Below you can find the Vestry News and Review, a monthly message from the Vestry. These are sent out periodically via our newsletter and posted here.

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Vestry News and Review, message from the Vestry Nov. 18, 2024:

A message from Diane Bamforth, member of the Vestry:

As I approach my final three months on vestry, I have been reflecting on the last three years and just how different the Vestry experience has been since I last served back in the early 2000s.

Back then we ran a Capital Campaign to effect many changes on campus for the remodeling of bathrooms and the library, the labyrinth and more. We were in a phase of intense physical growth, which continued in succeeding years as we added the narthex and baptismal pool, remodeled classrooms, and built the lych gate.

Joining the vestry towards the end of the pandemic was a very different experience as we struggled with what we thought was going to be a deficit budget, the loss of parishioners who never returned to in-person worship (and some of whom had died), shrinking numbers in church school and an aging population. We live and operate in very different times than we did just five years ago.

We cannot ignore the reality that things are changing, and we know that we cannot go back to how things were. Yet we need to be ever careful about how we move forward. And so, after compline, our meeting began with Pamela leading a discussion based upon Susan Beaumont’s book “How to Lead When You Don’t Know Where You Are Going.” The book had been published in 2019 to address issues of the church in transition, a church facing the challenges of leading in liminal (transitional) seasons, when old ways no longer work and new paths are not clear. As you can imagine, this became more pertinent reading as we lived through the pandemic. We discussed the need to embrace uncertainty, clarify our purpose, be creative and be willing to experiment (and fail) whilst fostering a deep connection to God and practicing presence.

Prior to the meeting we had also been given “homework” which in part consisted of us following up on our February retreat by listening to “Igniting the Imagination” podcasts. If you are interested in learning more, please go to https://ignitingimagination.org and look at Series 3.

Leading on from this, each of us shared three meaningful experiences that we had had at St. Martin’s and named the values that each represented to us. If we are to discern how to move forward, it is important that we, as St. Martin’s Church in Davis, identify our core values as a starting point.

This visioning experience was particularly rich, and I felt full of hope as certain values were mentioned again and again, such as joy, sacredness, welcoming, cooperation, community, inclusion and tradition. The experiences we shared varied from sacred services such as the Easter Vigil and Ordinations, to music, fellowship events, star gazing at the Ranch, and church school.

We still found time to conduct essential business such as approving a committee to oversee the distribution of the Linda Frost Grants, approving fundraising for the Thanksgiving Project, and taking reports from Building & Grounds, Social Justice & Outreach, and the Budget & Finance Committee. 

This month the vestry recognized the work of the stewardship committee and acclaimed the four speakers for their excellent presentations: James Hochbrueckner, Dian Vorters, Francis David and Jerry Hulbert.

It has been a pleasure and so worthwhile to serve on Vestry throughout the last three years.