{"id":3656,"date":"2013-06-25T07:58:42","date_gmt":"2013-06-25T12:58:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/?p=3656"},"modified":"2013-06-25T11:19:49","modified_gmt":"2013-06-25T16:19:49","slug":"mv-times-blessing-of-the-fleet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/2013\/06\/mv-times-blessing-of-the-fleet\/","title":{"rendered":"MV Times:  Blessing of the Fleet"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/http:\/\/www.mvtimes.com\/2013\/06\/24\/beautiful-weather-blesses-fleet-menemsha-harbor-16122\/\">http:\/\/www.mvtimes.com\/2013\/06\/24\/beautiful-weather-blesses-fleet-menemsha-harbor-16122\/&#8221;><\/a><br \/>\n(CLICK ON LINK TO SEE PHOTO SHOW)<br \/>\nMembers of Chilmark Community Church hosted the annual Blessing of the Fleet in Menemsha Harbor on Sunday. More Photos [More Photos]<\/p>\n<p>A crowd of around 50 gathered at water&#8217;s edge on Menemsha Harbor Sunday morning, for the annual Blessing of The Fleet.<\/p>\n<p>Chilmark Community Church Pastor Seongmoon Ahn, a volunteer pastor at Chilmark Community Church, led the morning service alongside Reverend Arlene Bodge. Church members, children, a few dogs and a group of  U.S. Coast Guardsmen shared in a series of hymns and chants before bowing their heads in prayer for safe passage in the season ahead.<\/p>\n<p> &#8220;I had a great time with these people. I never expected this many people would be here,&#8221; Mr. Ahn, a native of Korea, said. &#8220;I really enjoyed it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Organist Carol Loud provided a nautical theme for the service with her rendition of &#8220;Row, Row, Row Your Boat,&#8221; as a group of children organized toy boats in a circle for their own symbolic blessing of the fleet.<\/p>\n<p>Trumpeter Edson Rogers first rehearse the lyrics of &#8220;America The Beautiful&#8221; with the group. &#8220;If you can hear the trumpet, you&#8217;re not singing loud enough,&#8221; Mr. Rogers said before leading the group in song.<\/p>\n<p>Just as the service was coming to an end, captain Gregory Mayhew of the fishing vessel Unicorn pulled up to the dock in a timely appearance.<\/p>\n<p>The blessing of the fleet is a tradition that began centuries ago in Mediterranean fishing communities.  Predominantly held in Catholic regions, a blessing from the local priest was meant to ensure a safe and bountiful season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>http:\/\/www.mvtimes.com\/2013\/06\/24\/beautiful-weather-blesses-fleet-menemsha-harbor-16122\/&#8221;> (CLICK ON LINK TO SEE PHOTO SHOW) Members of Chilmark Community Church hosted the annual Blessing of the Fleet in Menemsha Harbor on Sunday. More Photos [More Photos] A crowd of around 50 gathered at water&#8217;s edge on Menemsha Harbor Sunday morning, for the annual Blessing of The Fleet. Chilmark Community Church Pastor Seongmoon [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recent-events-photos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3656"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3656\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3662,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3656\/revisions\/3662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chilmarkchurch.org\/service\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}