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本文是出自于一个等同“党委书记”头衔的领导的周记。本人一直很欣赏该书记的作品，张贴此文的目的是让大家品味一个外国“党委书记”的思维。学英语者也可以从其作品中学到英语的表达和写作的技巧。希望大家喜欢。

Dear Colleagues and Friends:

A few weeks ago a group of us were meeting in one of the rooms on the 2nd floor of our building.  There were a couple of geese standing outside the window, and one of them kept approaching and pecking at the window in a determined fashion.

After we tried to ignore it for awhile, at some point the conversation turned to whether there was some message we should be receiving.  Perhaps the goose was reminding us of whether there was something we were not hearing, someone we were not hearing from.

Another possibility was that this poor creature of the wild was confused and unhappy in the concrete jungle of Toronto.  

I remember the first time I saw the building where the United Church is located.  It seemed so surrounded by city that I struggled to imagine myself feeling at home.

That wasn’t really fair of me.  As I have come to understand, the glass and concrete creates the structure, but the people and the things they do in the building, make it a community.

I think of that now when I ride the elevators or walk through the lobby.  Usually there is someone from our offices to greet or chat with, or sometimes a visitor from elsewhere in the Church.  

Sometimes there are special moments of community, like this week when staff from the Information Technology office hosted a Chinese Tea to raise awareness and funds to support the earthquake victims.  A table of delicious Chinese snacks and several kinds of tea had been arranged on short notice, but the dominant feature of the room was the large screen with a continuous feed of photographs of the earthquake damage and its human impacts.  The pictures were terrible and painful to watch.  Some captured the beauty of humanity in the midst of it all.  We were grateful that none of our colleagues have relatives in that exact area, but some had connections through friends or had traveled in the area themselves.  The tea party was very well attended, and it helped connect us more personally to the devastating events on the other side of the world.  

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Later the same morning, an unusual gathering of the community took place in the lobby of our building.  People from many different offices crowded into the space outside the credit union on the main floor of our office building to see three baby peregrine falcons.  These young falcons, hatched about three weeks ago on a ledge high up on to office tower where we work, were brought down to be banded.  They have been on view on a TV monitor since they were hatched, but this was the day for us to see them close up, and to learn a little more about the banding project.  It’s a project that takes advantage of the similarity between the natural habitat for peregrines high up on a rock face, and the habitat available high up on a concrete tower.  Like us, the peregrines are adapting to a changing world. 
 

Blessings to all in our community, near and far, and may we all know our deep connection to God’s earth, wherever we may be.
 

General Secretary's Weekly Message
 

For those who knows or is learning English