3/31
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| ...and still spring.... |
The New York City Presbytery General Cabinet meets via ZOOM to catch up on where we are. An emergency task force has been put together to pool resources and make appeals for help easier. Obviously most regular work has ground to a halt. It cheers me some when I hear our treasurer say, “There’s plenty of help available and we are going to make it through.” I want to believe that. The conversation turns to congregations without pastors. Who can’t afford to pay pulpit supply pastors. Guest preachers. There’s a quick move to make a list of churches streaming services so that these preacherless churches can tune in. Thankfully, our Exec points out that this is only half the problem. A lot of ministers depend on guest preaching to make it. (Like me) They’re now missing up to $1000 a month from their income. Ecclesiastical gig workers, as it were. Maybe there is coverage under the Cares act. Not clear. I also have another concern. Three of the congregations I work with are marginally computer literate. “ZOOM” is a mystery to many. There’s been contact among members since this all began. If we don’t find a way to connect them and this goes on awhile, it could mean the end for some who have just barely been hanging on.
Clearly our denomination's biennial General Assembly is up in the air. The Baltimore Convention Center, where we were going to meet, is being turned into an emergency hospital.
Something about this all wears me out. I fee too tired for my friend's nightly online bull session.
I stop to think…..60 tents in a Central Park war style “Field Hospital,” US Open Tennis courts and the Javits Center for emergency hospitals, a Navy hospital ship in the harbor, hotels next. And freezer trucks outside of a Brooklyn hospital for bodies. I can’t find a way to appropriate these as part of my reality or truly understand what they mean. For the first time, I feel an undercurrent.of fear……
"There’s plenty of help available and we are going make to through,,”
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