I am done with being moderator of the First Congregational United Church of Christ in Longmont, Colorado.
It is official.
I still have one last task that I need to finish, which is the restructuring of the church's governance, which will be this coming Saturday, and it's been in relation to a lot of things that have been happening for what seems to be the whole last decade. And, yes, that's as big as it seems, and both the past and future Cabinets will be involved along with a consultant who is an expert on church and other non-profit governance structures.
I finished off my official stint as moderator with the traditional congregational meeting, which had five entire items of business (which is a lot). We moved the endowment to a new management system (a big deal that was paved with six month's worth of information and communication), got approval to move ahead on possibly building four low income apartments on church property, and managed to get the 2016 budget approved (which had been fraught with all kinds of other things and was the Reckoning of the last post). We elected the new officers, got a resolution that is to be sent to the Longmont City Council, urging them to adopt an inclusivity (yes, I know it's not a word, but it is being used as one locally) resolution, and then I got to close the meeting in under an hour.
And I got a standing ovation.
That was entirely unexpected. Moderators don't get standing ovations by the whole congregation... but... well... I did.
And what made it even more surreal was that at the beginning of the service, before the meeting, the moderators-elect (yes there are two), our pastor, and I announced the fact that our pastor and our church were parting ways come the end of May. There was a mutual agreement that it was time to end the relationship, and on my last day as moderator, it happened officially, too.
So.
Yeah.
It's been... uhm... a little insane since I last wrote.
But my being moderator is now done, and I can get on with my life. Even with what's expected of me for next week, I'm already letting go of pretty much all my moderator jobs. I also thought about volunteering for another job, and got scolded by three different people, so I backed off of that.
This big change has also made it easier for me to make little changes, things like being able to completely stop playing Mafia Wars, which I've been doing for years and years, now. I got to level 10,000 and I quit cold turkey and am just not looking back. There's a writer's group at our local library, and I'm probably going to be going to that as a lady that I've been friends with suddenly wanted to meet at the library on Tuesday nights, and I said, well, there's a writers' group, so why don't we meet with them?
We'll see. Right now, everything is in flux, shifting like the aftershocks of an earthquake. In a few months, it'll settle out, but for right now, I'm just hanging onto the local stable doorframe anchored to the foundations (called myJohn) and riding out the waves.
It may well be a new world in three months. And there should be more that I can write about in the coming times.
It is official.
I still have one last task that I need to finish, which is the restructuring of the church's governance, which will be this coming Saturday, and it's been in relation to a lot of things that have been happening for what seems to be the whole last decade. And, yes, that's as big as it seems, and both the past and future Cabinets will be involved along with a consultant who is an expert on church and other non-profit governance structures.
I finished off my official stint as moderator with the traditional congregational meeting, which had five entire items of business (which is a lot). We moved the endowment to a new management system (a big deal that was paved with six month's worth of information and communication), got approval to move ahead on possibly building four low income apartments on church property, and managed to get the 2016 budget approved (which had been fraught with all kinds of other things and was the Reckoning of the last post). We elected the new officers, got a resolution that is to be sent to the Longmont City Council, urging them to adopt an inclusivity (yes, I know it's not a word, but it is being used as one locally) resolution, and then I got to close the meeting in under an hour.
And I got a standing ovation.
That was entirely unexpected. Moderators don't get standing ovations by the whole congregation... but... well... I did.
And what made it even more surreal was that at the beginning of the service, before the meeting, the moderators-elect (yes there are two), our pastor, and I announced the fact that our pastor and our church were parting ways come the end of May. There was a mutual agreement that it was time to end the relationship, and on my last day as moderator, it happened officially, too.
So.
Yeah.
It's been... uhm... a little insane since I last wrote.
But my being moderator is now done, and I can get on with my life. Even with what's expected of me for next week, I'm already letting go of pretty much all my moderator jobs. I also thought about volunteering for another job, and got scolded by three different people, so I backed off of that.
This big change has also made it easier for me to make little changes, things like being able to completely stop playing Mafia Wars, which I've been doing for years and years, now. I got to level 10,000 and I quit cold turkey and am just not looking back. There's a writer's group at our local library, and I'm probably going to be going to that as a lady that I've been friends with suddenly wanted to meet at the library on Tuesday nights, and I said, well, there's a writers' group, so why don't we meet with them?
We'll see. Right now, everything is in flux, shifting like the aftershocks of an earthquake. In a few months, it'll settle out, but for right now, I'm just hanging onto the local stable doorframe anchored to the foundations (called myJohn) and riding out the waves.
It may well be a new world in three months. And there should be more that I can write about in the coming times.
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