Dear First Parishers,
It has been a joy to be back and to see everyone as we return for another church year. It is a hard and heartbreaking time in our country and our world right now, which makes our time together even more meaningful. Here, we gather to remind one another about what matters most: the spirit, the values, and the practices of living in beloved community. For that is what worship means—to lift up that which we trust is worthy of our deepest commitments.
The fall is always busy as we return fulltime to congregational life, but this year feels particularly so as we added a couple of special events to the schedule. We held a special dinner in honor of Carlene Merrill on September 5th, dedicating our kitchen in her memory and thanking her family for establishing a fund in her name that allows us more flexibility and resources in support of our staff. Last weekend, a team of donut makers led by Sarah Manning and Diana Keohane raised over $1,500 at Chelmsford’s Fall Festival on the Common. And coming up on October 26th, we will ordain Brian Snow into the Unitarian Universalist ministry at a special service at 2pm in our sanctuary, having voted unanimously at our annual meeting last June to confer the act of ordination on him. It is one of the important rights and rites of the membership of UU congregations, an essential part of our congregational polity. It will be a joyful and meaningful event and I hope that you all can attend!
A couple of updates on our First Parish staff. Over the summer, the Standing Committee voted to increase the hours for Erica, our office and building and events coordinator, from 19 to 30 per week. There were several reasons why I recommended this to Human Resources and the Standing Committees. First, at nineteen hours a week, Erica’s time in the office was very limited and she ended up having to react to whatever rose to the top of the list on a particular day—answering emails or taking care of the orders of service and newsletter. She could not sustain focus on longer-term requests from me, staff or other lay leaders in the congregation. She and I rarely crossed paths, which impacted both our jobs. At the same time, we have been asking her to take on more responsibilities in the wake of our changing staff, including supporting our new bookkeeper who works remotely and tracking copyright reporting on behalf of the music program. Finally, Erica was finding it difficult to juggle two less than half-time jobs and needed to find one job, with us or somewhere else. Given that both we and Erica needed the increase in hours, we decided to find a way to make it work. Luckily, we have the Carlene Merrill Legacy Fund to help bridge the financial gap. I am grateful to the Standing Committee for their support of this change.
Second, we continue our search for a new music director. The search team (Tom Coffey, Peggy Stephens-North, Janice Tervo, Cindy Gist, Jessica Volk and I) are committed to finding the right candidate and this has turned out to take longer than we expected. We are blessed to have Brian Snow step in as our interim as we continue our search. I am grateful to Brian, to the Senior Choir and to other musicians in the congregation who are stepping up as we find our way. The music, which has always been an essential part of our worship life, continues to be uplifting and powerful.
In faith,
Rev. Ellen
