Easter Greetings:
Sunday, I encouraged everyone to get vaccinated as soon as possible. There should be no hesitancy among us concerning either the safety or the efficacy of the vaccine; and we should all know that a Durham native was one of the lead researchers who helped to develop it. So, I encourage everyone to get vaccinated as soon as you can. I am strongly encouraging this because 1) I am concerned about the health of every person and I want everyone protected; and 2) this is the best way for us to plan to reopen our building.
A couple of weeks ago I received a letter from Bishop Monroe easing the restrictions he had placed on all of his churches. The first restriction he eased is on the number of persons who can be in the building. The Bishop says that we can now have 20-25 persons at any time. Well, that will work for St. Mark or Mitchell’s Chapel but not for us. To have people properly socially distanced here, we would be stretching the limit to have 20 persons; and that would be with 1 person on either end of the choir stand. Two years ago, we would have said that our facility is “intimate;” but with current guidelines for social distancing, our facility is small. I have reached out to some who do not have the capability to view us on our social media platforms but other than that, we will need to continue our livestream services.
The other restriction the Bishop lifted was concerning Communion. He said that Communion could be served in small groups of 20-25; and he suggested that we do this by Class. Well, I have a different metric for serving Communion. As I told my Preacher’s Steward and a couple of Trustees, my metric is Mr. John Fearrington. I will not serve a young healthy person like Lydia (to pick on her) if it is not also safe for me to go to their home (which is always a delight) to serve the Fearringtons. If I cannot serve everyone, then I will not serve anyone. So again, I stress the need for everyone to get vaccinated so that we can return to the celebration of Communion.
The good news is that vaccinations are now being opened to persons 16 and older in a couple of weeks; and by mid-Summer a good number of us should be vaccinated and we will revisit this issue then. However, for now, I wanted everyone to know where I stood concerning returning to our services.
Sincerely,
Dr. Broadnax