As many of you are hopefully aware, this weekend is our mid-year congregational meeting. For many of you, I am sure this meeting is not a red-letter event. But, hey, the Steelers lost so there are no football games to worry about Sunday (Bruce Travers would like me to note there is a Bills game). The meeting is streaming live on our YouTube Channel with the opportunity to ask questions through the chat function. So you do not even have to go out in the cold.
The above is a longhand for asking you each to attend
Before this pandemic, the best part of the church was sometimes after church. Catching up with each of you, seeing how your children were doing, and reflecting on the service together was life-giving in a way that Zoom cannot replicate. This time last year, I looked forward to spending the year with us getting to know each other again and this pandemic behind us. How silly I was. Instead, we have stutter-stepped forward, tripped up at each turn by another variant, rising infection rates, and the risk of lower temperatures. We are nowhere close to “back.”
How can you get involved as the pandemic lingers?
We must do our best to remain tethered to this beautiful community so I urge each of you to attend the mid-year meeting. As much, please participate. Is there a team or committee you are wondering about or thinking about joining? Do you want to know what is going on with Green Sanctuary or what Dana and Co. have planned for the kids this spring? How about that Capital Campaign thing you keep hearing about? We have nearly ten groups presenting this Sunday, and all are available for questions.
The Ministry Council has been working for more than a year on the UUA’s “Widening the Circle” campaign. One of the focuses of that campaign is to ensure all members of our community have access to the governing structure of the church through formal information access. I am hoping this year’s meeting will serve that worthwhile goal.
In this time of forced non-interaction, I would like this year’s meeting to be as interactive as each of you needs it to be. I hope as yet unanswered questions get answered, or at least asked and answered with a promise to follow up. I can assure you that if you have a question, someone else has that same question. For the betterment of our community, please ask!
I hope to see you all Sunday at – and after – church!
Alex Saksen