Council Highlights

Diocesan Core Values

The 104th Council will receive the core values discerned by the diocesan family in the past few months and then will explore ways in which these values will guide our future decisions and actions as we continue to be Jesus’ witnesses in all that we do.  Click for more information.

Computer Recycling

Got old computers, monitors and printers filling up your office or garage storage?  Environmental Stewardship Department
 has the answer, bring them to Council this year!  Available on Thursday morning BEFORE Council begins at 1:00 pm.
Click for more information.

Worship

The Council Eucharist will be held at First Presbyterian Church, within walking distance of the Municipal Auditorium. And walk we will, in procession, led by a New Orleans style jazz band, with church banners unfurled. Congregations are asked to bring their church banners to the Municipal Auditorium between 10 a.m. and noon on Thursday. Banners will be displayed on the Council stage, and one person should be designated from each congregation to retrieve the banner to carry it to First Presbyterian Church.

Friday's Luncheon

Supporting our theme, we will dine on a simple box lunch at the Municipal Auditorium on Friday, then hear again from Baroness Caroline Cox. Proceeds from the luncheon (cost is $15) will go to local charities. Cost is included in registration fee for all.

Banquet

This is our family time, and we will gather at the Crowne Plaza Hotel. Food will be served banquet style, with seating for everyone. Cost of $35 is included in registration fee for all but visitors.

NEW - Clergy Spouse Breakfast
On Saturday morning, Catherine Lillibridge and Patty Reed will host a seated breakfast for the spouses of our clergy beginning  at 7:15 am in the lower level of Municipal Auditorium near the exhibits.  Special Guest and speaker will be Ann B. Davis.

Ann B. Davis was born May 5, 1926 in Schenectady, New York along with her twin sister, Harriet. The daughter of an electrical engineer father and an amateur actress mother, Ann originally wanted to be a doctor. She studied pre-Med at the University of Michigan while her twin sister simultaneously took acting courses there. After seeing her older brother perform in the play "Oklahoma!," Ann was bitten by the acting bug too, and switched her majors.
Ann ended up performing at theaters around the country before heading to Los Angeles in 1954. A casting director discovered her acting at a non-paying coffeehouse on Sunset Boulevard and suggested she audition for the role of Schultzy on The Bob Cummings Show. She got the part, which she kept for five years, earning her two Emmy Awards (and four nominations).

With her theatrical roots firmly planted in years of stage work, Ann appeared on the Dinner Theater circuit in many plays including "The Matchmaker," "Three On A Honeymoon" and "Everybody Loves Opal." She was also in a play called "The Nearlyweds." written expressly for her by Lloyd Schwartz, producer of The Brady Bunch. Ann thrilled troops when she toured Vietnam, Thailand and Korea with the USO.

Since 1969, she has been known to the world as Alice, the loveable housekeeper from The Brady Bunch. Ann continues to return to the various Brady reunions, including "The Brady Bunch Movie". She also been seen in touring companies of “No No Nanette” and on Broadway in “Crazy For You.”

Ann currently lives near Leon Springs and attends St. Helena’s Episcopal Church where she is very happy in retirement.

This meal, along with the Banquet and the Friday Bishop's Box lunch, are all included in the clergy spouse registration fee.

Guest Speaker
Council will also hear from Peter Alier, one of the "Lost Boys of Sudan" who now lives in San Antonio and is a member of Christ Episcopal Church there. Lost Boys of Sudan is the name given to the more than 27,000 boys who were displaced and/or orphaned during the Second Sudanese Civil War (1984-2005).

Peter's story is typical of the thousands of boys who banded together and walked from Sudan to Ethiopa over many months. Peter's father was a cattle keeper, and Peter and his father were out tending the herd when the local Janjaweed rode in and shot the father. Peter escaped into the bush where he discovered many more boys like himself, generally between the ages of seven and 12. Orphaned and with no support, bands of boys would make epic journeys lasting years across the borders to international relief camps in Ethiopia and Kenya evading thirst, starvation, wild animals, insects, disease, and one of the most bloody wars of the 20th century. Examiners say they are the most badly war-traumatized children ever examined.

In 2001, about 3800 Lost Boys arrived in the United States, where they are now scattered in about 38 cities. Halted after 9/11 for security reasons, the program restarted in 2004, but peace talks were underway in Sudan, and so other refugee crises in other countries took priority.

Peter will tell his story on Thursday afternoon of Council, preceding Baroness Caroline Cox.