Stcroixchurch.ca



Greetings from St. Croix Church: With a full band, we just celebrated our 28th birthday this past Sunday (Oct. 4). It seems like a good time to reflect back as well as to think about where we’re headed as a church community, even as we continue to navigate this unusual season with so many challenges. We hope that, in spite of the hardships, you've been able to find ways to connect with family and friends that have been meaningful to you and supportive of each other.It seems like a different world back when we were together in more “normal” ways and our focus was on charting a new path separate from the Vineyard denomination. Back in March, COVID-19 took some of the wind out of our sails, though we still managed to mourn and celebrate with a “Queerly Grafted” event; we acknowledged and grieved with the pain of LGBTQ+ friends who were hurt by the decisions of the national Vineyard leadership, but we celebrated that we are now freer to make our own way and follow the priorities and callings that God has put before our weird and wonderful little group. This was followed by a Sunday morning (Mar. 15) when we quietly announced our new name: “St. Croix Church – SCC - (at Victoria St. Centre)” to the small group that met with careful distancing as the new realities started to sink in. There were at least a couple churches (one not too far away) that had outbreaks spread that morning, and so we’re glad that it was a small and careful service. When our new name is legally official (a lawyer is at work), perhaps we can try a new party! Since then, life has shifted dramatically as we entered a season of shutdown the likes of which we’ve never seen, followed by the gratitude of living in a corner of the world that has graciously been spared any significant viral spread. Of course, the shutdown included our SCC services, but in different ways our Celtic (early) service and the second service continued. Joy and friends kept the kids connected during the first months of shutdown primarily through Facebook Live and we posted recorded worship and teaching videos on our Facebook pages. Starting in mid-June, we began meeting face to face, at first outdoors and now, carefully, indoors. The Celtic service met at first over Zoom, but when it became possible to meet in person, we started back in the café and broadcast the service on Facebook Live. Since we had so enjoyed Zoom-ing with friends across North America and even in Europe, we decided that we would keep doing a monthly Zoom service in order to keep these relationships up. Janell has done an amazing job of drawing our youth together as that became possible.In spite of the challenges, the services that we have been doing, both upstairs and down, have been pretty rich. The downstairs ones have been shorter and simpler than they've been in the past but it's always good to be together, so long as we can feel safe while doing that. So far, with some people using masks, and others sitting at a distance from people that they don't bubble with, that seems to be working.Now that schools are back in action, there is a sense of exploring what a return to a new phase of public and community life could look like. Online platforms and various “bubbles” have allowed some degree of connection, but many of us are still not seeing each other around much at all. And it’s awkward for any of us to know how to re-establish contact and some type of “normal” socializing. Aside from our name change, one of the things that we had planned back in late winter was a meeting especially focused on learning from the 20s to 40s and the things that they would like to be a part of at SCC. We still hope to invite those interested (and if you’re older or younger, you’re still welcome!) to a unique community meeting in which we could explore together questions like: “How can we best care for each other and our community during these days?” “Who is excited about exploring new roles with the church in the years ahead?” and “What would make you most interested in being a part of that?” We’re delighted that we have so many folks in this demographic, and we’re very aware that this represents the future of our community! Unfortunately, many of those in this age bracket have been the hardest to stay connected with during these last months – partly because it has been very difficult to create a COVID-safe children’s time on Sunday mornings. Public Health guidelines assert that children need to distance as much as adults if they are not in an intentional bubble together, which is fine for those kids who are already “bubbling” but very challenging for those kids who aren’t. Now that the dust has settled with the new school term, we would love to figure out a way to have that meeting that we weren’t able to have months ago. If you’re interested, please be looking out for that or get in touch with us about what would make it possible for you to take part.In the meantime, we’ll continue with our small services of socially distanced, masked or bubbled folks, upstairs in the café (for the early service at 9:15) or downstairs at 10:30am. If coming out for services still feels too complicated (or if you live in Maine), please let us know how we can help you to stay connected. These days, more than ever, we need to be creative about how we share God’s love and peace with each other - among us and around us. Let us know your ideas or needs! with love and peace,Mary Ellen and Peter FitchWalter and Carol ThiessenLorna Jones ................
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