanting to know it, for assuming there is such a secret, yes, for that most of all. "The Secret" by Denise Levertov, born in Ilford, England, on this day in 1923

"'Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view,' [Emerson] says, and suddenly that elite mystical practice seems clearer than ever before, and possible to each of us." Mary Oliver, from "Upstream"

"What we call doubt is often simply dullness of mind and spirit, not the absence of faith at all, but faith latent with the lives we are not quite living, God dormant in the world to which we are not quite giving our best selves." Christian Wiman, from "My Bright Abyss: Meditation of a Modern Believer"

He prayeth best, who loveth best; All things both great and small; For the dear God who loveth us; He made and loveth all. from "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, born in Devonshire, England, on this day in 1772

Here is Episode 2 of Clarence's Art Corner, with thanks to producer Lauren Biglow and "camel stand" Dave Howell.

"Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire." Catherine of Siena

"In a dream I walked with God through the deep places of creation; past walls that receded and gates that opened through hall after hall of silence, darkness and refreshment--the dwelling place of souls acquainted with light and warmth--until, around me, was an infinity into which we all flowed together and lived anew, like the rings made by raindrops falling upon wide expanses of calm dark waters." Dag Hammarskjöld