July 12, 2011--Meeting Notes

OPENING AND ATTENDANCE A meeting of the Congregational Development Commission was called to order at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, July 12, 2011 by David Lucey. Betsy Fornal attended the meeting along with Commission members: Carol Drought and Catherine Thenault. The meeting began with a prayer. Chair Casey Shobe joined the meeting late due to his presentation to the Standing Committee about the changes to Canon X proposed by the Commission. The Rev’d Michael Coburn and the Rev’d Mercedes Julian of Ascension Cranston were guests.

GRANT PROPOSALS
ASCENSION, CRANSTON—About 36 families (more than 100 people) form the Hispanic congregation at Ascension. As Mike explained it, his job is to make the Anglo and Hispanic congregations work together and Mercedes’ job is to develop the Hispanic congregation. They have just published their first bi-lingual newsletter. Quite a few families that were former members of the Hispanic congregation at the Cathedral have come to Ascension. A new schedule comprised of Christian formation for children and adults sandwiched between an English language service and a Spanish language service on Sunday mornings will be instituted soon. Christian formation for children will be bi-lingual with teachers from both congregations conducting classes. Because most of the adult Spanish speakers are not bi-lingual and virtually none of the English speakers are, there will be both English and Spanish language offerings for adults. There are lots of positive developments and the Anglo congregation is very excited about the progress of the Hispanic congregation.

ST. PETER’S BY-THE-SEA—The proposal to fund a Coordinator of Children’s and Youth Ministry would involve St. Peter’s, St. Augustine’s, and Ascension, Wakefield. Half the job would be with children at St. Peter’s and half would be with youth involving all three churches.

SUGGESTIONS FOR THE FUTURE—There was a suggestion that we review this set of grants at the six-month point. We would want to know how the projects affected each congregation.

LEARN & LEAD
The next Learn and Lead program will be held in January, 2012. The subject is Communications.

NEXT MEETING AND ADJOURNMENT
The next meeting will be on Tuesday August 2 at 5 pm. At that meeting we will be hearing from representatives from All Saints Memorial/St. Martin’s and St. Peter’s & St. Andrew’s about their grant proposals. The meeting adjourned with a prayer at 6:30 p.m.