Three Churches; One Community
“We have many parts in the one body, and all these parts have different functions. In the same way, though we are many, we are one body in union with Christ, and we are all joined to each other as different parts of one body.” Romans 12:4-8
The parishes of St. Monica’s, St. Martin’s and St. Stephen’s are all within a five-mile radius of each other within the Hartford Metropolitan area of CT. They serve a similar population consisting primarily of African American and Caribbean descent. St. Martin’s is located in the Blue Hills neighborhood of Hartford. St. Monica is located in the Northeast Neighborhood of Hartford and St Stephen’s in Bloomfield. St Monica’s, established in 1904, is one of the oldest Black churches in CT. St Martin’s was formed from St Monica’s when Collin Bennett, a longtime member of St. Monica’s later became a priest. He and some other members left St. Monica’s and established St. Martin.
St Stephen’s has become a majority Black church over time due to changing demographics in the Bloomfield/West Hartford area. Each parish recognizes that we each have unique challenges that could pose a threat to our continued existence as individual parishes. With that knowledge, we reached out to one another to determine if there might be ways for us to collaborate for our mutual benefit. We began exploration around that topic about two years ago. Both St Martin and St Stephen’s have been without permanent clergy for several years and have been working with supply priests. St Monica has a full-time priest but continues to struggle keeping up with financial obligations.
One proposal of collaboration with mutual benefit is to share the services of St. Monica’s full-time rector. The “Transition in Parishes” document on the Episcopal Church of Connecticut website communicates that parishes are leaning into sharing rectors. Currently, only 38% of the parishes in CT have full time rectors. Facing that reality, we began discussions around what sharing the services of St Monica’s rector would look like for each parish and its financial impact. St. Monica’s could give up a Sunday with communion, essentially moving to a ¾ time rector. Our parish would reduce our cost accordingly. St. Martin’s and St. Stephen’s would have communion at least once a month. There would also be a rector to attend vestry meetings and provide pastoral care to the congregation. The other collaboration we discussed was creating an inter-church lay ministry outreach team. This team would consist of members from each church. The team will visit the sick and “shut in” of all three churches.
The “Transitions in Parishes” document also discusses the importance of lay people taking on more of the pastoral care functions within a parish due to the shortage of priests. The rector of St. Monica’s would train and supervise the team– equipping the lay people of the three churches.
Our efforts to bring this plan to fruition has stalled in recent months. I am hopeful that being a part of the Reimagining Church group will help to revitalize our efforts and generate new thoughts and ideals on areas of collaboration. I look forward to working with our assigned intern, Morenike, to keep up us on track and meeting with other churches to hear about the ways in which God is calling us into community.
Image | Simon Berger on Unsplash