Three Values & Three Initiatives

We at St. Luke's, as well as other local and national churches, are in a transitional moment in our history. This moment has been exacerbated by the COVID pandemic, but in truth, societal trends and forces have long been undermining the foundations of the church. However, Christ is eternal, and we do not lose faith! It is time for us to be as "shrewd as serpents" (Mathew 10:16). As a first step, the Vestry met for a day-long exercise to assess and confirm three of St. Luke's central values and to plan three initiatives (underpinned by those values) that support the work of the church moving forward. (The work focused on three values and intentions as an achievable goal, with the understanding that these are not fully definitive and we have room to develop more in the future.)

We share these with you here, and we look forward to new conversations and new possibilities as we emerge like cicadas (after almost 17 months instead of 17 years) and look upon a fresh new day! 

With so much gratitude for each of you,
Ginny Sharkey, Sr. Warden

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Three Values and Three Initiatives

St. Luke’s affirms and supports by consensus these three values and three initiatives that will direct our work.

Three Values
We value and will continue to practice our history of

  • community,

  • resiliency, and

  • service

 

Three Initiatives

Facilitating Effective Communications
St Luke’s communications plan will be fashioned around a healthy exchange of information and news about our people, our church and our community. We share information in the spirit of transparency where our message delivers thoughts, feelings and motives in ways that are easy to perceive and understand. 

Our communications plan encompasses all methods of Parish communications and ongoing assessments of their effectiveness. It supports the work of St. Luke's employees that are tasked with communications efforts. 

Engaging Our People
Engagement is a concerted effort to reinvigorate and build our community, strengthen existing and new relationships, and renew our commitment to the values that St. Luke's represents.  This process will include a frank "re-imagining" of how we want to do church so that our community is "faith building, life-giving and enriching for our members."[1]  Engagement is also living into these values in the communities beyond our parish and asking others to join us. We acknowledge that maintaining the status quo is not an option.

Empowering and Underpinning the Passions of Our Congregation
We will empower and underpin the passions of our congregation that support values of community, resiliency, and service.  We will support parishioners in identifying their gifts, and skills and empower parishioners to put these into practice by providing ongoing support in a variety of forms (e.g. leadership development, funding, technology, communication) to sustain and grow this work.   

Next Steps
Ginny Sharkey, Josh Whittington, Robin Whittington, and Fr. Michael are assuming leadership of the Facilitating Effective Communications initiative and will work closely with our Parish Staff on this initiative.  

Fr. Michael will call and facilitate a meeting to clarify similarities, differences, leadership, and next steps of the Engaging Our People and Empowering Our Congregation initiatives.  These initiatives will engage our parish and our community partners as we move forward.

Questions? Please contact any Vestry member:

[1] See Jack Bowers’ April 11, 2021 sermon at St. Luke’s.

Lara Benschoter