From Rev. Susan Frances: November 12, 2021
Dear Friends,
New Times Call for New Plans!
I want to thank everyone who has provided feedback to me, the other staff, and the Faith Formation Force about the worship service and faith formation hour on Sunday mornings. We’ve been back in-person for Sunday morning worship for 9 Sundays now. We have a sense of how many people are attending, a sense of how our traditional 13 Hospitality Teams schedule is going, and a sense of what people are enjoying.
As with most things in this pandemic, we are making plans with the information we have and then we are adjusting as we gather feedback and experience. With this in mind, we are making two adjustments to our Sunday morning in-person flow.
Kinship Time
The first adjustment is creating time for Kinship, which some of us call Fellowship, after the worship service each Sunday. After the service, please stick around in the sanctuary for 20 minutes to greet visitors, get to know new members, and reconnect with your friends. At 11:35 am, Faith Formation Hour will commence with the same activity pattern that we used in October.
Wander back through the café area next to the kitchen to interact with our committees and teams. There will be three program tables available to our committees and teams each Sunday during Kinship Time. Please contact Jessica Meis at admin@ucevanston.org if you would like to reserve one.
The tables outside the kitchen will have a variety of hard candy treats. Try a new flavor each week! Water will be our only beverage available through February. You are welcome to bring warm beverages from home in your travel mugs. Please practice entering the kitchen along the hallway by the sanctuary doors and exit into the café area. We will continue to wear our masks snuggly over our nose and mouth with breaks to take a sip or pop in a candy.
Reshaping Hospitality Teams
Our faith calls upon each of us to engage in radical hospitality, creating a place of welcome for the stranger and the friend. Our shared ministry calls us to figure out how to do this together. UCE has a long tradition of everyone in the congregation being assigned to one of the Hospitality Teams. This tradition is continuing, but in a new format.
Our new Sunday plan is that we will have 4 dedicated Hospitality Teams:
It is my hope that everyone in the congregation will continue to be on one of the hospitality teams. Hospitality is one of the foundations of creating community, of building relationships, and of engaging in something larger than ourselves. For some it is a spiritual practice, for some it is a social connection, and for some it is an act of service. For all of us, it is vital to our congregation’s ability to flourish.
You may sign up for a team in two ways. The first is to log into REALM, go to Groups/Find Groups/Hospitality Teams, click on the Hospitality Team you are interested in, and then click “Join”. The second is to respond to the email from the team coordinators or me (sfrances@ucevanston.org) and we’ll get you added to the Hospitality Team of your choice.
The new Sunday morning volunteer schedule for our 4 dedicated Hospitality Teams will commence on January 2, 2022. The Team Coordinators have committed to this plan through 2022. We’ll see how we, and the world, are doing then and either continue on with this plan or shift again. Our traditional 13 Hospitality Teams will be deactivated after each has completed its scheduled Sunday between now and the end of December.
If you have any ideas, questions, input, or concerns, please let me know. As with all things right now: We will try it and see how it goes. We will embrace patience and flexibility. We will do it together.
In faith,
Rev. Susan