We are so excited you have decided to join us for our virtual Convention this year! Every day is full of events and we have done our best to make it possible for everyone on both the West Coast and East Coast to participate. If you like, you can download the schedule and print it out for your convenience. Below you will find descriptions of each event along with a “join” button next to the event. If you would like to join the event simply click “join,” enter the Convention password that was emailed to you when you are prompted, and that’s it! We look forward to seeing you!
(‘Join’ link will not work until after registration closes)
- This event has passed.
Opening Worship by our host congregations and Keynote by Rev. Sage Cole ✅
July 1, 2023 @ 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm EDT
Join us in the Moakley Center for:
Opening Worship co-officiated by Rev. Dr. Donna Keane from the Elmwood Church and Pastor Kelly Milne from the Bridgewater church. Our Opening Worship Service will introduce our 2023 Convention theme “The Practice of Optimism” and center us in the Lord.
Followed Immediately By:
Convention Keynote by Rev. Sage Cole
Becoming Everyday Mystics: Helen Keller and the Inner Call of the New Church
“Deep, solemn optimism, it seems to me, should spring from the firm belief in the presence of God in the individual; not a remote, unapproachable governor of the universe, but a God who is very near every one of us, who is present not only in earth, sea and sky, but also in every pure and noble impulse of our hearts, the source and centre of all minds, their only point of rest.” –Helen Keller, Optimism 1903
Helen Keller was a reformer, a lover of a life, a devotee of the writing of Emanuel Swedenborg, and as I am increasingly coming to believe a mystic in her own right, who knew God to be at the heart of her very being. Helen was an every day mystic, whose experience of God did not set her apart but instead bound her together with her fellow human being. As we face the reality of decline in our denomination and church society structures, I am emboldened by Helen’s way of life and faith, and believe that she shows us a path forward to live out the profound call of the New Church beyond the strictures of denominational identity and practice. Helen’s way of life and understanding of God challenge us all to become everyday mystics. To see church as the presence of an inner sanctuary, that never closes, an inner point of rest, always accessible as the swirl of life and death, creation and destruction continue on.
Rev. Sage serves as pastor and director of Swedenborg Chapel in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 2018 she cast a vision to create The Helen Keller Center for Spiritual Life at the Chapel. Sage lives in Boston, Massachusetts with her husband Ted and their two sons Theo and Zach.
Rev. Sage Cole
Bridgewater State University 2023 Convention Map (click to enlarge)
