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Mid-summer updates  

“Summertime, and the livin’ is easy.”  That’s what Clara famously sings out at the opening of Gershwin’s 1935 opera Porgy and Bess.  And indeed, there is a sense that the “livin’ is easy,” or at least easier, this time of year, from relaxed walks in the lengthy evening sunshine to the noticeably lighter traffic on the weekday commute (at least that’s been my commute experience; sorry if it’s not yours!).  Of course, here in the life of our congregation, too, summer does have a different and often more relaxed feel to it.                

Nevertheless, summer is not “off-season” for church!  “The mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting,” sings the psalmist, and our summons to gather together as God’s people, to worship and praise, to grow and deepen, and to together live a life of gratitude for that love of God is a 24-7-365 calling.                 

So, while there is a different pace around here in late June through Labour Day, there are still things going on in the life of the Cloverdale United Church right now, and I wanted to take this opportunity to quickly update you on a few of those things. 

Property sale to Park Ridge Homes: 

We are continuing to make progress on the sale of the eastern greenspace portion of the church grounds to Park Ridge Homes.  In the first couple of months of the year, we engaged Park Ridge around some final details in the proposed offer and around the purchase price itself.  In late February, we tentatively agreed to a final offer, including a 10% increase from the originally proposed sale price.  At their March 28th meeting, our Church Council reaffirmed their November 1st decision to proceed with the proposed sale and instructed the Trustees to move forward.  The Trustees voted approval of the final version of the contract at a meeting on April 12th, and the contract was signed that day.  We gathered all of the required materials for submission to the Pacific Mountain Regional Council for its approval of the proposed sale, and the regional council issued its approval on May 23rd.  With the final approval from the region received, things are now “official” and Park Ridge has begun work with site investigations and testing; they still have an option until mid-September to back out if they discover that the site will not support what they hope to build.  The actual legal subdivision of the property, sale, and receiving of the sale proceeds happens at the point when the development proposal gets approval with the City of Surrey, which Park Ridge estimates will be around 24 months from when we signed the contract back in April (so around April 2025, give or take). 

Office Administrator: 

Of course, we were sad to say goodbye to Mope Iruobe as our office administrator near the end of May… and we are excited to now be welcoming Lily Lee as our new office administrator, after a blessedly quick search process!  Lily brings experience providing administrative support in a church office setting, along with significant experience and talent in graphic design and publishing work. 

Children & Youth Leader: 

We’re very happy for the birth of a new addition to the family for Robyn Garland on June 14th, even if that did mean Robyn deciding to end her time among us as Children & Youth Leader at the end of May.  Laurel Zulke (as Ministry-&-Personnel Chair) and I have just begun posting the opening for our next Children & Youth Ministries Leader this week, hoping for a September 1st start date.  We are aware that, in general, there tends to be a bit of a dearth of qualified applicants for these types of positions, especially when they are part-time, and so we are trying to be as expansive as possible in getting the word out.  Please contribute your prayers for our congregation and our ministries for, with, and among children and youth, as well as your own word-of-mouth sharing about the opening in whatever way may be possible; complete information is posted on our CUC website. 

Congregant records and directory information: 

One of the ‘special projects’ that I and others around CUC are working on this summer is the clean-up of our congregant records and directory information.  Our roster of official “full members” hasn’t been reviewed in many, many years and we have dozens (well, a couple hundred actually) of people listed as full members for whom we don’t even have current contact information—people perhaps have relocated, passed away, or simply long ago disengaged from active participation and support of CUC.  Likewise, among the “adherents” and friends on our congregant list, there are quite a few who are no longer present among us, and plenty of more-recent newcomers since the last time we did a comprehensive directory update.  We’re getting records cleaned up and we’ll very soon be reaching out to the no-longer-active folks on these lists about their continued connection to the congregation.  The cleaned-up records and information will be going into our new church management system (a.k.a., church database) called Realm.  We’ll be able to generate new congregant directories, and begin taking advantage of Realm’s many other powerful capabilities for communications, volunteer scheduling, and much, much more.

A Remit from the General Council of The United Church of Canada — on establishing an autonomous Indigenous Organization: 

When the General Council of The United Church of Canada (our nation-wide denominational council) approves amendments to the ‘Basis of Union’ (the foundational, constitution-like document for our denominational operations) that involve substantive changes that affect denominational identity, which would including any significant changes to the nature of our denomination’s councils or to the overall structures of the church, the proposed amendments also have to be ratified by a majority of the regional councils and a majority of the pastoral charges (a single congregation or a set of yoked congregations served by the same minister).  This process of ratification is called a “Remit.”  The most recent General Council, meeting in 2022, approved such an amendment, in response to a proposal from the National Indigenous Council recommending the identification and removal of “all the structural barriers to developing and sustaining an autonomous Indigenous Church within The United Church of Canada”.  The way forward approved by the General Council involves giving pre-emptive remit approval for whatever the Indigenous Church determines in the future as the place it will have in The United Church, guided by the Calls to the Church issued in 2018 by the Caretakers of Our Indigenous Church and accepted by the General Council in 2019, and without the need for further remit approvals.  The Remit for the proposed changes was issued in March and our Church Council has begun their study and consideration, with exploratory conversation at the June meeting.  We anticipate returning to the topic for further consideration at one of the autumn Council meetings; we have until March 2024 to register our vote.  While the Church Council is the body charged with voting on the remit, we invite all who are interested to learn more; visit https://generalcouncil44.ca/council/remit-1-establishing-autonomous-national-indigenous-organization for a study guide, a video responding to frequently asked questions, and more. 

Cloverdale Community Kitchen ministry team: 

We are moving forward with a joint ministry team of our congregation and Northwood United Church (in Surrey’s nearby Fleetwood section) for serving at the Community Dinner program of the Cloverdale Community Kitchen.  Interested team members from both congregations met together via Zoom in late June, and Bev Woods, a member of Northwood, agreed to be our team’s coordinator.  Initially, our team is scheduled for “5th Fridays”—so, four to five times per year—with our first scheduled service opportunity on September 29th (which also happens to be the second day of추석, Chuseok, the Korean autumn harvest festival, with its themes of gratitude and food).  If you want to be a part of our ministry team for serving at the CCK community dinner program (not just for the September date, but anytime going forward), please let Bev Woods know (woodsb@hotmail.com, 604-562-6547).

My own away plans: 

I’m not the sort of pastor who takes all his/her/their vacation and study leave together in one block during the summer.  As I said earlier, we shouldn’t think of summer as “off-season” for church; furthermore, I prefer having the opportunity for a week or two of away time here and there across the year.  That said, I will in August take one week of vacation leave (July 31 – August 6), be back in the office for a week, and then take one week of study leave (August 14 – 20).  I’ll also be away on a week of vacation leave the week following Labour Day (Sept 4 – 10), travelling for a friend’s wedding on September 9th that Adam is officiating.

Upcoming special events: 

You hopefully have already seen some “save-the-date” information on a couple exciting events coming up as we head toward and into the autumn—namely, a wonderful Candlelight Concert sponsored by CUC and Doctor Music Academy, the music studio of our music director, of primarily romantic music on Saturday, August 26th… and CUC’s annual Community Handcraft Market in November.  Mark your calendars!  

So, beloveds, those are a few notes about things going on in and around the life of the Cloverdale United Church these days.  Look forward to seeing you around!  

Yours in the journey,
—Matt