When visiting the same building (or organisation) regularly, it’s sometimes natural over time to become invested in wanting that building or organisation to prosper and survive for future generations.
For me, that building is a church, and the organisation is my parish/congregation. And after singing every Sunday in this church for the last 8 years, you could say I feel invested.
I’m so invested that in March of this year I volunteered to serve on the Select Vestry for my parish. The Select Vestry is like the management committee for the church that looks after non-spiritual aspects – such as maintenance of the buildings, managing the finances, checking compliance with regulations, and being the employers of any non-clergy staff.
Anyone who’s ever served on a committee with recognise the structure. We have a chairperson (normally the Rector), a secretary, and a treasurer. In addition there are church wardens and glebe wardens. And the rest are ‘ordinary members’.
This isn’t my first time serving on a vestry. Many years ago I was on the vestry of my old parish of Old Saint Paul’s in Edinburgh. And I also served on the communications sub-committee, which was responsible for the parish magazine, emails to the congregation, and the church website.
This time around in St Ann’s and St Stephen’s I seem to be carving out a similar role for myself, as I’ve recently completed a re-design and re-launch of the parish website. And I’ve started tentative investigations into the email system.
I’m a passionate believer in making good communications the heart of any community. Because if people don’t know about us, then how can they join us? And if they don’t hear about all the wonderful things we do, how will they ever know to come along and join in?
So I’ve started with the website, because its an easy first step. But I’m not done yet. Good communications is not just about an online presence – it’s about reaching people where they are – be that on social media, on chat apps, on email, on service sheets, or parish magazines. Or maybe even TikTok videos and Instagram Stories?
At the moment the social media presence is disjointed and dated – and all the other things don’t exist at all. The Rector used to send out a regular email to parishioners, but that only reached the people he knew about. I don’t know if any of the choir were ever included in those mailings, which seems to be a bit of loss to me.
There is an inspiring quote that is often wrongly attributed to Mahatma Gandhi that says:
Be the change you want to see in the world
I read it as a call to action to put my hand up and volunteer for the things that are important to me. To use my time and talents to support the things that are worthwhile and that I would like to see thrive and build into the future.
I’m also reminded of the quote from the US TV series The West Wing, where the fictional President says:
Decisions are made by those who show up
If I want to effect change, there’s little to be gained by sitting at home moaning about things. I need to show up, be part of the decisions being made, and hopefully be the change I want to see.