Living into a new way of ordering our life together
We did it! The process of evaluating and reordering our life together began early in 2018. The methodology chosen was highly participatory and based on what we could learn and observe. The congregation was invited and responded by simply noticing what wasn’t currently working, trying a different approach, and evaluating the results. The investment of time and broad participation early in the process allowed us to move with some confidence to adopt our current structure, even in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic.
That was hard work. However, the hard work is not yet over. It’s one thing to make a plan! Even a wonderful plan is only paper until it is enacted and embodied, practiced, proven. On this page, you’ll find our newly adopted constitution, information about current ministries and contact people, and documents meant to help guide our next steps in resourcing and establishing new ministries or reviving existing ministries.
*November 15, 2021 Update
As we at First Mennonite Church continue to take seriously the pandemic of COVID-19, we also realize that life has changed around us. We are grateful for the strong fully vaccinated rate in our church, and now we have boosters and pediatric vaccines that will only help with better protection. We believe that the safety precautions taken within the church body, especially with large group gatherings, have worked well for us in the past and we want to continue much of that. Therefore, we will continue masking and social distancing for worship, Sunday School, and music ensembles. However, we will leave it to small groups to discern other practices when they meet. And, if various groups, including Sunday School classes, are in agreement, eating meals together is fine. The drinking fountains are now available to all, but people are also welcome to bring bottled water. We will continue to encourage outside groups, who use our building, to mask and take similar safety precautions.