Great Attendances, Continued Progress on our Building, and Planning for the New Session — the story of our summer!
Decoration work starts in the old Vestry
Having the Vestry is a real boon. It was exceptionally damp when we began two years ago but the new air-to-air heating system which has removed the damp from the church has done the same for this delightful space. Rev. John Hunter who grew up in the Manse in Fogo when his father was minister here recalls that in his father’s time the window in the picture was the door through which his father entered the church before Sunday worship. It was, he told us, damp even then.
Our pictures are a sequence. Because the vestry had dried out we have been using it for coffees and teas after services, although it is no longer big enough for that purpose and we usually have to spill out into the church itself, or during this good weather, into the churchyard.
This summer the plan is to redecorate the whole of the church and we have started here. The second picture shows Tom, our Session Clerk, laying a new floor — the walls have already been painted and the final picture shows the room as it now is — nice clean walls and a lovely wooden floor. Of course, this is only the start. New seats will be arriving shortly, designed to fit in with the rest of the church with upholstery to match the relatively new church chancel carpet and a mini-kitchen unit will be installed to make life easier for those who make the teas and coffees with even a fridge, to keep the milk cold, included.
Now we can plan to use the room during our new session. It won’t replace the meetings and gatherings we have in folks’ houses because that is one of the things which makes our congregation such a friendly one but it will enable us to plan additional activities, although we shall be commissioning some wall-hangings to absorb some of the echo which the attractive curved design creates. It’s a work in progress but what a good start to our decoration programme, and if all goes to plan the entire building will be completed by the third week of September.
Education Programme Unveiled
At the start of the summer a group from the congregation met to think about a mission programme for the congregation. This was presented to the Kirk Session at the start of June, was reported in the last edition of the newsletter and is now in the process of being implemented.
The next step was to meet to create a similar programme for education. As with last time, a good number of people (about half the congregation) met in Clare’s home to set about the task. The minister said that he had told someone that we were meeting to create an education programme to which the response was, ‘I didn’t know that you had enough children to need an education programme.’ We are fortunate in the children we have, but education, of course, is not something which is just for children; it’s something for everyone. As we started talking in groups we realised that Christian education is something which we need to offer, explore and enjoy as a congregation.
Lots of ideas came forward. Some thought that Bible study was important, others that we needed to learn more of other branches of the Christian faith and of other faiths as well. Some liked the idea of meeting in each other’s homes, others the idea of enjoying a retreat; the opportunity of using films — we already had an excellent film evening earlier in the year — while others thought that we should establish a church library to enable folk to borrow some of the new and exciting Christian books which are available.
Over an excellent time of refreshment and chat it became very clear that we had enough material and ideas to run an educational programme which would last ten years! So the idea emerged that we would run a monthly programme from September to March and that this would be a series of one-off different methods of learning. After Easter next year we will be ideally placed to sit down and review what we have done and see how our programme might develop.
So here is our programme, still very much in draft form. It has been agreed that we shall meet on Wednesdays and provisionally the following dates have been suggested:
Wednesday 26th. September at 7 p.m. A film about the life of St. Paul, chosen because the theme of our summer services is the Book of the Acts of the Apostles in which Paul plays such a large part. One of the things we have discovered is that there is a good range of modern Christian films being produced and perhaps a regular film night might become part of a future programme.
Wednesday 17th. October at 7 p.m. A study group evening in which we will work in groups to produce our thoughts on the question “What should it mean to live as Christians in the World today?” It’s a huge subject and we will sort it out in just a couple of hours (with refreshments as well)! We’ll have worksheets and Bible passages to guide us and we’ll see how we like this kind of learning together.
Wednesday 21st. November at 7 p.m. A Congregational Question Time. We’ll take a bit of time to plan this event but the thinking at this stage is that we might invite members of different faith groups in the area to come and take part in this evening so that at the end of it we might be more aware not only of what other faiths believe but how they are acting out their faith in this area of Scotland.
Wednesday 19th. December at 7 p.m. A Congregational Christmas Party with a ‘So You Think You know All About Christmas’ quiz. We’ll have enormous fun but perhaps learn a little as well!
Wednesday 16th. January at 7 p.m. A book evening. We’ll choose a book, make it available for everyone to read and then come together and discuss it. With so many books to choose from this too could be come a regular feature of our education programme. A suggestion, and it is only a suggestion until more folk have had a look at it, of what our first book might be is ‘The Shadow of the Galilean’ by Gerd Theissen. This book is unashamedly a theology book but it is written in the form of a novel and many have found it to be both exciting and challenging.
Wednesday 20th. February at 7 p.m. We’ll meet together as a House Group. House Groups have played a huge part in the Christian development of many people in our country and experiencing the informal worship, learning, discussion and friendship which such a group generates may suggest that this is a way forward for us.
Saturday 16th. March. A congregational Away Day or Retreat. We still have to plan this event but it will include an invited speaker, eating together and the opportunity to review all that we have done over the session to this point.
We hope to have the library in place by the start of September and a number of events in the Mission programme are also educational, notably the trip to the Holy Land planned for January/February 2020 with its own programme of monthly meetings to prepare for this pilgrimage of a lifetime. Full details of this will become available in October. We hope that others may wish to join us for this adventure.
Flower Festival and Congregational Scrap Book
This is a picture of the Kirk Session and Congregational Board meeting at Charterhall. It must have been taken by Alice because Eck can be seen taking another picture over his father’s shoulder at the far end of the table.
Our Flower Festival, held in June this year, told the story of the Church and its community. This display was prepared by the children of our Fogo Nursery and told us something of the story of this important organisation.
The next three pictures show some of those present at our Education Programme meeting. Normally all of our pictures are taken by Molly but as she is in one of the pictures this hasn’t been the case on this occasion! Lots of happy smiling faces. How fortunate we are.
Finally, four lovely pictures taken by Molly. The picture was painted by June and we hope to host an exhibition of her paintings later in the year. The third picture is of a display of flowers which all have medical properties. What a lot of very talented people we have in Fogo Kirk!
A note from the treasurer:
Olive writes, “We have had this week a letter from 121 (Church of Scotland “Headquarters”!) to thank us for meeting our commitment to Mission and Ministries in full for 2018. Thank you all for enabling us to do this.
We also have a lot of exciting projects now to help us move forward as a congregation — the congregational meetings on mission and now on education for example — and these of course all have resourcing implications. I am therefore writing this note to keep everyone up to date on where we stand.
Our beautiful old church building has clearly been loved over the many years it has been the centre of worship in Fogo. We can see this in the way it has been adapted to cater for changing circumstances over the centuries. Now we have a building that has been protected from environmental factors and provides a warm welcoming worshipful place for all the normal activities of a worshipping congregation. As we move on, how wonderful that the simple decoration of the vestry and its flooring has revealed what a beautiful room it actually is!
We have decided that we cannot therefore simply fill it with the cheapest furniture we can find – we have to respect the love that the church deserves. We are therefore going to equip it with seating in keeping with the décor of the rest of the church and ensure that any improvement to facilities is in keeping with this tradition.
We are also setting up a store to hold the necessary resources to enable us to respond quickly to opportunities for mission when they present themselves and an education resource centre (these arise from the congregational meetings). To this latter end as a first step we have purchased an appropriate bookshelf which will fit nicely into the end of the Church. Filling this will of course be expensive – I am suggesting that for a few weeks we support this endeavour with sales of those books we all have that we have read and will never read again. Please let me know if you agree this would be a good way to finance the books we need – and contribute if you are willing to!
Any further resourcing needs and ideas for how we meet the expense will be very welcome – we are so fortunate to be able to meet our essential expenditure from your regular generosity, and look forward to exciting times ahead!”
From the Minister’s Desk
Dane Sherrard writes:
By the time the next newsletter comes out we will have completed two years of our three-year Presbytery Guardianship and it will be time for Presbytery to come and review our progress.
I will be delighted to tell them that, as they asked, we have set up a Community Trust, prepared to take on the ownership of the Church building. I will be delighted to tell them that we now have a wonderfully loyal and enthusiastic growing congregation which meets every Sunday of the year; that we are self-sufficient in terms of income and personnel; that we have developed programmes to take forward our mission and our educational commitments as a congregation.
I will want them to see how beautiful the church building has become, to see that the damp has been expelled and that the church feels like the centre of worship it is.
I will share my excitement at the support we get from our community, at the special events we are able to host, at the children who choose to worship with us.
I will make sure that they understand how much of a privilege I feel in having been allowed to share in this adventure and how much I am looking forward to all that God has in store for us all in the years which lie ahead. Thank you all for your generosity and your support for your parish church here in Fogo:
“You are always welcome at Fogo Parish Church.”