{"id":25667,"date":"2025-07-25T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T01:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/?p=25667"},"modified":"2025-07-25T20:57:17","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T20:57:17","slug":"lancaster-evening-of-stories-songs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2025\/lancaster-evening-of-stories-songs\/","title":{"rendered":"Lancaster Church\u2019s \u2018Evening of Stories &amp; Songs\u2019 to benefit immigrant community"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Lancaster (Pa.) Church of the Brethren is hosting an outdoor \u201cEvening of Stories &amp; Songs\u201d to benefit ministry to refugees and other immigrants on Saturday, Aug. 9, beginning at 6:30 p.m. The church is located at 1601 Sunset Ave., Lancaster, Pa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The evening on the church lawn will include music from local musician Matt Wheeler along with an update on the Lancaster congregation\u2019s refugee ministry by pastor Don Fitzkee and comments from Elyas Sadat, who will share some of his family\u2019s story since coming to the US from Afghanistan. Kate Good, executive director of the Parish Resource Center (PRC), will introduce a new initiative to meet the needs of immigrants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A group of local volunteers is partnering with PRC to create a Welcome Community Coordinator position. The position\u2014which is intended to help fill the gap left by funding cuts to refugee resettlement agencies\u2014will complement and expand PRC\u2019s work with immigrants. The purpose is to connect resettled refugees, asylum seekers, and other immigrants with individuals, teams, and organizations in the community who can provide needed support. An estimated $100,000 is needed to fund the position, which will be initiated when $25,000 has been received.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>An offering will be received at the event with the Lancaster congregation\u2019s refugee ministry receiving 25 percent and 75 percent supporting the launch of the PRC Welcome Community Coordinator position. Those unable to attend the event can mail checks payable to Lancaster Church of the Brethren with \u201cRefugee Benefit\u201d written in the memo line or give online by choosing \u201cRefugee Ministry\u201d from the dropdown list on the church\u2019s website donation page.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Water and popcorn will be provided. Bring lawn chairs and blankets. In case of bad weather, the event will be held in the church\u2019s Worship and Event Center. For more information, contact pastor Don Fitzkee at <a href=\"mailto:PastorDonF@lancob.org\">PastorDonF@lancob.org<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8212;&#8212;&#8212;-<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Find more Church of the Brethren news:<\/p>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__list wp-block-latest-posts\"><li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2026\/new-interim-leadership-positions\/\">Madalyn Metzger and Rhonda Pittman Gingrich to serve in new interim positions with the Church of the Brethren<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2026\/global-church-of-the-brethren-communion-meets\/\">Global Church of the Brethren Communion meets in Spain<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2026\/grant-of-500000-to-church-supports-bdm\/\">Grant of $500,000 to the Church of the Brethren will support Brethren Disaster Ministries<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2026\/god-at-work-in-the-dr\/\">Discovering joys, challenges, and God at work with the churches in the Dominican Republic<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"wp-block-latest-posts__post-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/2026\/global-mission-executive-visits-burundi\/\">Global Mission executive visits Church of the Brethren in Burundi, meets with church leaders from Democratic Republic of Congo<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Lancaster (Pa.) Church of the Brethren is hosting an outdoor \u201cEvening of Stories &amp; Songs\u201d to benefit ministry to refugees and other immigrants on Saturday, Aug. 9, beginning at 6:30 p.m. The church is located at 1601 Sunset Ave., Lancaster, Pa.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1703],"tags":[2422,1395,3385,3185,2220,201,2417,2024,2195],"wf_post_folders":[],"class_list":["post-25667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church-of-the-brethren-newsline","tag-concert","tag-don-fitzkee","tag-evening-of-stories-and-songs","tag-immigrants","tag-jesus-in-the-neighborhood-stories-from-congregations","tag-lancaster-church-of-the-brethren","tag-music","tag-refugees","tag-service"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25667"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25667\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25668,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25667\/revisions\/25668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25667"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=25667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}