Tag: Church and Community

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News & Announcements

Reflecting on Como Manning

The closure of a congregation usually brings to me a tinge of sadness at the concept that memories won’t be created there anymore. I never considered Manning Uniting Church to be a quiet  peaceful church. It was full of life with a variety of activities for us kids. I have fond memories of plays, preparing the sets and rehearsing. Come Christmas time we would relocate to the hall for church instead of our chapel. Here we would make murals using one and two cent coins with the money going to the Christmas Bowl.

Church camps were a time for all of us to really be a community eating, worshiping, and learning together. I had many sets of parents and  grandparents looking out for me as well as friends  close to my age and older. This is where I developed the skills to move and work within a diverse age setting.

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Bridging the age gap

Rockingham Uniting Church has always welcomed and encouraged its youngest members. In our Kids of Uniting Church in Australia (KUCA) group on Sundays, children would learn and have fun, however there was always something missing.

With KUCA finishing after age twelve, those who finished had no next step along their faith journey other than to join adult worship and studies if they wished. To cater for this fast growing demographic, Rockingham has implemented two new groups to help the youth and young adults of the church to continue to grow in their faith and as people.

Our Youth Group, aimed at high school aged teens, has been running for more than three years now and continues to attract new members from both within and outside the church congregation. Mostly comprised of games and activities with elements of team building and prayer, the youth group offers a great setting for local teens to enjoy fellowship and have fun together whilst growing into well rounded young people.

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Stories & Feature Articles

Breaking the tradition and connecting with God

Sunday 2 November 2014

IMG_20120429_094340Five people are on the veranda outside Melville Uniting Church hall tie-dying t-shirts. Inside the hall, others are sticking strips of coloured cloth to wooden dolls while another group is painting pictures of stars and wheat. Meanwhile there is deep discussion all around the building about the story of Joseph: about humility, ambition, and favouritism in families.

This is Craft Church, an all age worship experience where art and craft provide the means for genuine engagement with the scriptures, with each other, and with God.

One Sunday each month at Melville Uniting Church, we don’t sing hymns or hear a sermon. We begin together with prayers and the Bible reading, but then we split into groups to talk about the story as we do our different craft activities (a diversity to suit the different interests and abilities) before joining back again for a big group discussion, a closing prayer and a sending out. The basic elements of worship are still there, but they look a bit different.

So how did this come about? Let’s rewind.

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Stories & Feature Articles

Paving a way forward

All this year, we’ve been reporting updates from Rev David Kriel, Strategy and Mission Planner for the Uniting Church in WA in his work looking towards building strategies for the future. In our final article in the series, David offers some ideas for a way forward for us as a church.

David shared that in this journey, it’s vital for congregations to do some active soul searching.

“For the future it’s a question about faith formation and faith sharing,” he said. “Congregations need to discover who they are as a faith community and how they’re going to share that faith with their neighbours, their community.”

Part of being able to share faith with our communities is to know our communities.

“Congregations need to see who their community is and how they are going to engage in their community; not asking people to come to the church all the time, but getting out and engaging with the community. I think that’s very important,” he said.

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Stories & Feature Articles

Santa’s workshop for WA families

Who knew that Santa’s Workshop was nestled away in the northern suburbs of Perth? They call themselves the WUCMen, and each Wednesday they gather in a shed in the semi-rural area of Gnangara and make wooden toys for UnitingCare West’s Christmas Appeal – The Target and UnitingCare Giving Box. The toys are then distributed to families in WA to spread hope, joy and love to people at Christmas.

WUCMen pic 2A group of Men from Wanneroo Uniting Church wanted to start a men’s group for church members, but wanted to spend their fellowship time doing hands-on projects rather than sitting around chatting and listening to speakers. And so the WUCMen was formed – standing for Wanneroo Uniting Church Men.

Keva Barnard, a WUCMan, said that the group consisted of men from various backgrounds who just wanted to use their time doing practical things together.

“We’re interested in working, so we formed this group,” Keva said.

Throughout the year, the group make wooden toy cars, pull along trolleys and building blocks, usually donating around 20 toys a year. Some of the toys also get donated to Princess Margaret Hospital for Children.

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News & Announcements

GKI on the move

One of the outcomes of our recent Annual Meeting of the Presbytery and Synod of the Uniting Church in WA was the commitment to continue our partnership with the Indonesian Christian Church (GKI).

The partnership began over two decades ago and has led to the growth of the GKI Perth Uniting Church congregation in Mosman Park and a special Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that points to various ways we can co-operate and learn from each other.

IMG_0043Rosemary Hudson-Miller, acting general Secretary of the Uniting Church in WA, and I, moderator of the Uniting Church in WA, were very privileged to be able to visit Indonesia in September to  attend the GKI West Java Synod and sign the MOU. This was a tremendous privilege and richly rewarding for us. We were able to witness a church that is growing and dynamic in many areas of its life.

We stayed in the climatically cool Zuri Resort and Convention Center, owned by GKI, about three hours out of Jakarta, near Bogor in the mountains. It was very special being part of their synod  meetings. About 270 members attended from eight presbyteries across West Java.

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Mustard Seed expanding knowledge

Mustard Seed, at Glen Forrest Uniting Church, is a program offering computer classes for people in the local community. A reference to the Biblical mustard seed, the program is all about big things growing  from the small. Five sessions are run each week during school terms helping people learn more about tablets – such as iPads – iMac, Windows, printing and scanning as well as assisting with any questions or  troubleshooting people might be experiencing with their computers.

Running since 2001, Brian Hassell, coordinator of Mustard Seed, said that they are one of the most well-equipped computer learning centres in the region. Operating out of the back room at Glen Forrest  Uniting Church, they have 22 computers available for use, including laptops and desktops as well as a digital projector, tablet computers, scanners, still and movie cameras, an audio recorder and a CD/DVD  copier.

The building is also equipped with wireless internet for people who bring their own devices. Each session costs $3 a person and the program has been fortunate enough to receive grants from the Uniting Church in WA and the Mundaring Shire. It has been an extremely popular program, mostly with retirees in the area, attracting over 90 enrolments each year and a waiting list of people trying to get into  the classes.

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Stories & Feature Articles

Perth Hills fire response: Small congregations act big

On Sunday morning 12 January 2014, a devastating bushfire sparked by a private power pole in Parkerville resulted in the destruction of 57 homes. Many properties were damaged and 386 hectares burnt   in the affected areas of Parkerville, Stoneville and Mount Helena. A meeting was arranged with the Uniting Church Emergency Response Team and members of the three local hills Uniting Churches,  Mundaring, Glen Forrest and Gidgegannup. Representatives from these congregations formed The UCA Hills Fire Disaster Committee, supported by Synod/Presbytery representative, Rev Gordon  Scantlebury, and Metro East regional pastor, Rev Alan Stubbs.

Contact was made with the local schools and the chaplains to let them know of the assistance that we could give. Other local churches, the Mundaring Shire Towards Recovery Centre and, of course, word of  mouth in the community gave us many starting contacts. Vouchers were distributed directly by committee members and through the school chaplains. Cash gifts have also been given and we were  especially keen to help children continue with their extra-curricular activities, some requiring sporting fees and uniform expenses.

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Stories & Feature Articles

Movers in thier prime

For Monica Phillips, life was not meant for slowing down. Chair of the Gosnells Uniting Church Council, at 82 years of age, Monica leads three Prime Movers classes each week – including at the most  recent Regional Gathering for the Metro East Region of the Uniting Church in WA, where Monica led those present in a mini-class to help energise people for the day ahead. Prime Movers is a voluntary organisation running exercise classes for the over 55s.

Monica became involved in leading the classes 15 years ago, after her husband passed away. While he was alive, the couple spent their lives volunteering with the church, including a large involvement in youth work. After joining the classes as a member, however, Monica found that volunteering with older people was a natural progression. As for the fitness side of things, her health has never been better.  Despite having arthritis and sometimes having to take time away from the classes for treatment, she is always itching to get back.

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Pilgrimage to Living Waters

On Friday 15 August, nine intrepid ‘pilgrims’ set out from the Dongara Uniting Church to follow a trail around the Irwin River and estuary. The weather was glorious and the setting magnificent. Our planned route included trekking across the bar, but this was adjusted as the river mouth was open. Having the Shire bus to help transport those not able to walk the full distance meant the whole group could instead move together from the lookout on Church Street to the boardwalk in Ocean Drive. We were delighted to have Jess Rowe and her daughter Sue with us and our friend Viv, who had walked with us last year, as well as several first-time pilgrims.

‘Water For Life’ was the theme of the event this year, celebrating the wonderful and amazing qualities of the gift of water for this water-dependent planet. A pilgrimage booklet was available for every person, with text extracted from the book Downstream From Eden by David L Knight. This booklet also contained portions of some of the psalms and wisdom writings from the Bible. Further reflections came from a book of modern Psalms written by a New Zealand woman. At each of seven ‘stations’ along the way the group stopped and shared in readings from the pilgrimage booklet which opened insights into the complex nature of water. Here we expanded our understanding of how amazing this substance is, how chameleon-like it can be, changing in appearance and quality according to characteristics of surrounding air and earth.

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