All Ministry Services & Meetings Online Beginning 11/23
Dear Sisters & Brothers in Christ,
On Thursday, clergy from the Northern Region of the Greater New Jersey Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church met online with Bishop John Schol, as we do every year. During the meeting, he, in his own way, said that he would like the churches to be going back to fully remote operations. His words were, “if I were pastoring a church, I would be holding services remotely.” Additionally, on Friday, North Warren Regional High School announced that they were going to full remote learning at least through December 15 based on the county moving from ‘moderate risk’ to ‘high risk’ this week, and being very close to the ‘very high risk’ threshold. In addition, Frelinghuysen, Stillwater, and Knowlton elementary schools are all operating remotely at least through mid-December.
During the week, I shared this information with Charles Raymond, Mike Tironi, and Gene Taylor, and we are all in agreement that starting Monday, November 23, the church will roll back its reopening plans to where we were in August, allowing only worship participants, staff, UMW members (for pasties and cookies) and food pantry volunteers into the building. All meetings for the church and outside groups will need to be held remotely for the foreseeable future.
None of us want this to be the answer. Like you, we want this pandemic to be over and want to be gathering with our church family to celebrate Christ’s birth. But given the circumstances, we recognize that this is the right thing to do in order to keep each other safe. Please continue to hold our world, our ministry, and each other in prayer and continue to reach out and care for one another with the love and grace of Jesus Christ.
Pastor Dave