Weekday Email to Members and Friends – 2021-06-11
June 11th, 2021
A daily e-mailer from
Matt Matthews
To Members and Friends of
First Presbyterian Church
Champaign, Illinois
Dear Friends,
Your Session’s Covid-19 Response Team has been meeting throughout the pandemic to discuss (and pray about) how to do ministry and “be church” safely. We met early this week and the Session approved the report below. Next week, I’ll be sharing a great letter from the leader of our Covid Team, Dr. Ruth Craddock. For now, I’d like to try to summarize where we are.
- The Covid-19 Response Team strongly urges all persons who can get vaccinated to do so.
- All unvaccinated persons must wear a mask at all times indoors at the church.
- Vaccinated persons are invited—not required—to wear a mask in worship. (See the wording below).
- We are easing into congregational singing. Not now, but soon.
- We aren’t, yet, eating at congregation-wide, indoors, sit-down events. (Smaller groups of vaccinated people, sure. And we are resuming coffee and tea in Westminster after 9 a.m. worship,
- We will resume full, in-person worship at 9 a.m. That service will be live-streamed for our friends at home, and all over the country.
Please know that your Covid Team (Ken Chapman, Eric Corbin, Ruth Craddock, Ron Deering, Judy Geistlinger, Matt Matthews, Carol Miles, Mark Schoeffmann, and Tom Ulen) has been trying to provide the safest place for ALL our members and friends. They have attempted to do all they can to ensure that our church is a true, safe, sanctuary for all people. Please thank, have patience with, and pray for these saints who are doing their best.
May I reiterate one word: patience. Let’s work on loving and being patient with each other. We’re almost there. Hallelujah!
I hope to see you on Sunday.
Matt Matthews
FCC COVID-19 RESPONSE TEAM
June 8, 2021, Meeting Minutes
Present: Ken Chapman, Eric Corbin, Ron Deering, Judy Geistlinger, Joe Grant (to discuss congregational singing), Matt Matthews, Carol Miles, Mark Schoeffmann, and Tom Ulen
By Zoom
Matt presided over the meeting in Ruth’s absence and convened the meeting at 5:35pm. He had spoken with Ruth and gave her report to the committee. Ruth said that the Governor is expected to declare that the State is in Phase 5 at 12:01am on Friday, June 11. Everyone and everything in the State can return to pre-pandemic activities and status. All of our precautions can be relaxed as of Friday.
Vaccinated people are “good to go.” Those who are not vaccinated proceed at their own risk. Ruth reported and Ken confirmed that the probability of vaccinated persons getting the virus is very small and that if they do get the coronavirus, they are likely to have a mild case. Unvaccinated people need to wear masks indoors; immune-compromised people (even if vaccinated) need to remain masked. Matt suggested that vaccinated people may wish to wear masks to be in solidarity with those who are unvaccinated or immune-compromised.
Ken said that continuing to wear masks indoors, especially when children are around, might be a good idea. There is a new variant of the coronavirus from India (called the “Delta variant”) that is now common in the UK and is expected to arrive in the US soon. Ken reported that the three or four major vaccines appear to be effective against the Delta variant. Ken (and Ruth) urged everyone to be vaccinated as soon as possible. He said that Covid-19 will be with us for a long time and may require a regular booster shot. Our hospitals are not going to be overwhelmed if many of us are vaccinated. Ken said that if one has a cold, seasonal allergies, or respiratory infection, one should wear a mask.
There was vigorous discussion about how to phrase the general feeling in the group that wearing masks in worship was a good idea. Mark pointed out that a general policy of wearing masks could minimize the discriminatory feeling that those who are not vaccinated might feel. Matt added some generous thoughts about the advisability of continuing to wear masks during worship.
Others pointed out that unless people felt that all or almost all of those attending worship were vaccinated, they might not come back to in-person worship for some time. But we also agreed that we want all to feel welcome at worship, even if they are not vaccinated but are wearing a mask.
Matt proposed and the group accepted unanimously this wording:
Out of abundant concern for others, particularly for the unvaccinated, such as children and the medically compromised, the Covid-19 Response Team suggests that, out of Christian love, we continue to wear masks during indoor worship at this time.
We recognize that it will be hard to mandate mask-wearing for those who are vaccinated. Also, it will be hard to insist that only the unvaccinated wear masks or to enforce such a policy. So, we agreed on the language above – with “suggests” rather than “requires.” And we recognized that matters might change; so, we added “at this time,” at Mark’s suggestion.
Carol reported that the Worship Committee proposes that we move to an unlimited in-person worship beginning with the 9am service on June 20, 2021. In addition to the in-person service, the streaming of the service will continue. As of that date, the 10:15 service will be ended.
There was vigorous discussion of the advisability of having a basket of donuts at the 10am fellowship hour. The group felt that it would recommend not having donuts at the fellowship hour but that coffee, tea, and water would be alright. We need to find a more sanitary manner of serving donuts before we resume that practice.
We postponed any further modification to the worship services till later.
With regard to fellowship between the 9am and 11:15am services (the “Gathering” service is slated to begin on July 18 or soon thereafter), Carol pointed out that that fellowship is taking place anyway, regardless of whether drinks and donuts are available. The Nurture Committee has always provided the volunteers for coffee making and serving. That committee is meeting on Thursday, June 10, and should be advised of our decisions in order to staff the fellowship hour after the 9am service on June 20.
We turned to a more general discussion of fellowship and food. Eating events need to be started eventually. It’s okay to have meals, but families with children will be problematic. What about outside eating? We agreed that that is OK. However, we are uncomfortable at this time to have congregation-wide indoor meals. DREAAM will continue to follow the Unit 4 guidelines. Mindy is familiar with those guidelines and can inform this team on what those are.
We then turned to a discussion of singing in worship. Joe and Eric had attended a webinar on singing in in-person worship and reported on the consensus in that webinar. Joe said that the webinar participants suggested good spacing, singing for less than an hour, and being mindful of the fact that it takes time for air to turn over in a space. Joe could not yet make a recommendation that we go back to congregational singing. He recommended that the live quartet sing at the end of the worship service, while masked. The webinar mentioned that if there is congregational singing, that it take place only at the end of the service. Joe recommended that we wait until July at the earliest before moving to congregational singing. The committee unanimously concurred.
Eric posted this article for the team: Keep COVID-19 restrictions during in-person worship, ecumenical guide suggests – The Presbyterian Outlook (pres-outlook.org).
We then discussed the advisability of participating in spoken liturgy during in-person worship. We agreed that the spoken liturgy does not have the same risk as singing. We will, therefore, move forward with including spoken liturgy in worship.
This team will administer the Covid-19 account funds, which now total $15,000. We unanimously approved the following expenditures:
- 2 replacement Blue Air purifier filters for rooms 204 & 206 = $139.98 (6 months longevity)
- New air purifier for room 205 = $299.99.
- New air purifier for room 207 = $299.99.
- New air purifier for café = $979.99 (larger unit needed for larger room volume).
- Additional Owl device for the Chapel = $1,000.00.
Tom, as chair of Building and Grounds, will investigate with Mindy if any further air purifiers are needed.
These additional suggestions – with no dollar amounts included – were discussed:
- Reduce gun violence/gun buy back
- Families
- Immigrants
- Courage Connection
- CU at Home
- Drug Use
- Vaccine Clinic Event/Park (July 31, 1-5 pm – School supplies/back to school; food trucks/shaved ice for free)
Mark noted that Covid-relief donors wanted their donations to go specifically to pandemic-related projects.
Mark also proposed this agenda item for our next meeting: Can and should we require our staff to be vaccinated as a condition of employment?
We have tentatively called our next meeting for Tuesday, July 6, at 5:30pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Judi Geistlinger
Tom Ulen
* * *
I can see clearly now!!! A great end-of-pandemic song from the inestimable Johnny Nash…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
* * *
From your Nurture Team — There were no correct guessers of last week’s photo of Kathy Haynes (wife of former Associate Pastor Leroy Haynes).
Here’s this week’s photo, which will be our last — at least for now.
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