Dear friends
It’s weird to me to think that a year ago we were in the middle of our ‘online church’ period. Not seeing each other in person, trying to do growth groups over zoom, looking forward to watching church on the TV every Sunday. Strange times! Around the world there are lots of places where COVID is still having a devastating impact and lots of Christians are still having to do ‘church online’ even now. We can be very thankful for the part of the world we’re in, can’t we?
In fact with the recent relaxing of government restrictions we’re starting to think about whether now is a good time for us to make a few tweaks to how we do things on a Sunday. Here are a couple of things we’re thinking about (to be clear – nothing is decided, we’re just keen for your thoughts):
1. Removing the no singing zone?
As I flagged at church on Sunday, we’ve realised that our ‘no singing zone’ has become less popular lately, and that sometimes when people sit there it’s not because they’re uncomfortable with singing, but just because they’re trying to find a good seat. We’re not desperate to get rid of it, so if you think you’d still like to have it there we’d like to know that, but if no one wants it anymore, we wonder if it’s time for it to go.
2. Moving forward and partially closing the rear wall?
Under the latest government density requirements, if we were to close our rear wall, we could still have over 200 people in our church space. Again we’re not desperate to do this, and we’d probably only partially close the wall, but doing so would improve both the sound quality of our service and would also increase our ability to heat our space as winter arrives (with the gym fully open it’s going to get very chilly!). If we made a change here it would mean we have to get used to filling up from the front again and being slightly closer together to make sure everyone can still fit comfortably.
How would you feel about these changes? We’re very keen to make sure we aren’t making people uncomfortable and so if that’s how this makes you feel, we’d love you to let us know. If we do make changes we can also do so in the knowledge that we can always take a step back again if the COVID situation changes.
We’d love to hear your thoughts, filling in a contact card is probably the easiest way to let us know what you think.
Cheers,
Matt
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Matt Winter
Associate Pastor
Trinity Church Brighton
Day off Thursdays