Last Sunday, Homecoming Sunday at St. Martin's, I spoke about the three concentric circles of parish membership. I suggested by way of example how the relationship with God looks in each of the circles, with a particular reference to parental attitudes to the spiritual formation of children in the first two circles. If you would like to know more please visit relationalrealities.com or stmartinsprov.org/sermons.

 

Our priorities in the last year have been the typical concerns in any modern parish: encouraging a more committed engagement with community life, strengthening financial stewardship, and attracting new members. We have worked diligently and I have talked it seems, endlessly, about how we might make progress in these areas.  My sense of moving into a new program year is that it makes little sense to continue harping-on about these issues. We have made as much progress as we can by tackling them from a rational motivational perspective. This means that to effect the positive change we look for we will need to change our focus away from specific priorities and begin to address them as a single priority, i.e. the renewing our spiritual lives.  Our number one priority for 2016 is going to be:

 

 

Key to addressing our new priority is offering a practical approach to the enrichment of our day-to-day lives through spiritual practice. Spiritual practice - is for me a catchall phrase covering the application of age-old spiritual wisdom and experience to help anchor ourselves more securely in the face of the escalating demands and stresses of modern life.

 

On Saturday the link to the RenewalWorks survey went live in the parish and in the first 48 hours we had 60+ completed surveys submitted. This is fantastic! We need a minimum of 85 and a desirable return of 120 to give us accurate results. A big thanks to all who have completed the survey, and an encouragement to others to do likewise. Like all surveys it's not perfect so don't get hung up on its design. Approach it as a tool to aid your own self-reflection. The result is often a startling one.

 

On Wednesday evening the Vestry voted to electronically poll the parish on our experience of the nave altar experiment. This will begin after October 5th when the RenewalWorks survey closes. Reflecting on the very positive feedback on the experience of the summer schedule of services, the Vestry resolved to test run a similar schedule during the season of Advent. Final times have not been set yet. This is an experiment during Advent (December). As with the nave altar we will conduct a parish wide consultation on this experience in January. I will be saying more about the reasons behind this change over coming weeks, so stay tuned.

 

See you for worship and the hot dog lunch, this Sunday! 

 
Mark+