A congregation of the United Church of Canada
September Startup
“We finally get to press the reset button.”
When is the official end of summer? Is it Labour Day weekend when ‘back to school’ stops being a sale and starts being what kids do? Is it the astronomical event of the Autumn Equinox which happens on September 23rd? Is it whenever I have to put on a hoodie in the morning or evening? Nope. The official end of summer happens when churches hold their annual “Welcome Back” Sunday! (That’s this Sunday, September 17th, by the way!)
This year we wanted to do more than just a ‘welcome back’ – partly because this is not our typical September. It’s the first time in 3 years that we’ve had anything resembling a ‘normal’ approach of the Fall season. Insofar as church season programming goes, September just never happened in 2020, 2021, or 2022. We’re long overdue for a September! We are coming ‘back to church’ after a very long time apart. Sure, we’ve been worshipping in-person for quite a while now – but this September it really feels like we’ve got a shot at ‘getting back to normal’.
Except it isn’t. It isn’t normal. The world has shifted. This isn’t a typical ‘welcome back’ Sunday. It’s much more than that. In some ways it’s a, dare I say it, resurrection of the church! We’re not just ‘welcoming back’ – in some ways, we’re starting over, starting anew. So we’re calling our celebration a “September Startup” Sunday. ‘Startup’ was the best language I could find without being too churchy. If I called it “Resurrection Sunday” people might think we were doing Easter in September! We are starting up again after a long (too long) season of Covid. (No, Covid is not gone, but with vaccinations it appears to be mostly manageable.) After such a long dormancy, with so many things having to be different, we finally get to press the reset button and have a Fall Startup that feels hopeful.
We are restarting everything next week – Joyful Noise (kids’ church), Tots on Tuesdays, The Porch (bible discussion), Choir, Family Fun Night, and more. To kick it off, we’re having a party! There will be food, of course – a Potluck Finger Food Lunch, a BBQ (hot dogs with all the fixings) and ice cream. And there will be fun activities for all ages will follow: egg toss, jelly bean count, tug of war, hair/face painting, a soccer match and water balloons. The long-range weather forecast looks very good, so we hope you’ll join us in-person (and bring 2 friends)!
It’s the end of summer, and the start of a wonderful, new season of Faith. Let’s get started!