June 2010 Newsletter
Stewardship Donation
You should be receiving a letter and pledge card in the mail around the time that you get this newsletter. Please return the completed pledge cards by June 21 so that a more accurate budget for 2010/2011 program year can be presented at Annual Meeting. Thank you so much for returning the card, and for your pledge for the work of this church.
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Outreach – Sunday June 27
We will have an abbreviated worship service, and then adjourn to Russell Hall to prepare lunches for Worcester Fellowship before starting the Annual Meeting. Hopefully at the close of Annual Meeting, people will be inspired to join in the worship and lunch behind Worcester City Hall. Pastor Doreen and Quentin may leave the Annual Meeting a little early to ensure time to help set up, but others are welcome to come anytime, even if you miss the start of the service. Our next date as Worcester Fellowship lunch providers is August 29.
No Intergenerational Worship or Pot Luck on June 7
Our monthly fellowship event is cancelled due to Children’s Sunday on June 14.
Thank you for the Installation Gift
The gift certificate to Morning Star allowed me to add to my clerical wardrobe with another white stole for the Eastertide season, and a special wedding stole. I don’t know if I can wait until Eastertide 2011, so I might have to slip it on over the summer. As always, I am humbled by your generosity.
Love, Pastor Doreen
Enthusiasm Grows for Church Growth
Over twenty people turned out for our meeting on May 20 to review ideas from the UCC workshop “Getting More Members for Your Church” attended by a team from FCC back in March. We talked about the evidence that many churches operate under assumptions that were true in 1955, the high point for church attendance in this country. We wait for people to come to us, assuming they will because that was how they were raised, or what they automatically do when they have families. We don’t talk much about our own church involvement and assume other people are quiet about their church connections.
But nowadays, only 17% of the population has church ties. The vast majority are unchurched, and this has been the case for two generations. The thrust of the workshop, and our discussion, is that we cannot sit and wait for people to come to us, but must get out, show ourselves to have something to offer, and invite people in. Church can be an intimidating place when you’ve had little experience with it, and all you see or read in the media about church has to do with scandals, greed and hypocrisy.
I believe there is a deep spiritual hunger in our society, and that we do have Good News about God to share, as well as a caring community of nurture.
We all have a role to play in spreading the word. We are not talking about knocking on the doors of strangers, or pushing religion or church down someone’s throat. It might be helpful to think of it as networking – talking to the people you already see on a regular basis about what you like about church. It might mean inviting someone to a church event, or even generating an event around an interest you have. It might mean being more overt about who we are when we do things like sell refreshments at Concerts on the Common, or host the Christmas Carol Tree-lighting and Caroling. The Pastor plays a large role in networking, going out into the community, building relationships, getting to know who’s in town and where there might be a niche for FCC to fill.
No church can be everything to everyone, so we want to reach out to people we believe would be fed here, and who also may stretch us a bit. The workshop emphasized that there is no magic program or formula that will quickly fill our pews, but there are steps we can take, there are ways we can enhance what we do to become an inviting church.
At the meeting we decided that the church’s Social Committee would be revamped to carry out the task of identifying the next steps to take, and to be the point people for others with ideas. If you are interested in serving on this Committee, please see Neil Mulrain or Judy Ivel on Nominating. We also know that our growth will happen in God’s time and only with God’s help. And we know that there is power in prayer. So please say a prayer that FCC be enabled to move forward to be bold and strong messengers of God’s love.
Prayer Concerns
- Ann Orsi recuperating from knee surgery
- Quentin Lewis well on the road to recovery from hip surgery
- First Congregational Church in its efforts to grow
These last few months we have been studying prayer. The children have explored the types of prayer and different ways we can pray. They have been learning about the many things they can pray about as well.
JUNE 13 is Children’s Sunday!
Click here for more pictures of the wonderful Children’s Sunday Service
Be sure to come to this beautiful celebration of God’s Littlest Gifts! This will be a joyous service with lots of laughter, singing, and love. We will follow the service with a picnic lunch. The Sunday School will provide the hot dogs and hamburgers so please bring something to share.
The Teachers have been hard at work helping me to choose the curriculum for next year and the results are wonderful! I am so excited to see the new curriculum put to the test next year! The Preschool class will be studying the Boz Teach Me, Show Me, Grow Me Curriculum which is put out by David C. Cook, the older children will be studying the Core Truth Curriculum which is put out by Group Publishing, and all the kids in between will be studying High Point which is put out by Gospel Publishing House. These are all great curriculums but we will still be in need for our volunteers so please consider spending 1 week (or more) helping in a classroom next year! Just see Chris to commit to a week!
Any questions or concerns contact
Chris Cathcart at church or e-mail at christine_cathcart@yahoo.com
A Note from the Pastor
A Note from the Pastor
Grace and peace to you my brothers and sisters in Christ. I am amazed at how quickly the time has flown by, with the program year coming to an end on June 13, Children’s Sunday. My son Andrew graduated from high school on June 4, and my daughter Sarah finishes classes on June 21 (her birthday!). And so our thoughts turn to summer, that slowed down, relaxed period with the lazy hum of crickets, buzz of mosquitoes, flower-scented breezes, and if we are quite fortunate, the smell and sound and salty crispness of the sea. I am inspired to share with you from my book, Love Poems from God, an entry translated from the writings of Hafiz, a Persian poet:
JUST SIT THERE RIGHT NOW
Just
sit there right now.
Don’t do a thing. Just rest.
For your
separation from God
is the hardest work in this world.
Let me bring you trays of food and something
that you like to
drink.
You can use my soft words
as a cushion
for your
head.
In the church calendar, we are entering into one of the long stretches of what is called Ordinary time. The liturgical year consists of periods of anticipation and preparation such as Advent and Lent, times of celebration such as Christmas, Easter and Pentecost, and times that are more ordinary. One of the gifts of ordinary time is that it invites us to see God’s presence in the ordinary, everyday stuff of life. A workshop I went to on worship during Ordinary time suggests that this is a period where a “lectionary” (an order of scripture readings suggested as the basis of sermons over a 3-year period) of sorts could be developed out of ordinary events or issues that we all deal with. There could be worship focused on our calendars or our checkbooks, our meals or our errands, our work or our relationships. So much to draw from, so many places to look for God.
Can we get in the habit of giving thanks for that which is truly daily bread? Can we recognize the mosquitoes as part of God’s beloved creation? Can we take advantage of these slowed-down days to notice more, to let our attention drift where it will, and then find a way to reflect on what we noticed? I have a proposal that offers a structure (a loose one though) to enable this, and it will work for those who stay around town over the summer, and those who travel or spend Sundays in a different form of spiritual nurture. I invite everyone to be paired up with a church buddy with whom you will touch base periodically through the summer to share about your spiritual musings – where you have seen God, where God has been absent, what fed your soul, any such thing. The contact can be done by phone, even e-mail if both agree, but I would encourage at least one face-to-face meeting before the next program year starts after Labor Day. If you are interested, just tell me so by June 27, and I will match you up with a buddy. I promise you that you will be fed quite richly by the exercise. All are invited to participate, whether you are an active member or friend of the church or not.
Blessings, Pastor Doreen
Congratulations
Marge Rabidou!
Marge Rabidou
