On Sunday June 15, about 250 United Church members from St. Stephens to Sussex gathered at the Saint John High School to celebrate the 100^th Anniversary of the United Church of Canada.  It was a memorable occasion. 

And the preacher for the day, Rev. Faith March-MacCuish, posed two questions that have stayed with me.  “What from the past do we want to leave behind,” she wondered?  “And what do we want to carry forward with us into the future?”

In all likelihood, each of us would answer those questions differently.  But one of the pieces of wisdom that I’d like to see carried forward comes from a comment I heard a former United Church moderator, the late Rev. Lois Wilson, make on several occasions.  “The future of the church lies in re-connecting itself with the surrounding community and being a positive and constructive presence in the wider world,” she’d often state.  “It’s all about the community.”

If anyone understood the United Church, it was Lois.  I first met her when I was writing a paper on her father, E.G.D. Freeman, a longtime Dean of Theology at the University of Winnipeg.  Our paths crossed several times in later years, and I saw that a commitment to community was central to her understanding of the church and its ministry..  Over her decades of work as a congregational minister, UCC Moderator, and President of the World Council of Churches, she’d seen many churches and organizations become insular, focus primarily on themselves, and lose their potency.  So she constantly encouraged and challenged the church to resist this temptation and engage the realities that people outside congregational walls were really facing – even when doing so could be difficult.

I’ve come to believe that Lois put her finger on a key challenge facing many churches.  So I’m delighted that a plan is now in place for our congregation to work at connecting with the people of Saint John West in some new ways.  This initiative is important.  But I also know that I’m writing this message at a time when many of us are thinking a lot more about taking a break from our regular routines than we are about embracing a new piece of work.  Truth be told, that’s true for me right now.  Therefore, I really do hope that the coming weeks of summer will offer lots of opportunities for you to enjoy the season, have some fun, and recharge your batteries.   But I also hope that, whenever possible, you’ll support the great “55+” programs that Debbie McLeod is organizing for July and August.  And I also hope that we’ll all be ready to embrace the fall with energy, enthusiasm and conviction.  The Spirit is alive and at work at St. Mark’s United Church – we have much for which to be thankful – and I’m very much looking forward to being back in the fall!