Notes from the Diaconate

The Deacons are launching the "friends for fuel" drive. Pick up your "friends for fuel" clean, empty, drink bottle in the sanctuary. Fill it with your spare change and return. We are going to use this spare change for fuel assistance. If you need fuel assistance this winter please let Rev. Katherine, a deacon or the office know. We will do our best to provide needed aid.

The deacons also ask that if you would like to be contacted by the minister or would like a hospital visitation, please let the office, Rev. Katherine or a deacon know. Hospitals no longer notify ministers of illnesses due to confidentiality laws, so please have a family member call.

Orders for Easter flowers are available for Palm Sunday. Thank you!

April Goss-Baker

Welcoming and Name Tags

Our motto is "I was a stranger and you welcomed me." In an effort to be more welcoming, your Deacons are asking everyone to wear name tags. Although you may have been around for a long time and feel that if we don't know you by now, then shame on us, but a newcomer meets many new people and will be much more comfortable if we make it easy for them to remember us. It also gives us the chance to see their name in writing so that we may welcome them by name which will reinforce our memory.

We would like to ask those entering to please wear their name tags, and to encourage those who have no name tag to make one for the day and put in a request for a more permanent, designed as you like, name tag. Andrew Jennings will provide the permanent one.

The Name Tag Board has been moved to the downstairs hallway for easy access for the majorities who enter through the back or side door. For those who prefer to pick up and leave their name tags at the front door, a tray will be provided until we see how much room will be needed to hold them. Thank you for helping us to live up to our motto.

Trustees

The Trustees had the task of providing the 2012 budget at the annual meeting. The budget that had originally been proposed in October had to be reviewed and reconsidered as we realized that we'd be proposing an $80 thousand deficit. This was the deficit remaining after some intense work cutting all non-salary related expenses to the bare minimums and not offering our staff any pay increases. We examined the trends over the past 5-10 years and realized that deficit spending has continued to increase year over year. We decided that a set of alternatives to that budget had to be presented to the congregation.

These proposals were reviewed in great detail at the annual meeting and the option that was chosen has resulted in major changes in how our church will be staffed. It is our hope that by taking these steps, we can turn our financial situation around by working to have our expenses meet what the congregation is able to support. This resulted in us having to say goodbye to valued members of our staff and church community-Alison Andersson, our Office Administrator, John Beaton, our Church Custodian, Alex Montanez, our Security Monitor. The other staff salaries have also been reduced, and our minister, Pastor Adams, will be moving to a ¾ time schedule. It represents a huge change to how we will operate our church and we will be looking to the congregation to help support each other through this. We will be working with a Transition team on how best to make these changes but for now we'd like to thank our staff for their years of hard work and dedication.

This month, we also said goodbye and thank you to Steve Burton for his 3 years of service. He's been an especially helpful resource when it comes to issues related to insurance and has agreed to continue to help us in an advisory and as needed basis. Thank you Steve! We also welcomed Ron Tomlin onto the Trustees and are excited to work with him.

We will continue to monitor and maintain the physical health of our church building. Your ongoing comments or suggestions are welcomed. As the snow seems to have started, please let us know if you know of any areas of the driveway, parking lot or walkways that need more attention than they may be getting. Please place a written note in the Trustees mailbox along with your idea(s) to correct any issue. If there is a project you would like to see completed or that you would like to complete as a group please let us know.

Stewardship Committee

As those who attended the annual congregation meeting are well aware, The First Congregational Church in Billerica has a major financial problem. And to address those problems, the congregation voted to cut staff and change the way that we do a number of tasks. So what do these changes mean to us as individual members of the congregation?

1) We must continue to do well what we are currently doing well. FCCB is not a dysfunctional or a dying Church. We are a healthy church with a financial problem. FCCB is doing God's work in the community. We must continue to welcome, to feed, to visit, to educate, to worship, and to celebrate births, marriages, and provide funerals. As we make decisions about how we will do things differently, our mission as a congregation must be forefront in our minds.

2) We must continue to invite others to join us in our work. As we cut back, one of the dangers is that we focus on ourselves since our needs are more visible than the needs of others. Unless we invite others to join and work with us, we will not be reaching out as God wants us to do, and risk serving only ourselves. Evangelism is not in our DNA, so it takes a real effort to ask people to join us. We must be open to those who seek baptism for their children, who are in distress, and who need what we provide. As the world around us has changed, we can no longer expect people to seek us out, we must seek them out.

3) We must realize that our contributions of time and talent have become more important. In some cases, volunteers must do what paid staff used to do. In others, we need to make more effective use of technology to do what staff did before but to do it more efficiently. And finally, we need to find ways of developing opportunities that our former staff did not have time to do.

4) We must let people know what we want and love to do. When I was on the nominating committee, I marveled at the time that individuals were willing to put into choir and teaching Sunday School. Those individuals were challenged by those tasks, they worked hard at them, and they loved what they accomplished. We need to make a better match of what needs to be done with those people who love to do those tasks so that that the work of the church is less of a burden, and more of what we want to do. If you have artistic talents, musical talents, organizational talent, administrative talents, FCCB can use them. Please let us know what you want to do and enjoy doing.

5) If you need it, ask for help. Our greatest risk is that we burn volunteers and the remaining staff out. We must be honest with ourselves about what we are capable of and not overcommit. We must rededicate ourselves to sharing the work. And if some of the changes that we have made aren't working, let others know so that further changes can be made so that it does work.

FCCB is a healthy, vibrant congregation. We can make the adjustments so that the financial challenges can be met. But we must be willing to accept and embrace the change that will be required.

Observations from the Stewardship Campaign

I took the opportunity to take a look at the numbers from the recently completed Stewardship campaign as they stood at the time of the annual meeting. I thought that these would be the final numbers, but in response to the budget cuts that were made at the annual meeting, I was told that we have some additional or increased pledges, so we will report the final results later.

Observation 1: The average pledge increased significantly. It is now almost $30 per week. (For the statisticians, the median pledge was about $23 per week as there are more smaller pledges than large ones)

Observation 2: We are grateful to a few individual pledge units. The top five pledge units pledged over 28 percent of the total pledged. The top pledge units are giving significantly more than past years.

Observation 3: The small pledges are a very important component of the overall pledges. I know that we have many in the congregation with limited income, whose contributions are similar to the "widow's mite". If you are in that group, do not feel guilty. Your giving inspires others, and taken with the other small pledges is significant.

Thanks to all who pledged.
Andrew Jennings for the Stewardship Committee

The Outreach Committee Report

Recent Thank Yous

* From SEVA for living into the Biblical mandate of restoring sight to the blind
* From Lowell Transitional Living Center for our gift of $1,170 from the Alternative Christmas Market
* From the Outdoor Church of Cambridge. They had a philanthropic pledge of $100 for every December contribution over $100. We contributed $101 so they could receive the additional $100
* From Church World Service for our gift of $1,171 from the Alternative Christmas Market
* From Feeding America for our donation of $100 that, thanks to philanthropic "matches", resulted in the purchase of 170,000 servings of food for hungry people in the U.S.

Pantry
Our pantry continues to grow. We receive over 200 items each month plus a number of dinners. We share with the town pantry and remind you a call to 978-667-2961 results in the pantry being open any day to any member of our congregation and ... we deliver!

Soup & Sandwiches
We had our first "soup & Sandwich" lunch (more staff than guests) but we'll be back again on the second Saturday in February to see if our numbers grow.

Generosity
We thank you for your ongoing generosity to the Outreach Committee. You make possible so many actions of Christian relief; you are a light in a world that sometimes seems endlessly dark. We remember that this is not our personal money and we treat it with great care and respect.

Oil
Don't forget, one can still call 1-877-563-4645 (Joe for Oil) until February 27th for 100 gallons of free fuel oil. If you're receiving any kind of assistance, you'll likely qualify. Be persistent!

Upcoming Activity
We will be visiting the Outdoor Church of Cambridge and bringing white athletic socks and sandwiches to share with the homeless. If any would care to participate in his project, new socks maybe brought and placed in front of the lectern any Sunday morning through February 26th. Sandwiches could be brought to our church parking lot on Saturday, March 3rd between 9:30 - 11:45am.

Did You Know That -
a. The wealthiest 10% of the world's population annually consume 59% of all resources used while the poorest 10% consume 1/2 of 1% of its resources.
b. The U.S. has 5% of the world's population but 25% of its prisoners. We spend $70 billion/year on "corrections". 47% of all arrests are marijuana related.
c. In 2010, Americans spent $450 billion at Christmas. Providing clean water for the entire planet would have cost about $20 billion.

Bob Miner on behalf of our Outreach Committee