Category: New Vision Notes

Thurs Oct 15 2020

1. Here is a terrific video introduction to Caremongerers Hamont that describes their application of the principles of mutual aid. The Caremongerers will be picking up their food delivery program again at the end of October in our Lower Hall.
2. Our Church Council Chair Bob Marentette has called a meeting of the Threshold Partners for Sunday, Nov 1 after our worship gathering. The meeting is being convened as a check-in/temperature taking on how we all are doing in this time, and to advance the development of our Music Hall social enterprise through working on our plans for intercultural consultation with Hamilton’s diverse communities and their creatives about programming policy for the venue.
3. We will be inviting New Vision folks without access to Zoom to attend our Zoom worship gathering and Threshold Partner meeting on Sunday Nov 1 in person at 24 Main W. We’ll observe all the best practices for hygiene, screening, and sanitation. If you would like to be put on a list as a potential attendee of this gathering, please respond to this email with your interest. Whether or not we will be able to accommodate interest in attending the in-person gathering depends on the number of responses we get.
4. The Resting and Hygiene Centre continues in its fond appreciation for baked goods and other snacks you provide to it to share with its guests. Please contact Martine (martini.sings@gmail.com) or Helen (helen.bradleyrd@gmail.com) for assistance with getting baking to the Centre.
5. New Vision’s role in the capital campaign for the Music Hall at New Vision is to develop relational currency for the social enterprise through an intercultural consultation with Hamilton’s diverse communities with whom we will develop a cultural benefits memorandum, and codify the Music Hall’s role in providing those benefits with embedding a social enterprise charter in our social enterprise governance and operating structure. We continued our prepatory work for the consultation last Sunday, when we took in an overview of the Kaleidoscope Institutes’ idea of relational currency. You can watch the full 20 minute video here. Thank you to everyone who has expressed interest in shaping and leading this important work. We will work together on this.
6. You can watch the Do Well by Hamilton capital campaign launch video for the Music Hall at New Vision anytime at dowellbyhamilton.ca, the campaign website.
7. We are going to maintain our virtual worship gathering on Sundays as they are for the time being. We are working on accessibility for those who cannot access Zoom. We keep in place our phone network to sustain our faith across the digital divide. We admit we miss those we don’t see.
8. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.
9. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.” If you can only connect by video on your computer with no audio, you can use the phone connection for audio and the computer connection for visual.
10. For updates on New Vision plans in the post Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/.

Hope to see you on Sunday – again, or for the first time!

Rev Ian

Thursday October 8 2020

1. First off, in this Thanksgiving edition of New Vision Notes, a shout out to Rev. Miriam Spies whose thoughtful in-the-moment piece on imagining profounder relationships in the new reality ahead was published by Sojourner.net this week. Highly recommended Thanksgiving reading from this quarter!
2. New Vision has secured continued funding from the City for the Resting and Hygiene Centre for people sleeping rough through to November 11. We are engaging in discussions with the City and with our volunteer coordinators over how to reposition the Centre to be open for the winter as part of the public health response to the already emerging second wave of COVID-19 in Hamilton.
3. The Centre continues in its fond appreciation for baked goods and other snacks you provide to it to share with its guests. Please contact Martine (martini.sings@gmail.com) or Helen (helen.bradleyrd@gmail.com) for assistance with getting baking to the Centre.
4. New Vision’s primary role in our capital campaign for the Music Hall at New Vision is to build social capital through an intercultural consultation with Hamilton’s diverse communities with whom we will develop a cultural benefits memorandum, and embed with them the Music Halls’ role in providing those benefits in a social enterprise charter that will be implemented in the Music Hall’s governance and operating structure. We began our prepatory work for the consultation last Sunday, when we took in an overview of the Bennett Development Model for Intercultural Sensitivity. You can watch the 10 minute video describing the model here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vKRFH2Wm6Y. We will begin organizing our consultation engagement in the next week and look forward to your participation and insights!
5. You can watch the launch video for the Do Well by Hamilton capital campaign for the Music Hall at New Vision anytime at dowellbyhamilton.ca, the campaign website.

6. We are going to maintain our virtual worship gathering on Sundays as they are for the time being into the future. We are working on developing an accessibility option at 24 Main West in which those who cannot join our virtual worship gathering elsewhere can join in an in-person gathering at our building at 24 Main West that is enfolded in our ongoing virtual worship. We realize that a “temperature-taking” gathering on how we are all doing that includes both those who have technological access to New Vision virtually and those who remain in the in-person world is plausibly our next step to discerning an imaginable future with more inclusive relationships amongst us. We keep in place our phone network to sustain our faith across the digital divide. We admit we miss those we don’t see.
7. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.
8. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.” If you can only connect by video on your computer with no audio, you can use the phone connection for audio and the computer connection for visual.
9. For updates on New Vision plans in the post Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/.

Hope to see you on Sunday – again, or for the first time!

Rev Ian

1. The Civil Rights Movement was birthed out of the Church with the support of many faith based groups. That is why the organizations that form Black Hamilton are calling on faith based groups in Hamilton to join the “Songs of Hope Rally in Support of our Black Community” in the face of longstanding systemic Anti-Black Racism in Canada on Sunday Oct 4, 2020 at 5 pm, Hamilton City Hall Forecourt. Organized by the Centre for Community Engaged Narrative Arts and the Ubuntu Music Collaborative. Given the current restriction of out-door gatherings to 25 people at most, I will confirm if the event is going forward when I hear.
2. You can watch the Do Well by Hamilton capital campaign for the Music Hall at New Vision launch video anytime at dowellbyhamilton.ca, the campaign website.
3. New Vision’s primary role in the capital campaign is to build social capital through an intercultural consultation with Hamilton’s diverse communities. We hope the result will be a network of empowered people who have been marginalized to contribute to programming at the Music Hall at New Vision guided by a Music Hall social enterprise charter. You will be hearing more about this consultation in the weeks ahead as the fall gets going.
4. We will celebrate world-wide communion this Sunday, Oct 4. We are going to maintain our virtual worship gathering on Sundays as they are for the time being into the future. We will work in the weeks ahead on developing an accessibility option at 24 Main West in which those who cannot join our virtual worship gathering elsewhere can join the virtual gathering from 24 Main West. We will keep in place our phone network to share with such folks the distancing and hygiene protocols we will implement in a few weeks time.
5. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.
6. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.” If you can only connect by video on your computer with no audio, you can use the phone connection for audio and the computer connection for visual.
7. For updates on New Vision plans in the post Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/.

Hope to see you on Sunday –  again, or for the first time!

Rev Ian

Dennis Sendyowa telling part of the capital campaign story and introducing shn shn at the capital campaign launch last Friday evening.

1. The Civil Rights Movement was birthed out of the Church with the support of many faith based groups. That is why the organizations that form Black Hamilton are calling on faith based groups in Hamilton to join the “Rally in Support of our Black Community” in the face of longstanding systemic Anti-Black Racism in Canada: Sunday Oct 4, 2020 at 5 pm, Hamilton City Hall Forecourt. Organized by the Centre for Community Engaged Narrative Arts and the Ubuntu Music Collaborative.

2. The community-wide capital campaign for the Music Hall at New Vision is launching this Friday Sept 25 at 9:30 pm with the Do Well by Hamilton album launch. Come to New Vision’s launch watch party! You can join our Facebook watch party by following this link to New Vision’s facebook page. We’ll get the watch party happening around 9 pm for the 9:30 pm start. Get some snacks and a beverage and settle in virtually with me and others.

3. Sitarist and friend of New Vision Neeraj Prem was interviewed on CBC radio’s Fresh Air this past Sunday in celebration of the album launch and Hamilton’s deep music scene. Neeraj’s track from our Do Well By Hamilton is featured. You can listen to the segment and to the whole track here.

4. New Vision is partnering with Cobalt Connects to start the Music Hall social enterprise. New Vision’s primary role in the capital campaign is to build social capital through an intercultural consultation with Hamilton’s diverse communities. We hope the result will be a network of empowered people who have been marginalized to contribute to programming at the Music Hall at New Vision guided by a Music Hall social enterprise charter. You will be hearing more about this consultation in the weeks ahead as the fall gets going.

5. Finding ourselves in September during the novel coronavirus pandemic and looking to the times ahead, we are thinking now about how to accommodate ourselves to the new-normal post-the-pandemic-emergency. There are two themes that stand out for us. First, we need to make use of the stage three provisions on social gatherings to develop accessible options for those who are not able to join us on Zoom and yet could attend a hybrid worship service in person — provided carefully observed distancing and hygiene protocols are in place. Second, we need to exercise caution with respect to the possibility of a second wave of Covid-19 in the weeks and months ahead.

6. We are going to maintain our virtual worship gathering on Sundays as they are for the time being into the future. We will work in the weeks ahead on developing an accessibility option at 24 Main West in which those who cannot join our virtual worship gathering elsewhere can join the virtual gathering from 24 Main West. We will keep in place our phone network to share with such folks the distancing and hygiene protocols we will implement in a few weeks time.

7. At no time will we encourage people to attend an in-person gathering without giving them the resources to self-screen and to be fully informed of the safety and health measures we have in place for in-person gatherings.

8. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.

9. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.” If you can only connect by video on your computer with no audio, you can use the phone connection for audio and the computer connection for visual.

10. For updates on New Vision plans in the post Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/.

Hope to see you on Sunday ~ again, or for the first time!

Rev Ian

1. Finding ourselves in the middle of September and looking to the times ahead, we are thinking now about how to accommodate ourselves to the new-normal post-the-pandemic-emergency. There are two themes that stand out for us. First, we need to make use of the stage three provisions on social gatherings to develop accessible options for those who are not able to join us on Zoom and yet could attend a hybrid worship service in person — provided carefully observed distancing and hygiene protocols are in place. Second, we need to exercise caution with respect to the possibility of a second wave of Covid-19 in the weeks and months ahead.
2. We are going to maintain our virtual worship gathering on Sundays as they are indefinitely into the future. We will work in the weeks ahead on developing an accessibility option at 24 Main West in which those who cannot join our virtual worship gathering elsewhere can join the virtual gathering from 24 Main West. We will keep in place our phone network to share with such folks the distancing and hygiene protocols we will implement in a few weeks time.
3. At no time will we encourage people to attend an in-person gathering without giving them the resources to self-screen and to be fully informed of the safety and health measures we have in place for in-person gatherings.
4. We are also turning our attention now to how we best provide faith schooling to the children of New Vision as a community through this stage.
5. We will be celebrating communion this Sunday Sept 20 at our Virtual Worship Gathering.
6. The Rest and Hygiene Centre needs volunteer(s) to pick up sandwiches donated for our guests (currently Mon.-Fri., but possibly 7 days a week if we have enough volunteers).
The pick-up location is 350 King Street East (near Wellington), any time after 4 pm. Sandwiches are dropped off at New Vision. If you are able to help with this task, please contact Orianna Mak @ orianna.mak@medportal.ca
7. The public capital campaign for the Music Hall at New Vision is launching Friday Sept 25 at 9:30 pm with the Do Well by Hamilton album launch. It is the last event in McMaster University’s Socrates Project Shift 2020. You can learn about Shift 2020 and the Socrates Project here https://socrates.mcmaster.ca/shift-2020/. View the Music Hall at New Vision’s campaign website here https://www.dowellbyhamilton.com/
8. New Vision is partnering with Cobalt Connects https://cobaltconnects.ca/ to start the Music Hall social enterprise. New Vision’s primary role in the capital campaign is to build social capital through an intercultural consultation with Hamilton’s diverse communities. We hope the result will be a network of empowered people who have been marginalized to contribute to programming at the Music Hall at New Vision guided by a Music Hall social enterprise charter. You will be hearing more about this consultation and the invitation to participate in it in the weeks ahead as the fall gets going.
9. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.
10. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.” If you can only connect by video on your computer with no audio, you can use the phone connection for audio and the computer connection for video.
11. For updates on New Vision plans in the post Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/.

Hope to see you on Sunday ~ again, or for the first time!

Rev Ian

New Vision Notes Thur July 16 2020

1. We have secured more funding for the Resting and Hygiene Centre: it will continue to operate throughout the summer. Guests now frequently number 50 or more. Christ Church Cathedral is ending their resting centre July 20 and St. Pat’s will only have theirs open on weekdays. We are offering this resting centre outreach 7 days a week – some of us who were here before New Vision began remember we dreamed of a new church offering outreach 7 days a week.
2. Home baking individually wrapped is being highly appreciated by the guests! Please keep it coming!
3. For updates on New Vision plans in the Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/.
4. New Vision will be gathering for worship on Sundays on Zoom throughout the summer and into the fall. We will keep in place our phone network to keep in touch with those who are not able to join us virtually on Sundays. Here is our worship leadership schedule into September:
   Sunday July 19 2020 Rev Ian Sloan
   Sunday July 26 2020 Rev Ian Sloan
   Sunday August 2 2020 Rev Ian Sloan
   Sunday August 9 2020 Worship Team
   Sunday August 16 2020 Affirming Team
   Sunday August 23 2020 “Field Trip” Sunday
   Sunday August 30 2020 Foodgrains Sunday
   Sunday September 6 2020 Rev. Lynn Godfrey
   Sunday September 13 2020 Erin Poole
5. Our Sunday morning presentation desktop became inoperable due to a virus. We discovered this on Sunday morning. I am really proud of everyone who stepped up to make our gathering work last Sunday. Many thanks. We have rectified the problem and we’ll be ready for this Sunday.
6. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.
7. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.”

Hope to see you on Sunday ~ again, or for the first time.

Rev Ian

New Vision Notes Wed June 24 2020 For updates on New Vision plans in the Covid-19 emergency recovery, please visit http://newvisionunited.org/new-vision-covid-19-updates/ We are looking for donated electronic devices that can be used by participants in a New Vision setting in which a limited number of people gather at 24 Main W for virtual worship on Sundays. We imagine people without access to devices and/or the internet coming to 24 Main W on Sundays for 10:30 am and being given a device that allows them to get onto the internet and into our Zoom virtual worship gathering using our church wifi signal. They will safely social distance and screened as they come in for Covid-19 symptoms. Older mobile phones or laptops with wifi connectivity are what we are looking for. If you have any used ones around that you are not using suitable for this purpose and are willing either to donate or lend to New Vision, please contact George MacCuish at georgeamac@gmail.com. Beginning on Sunday July 19, Zoom will require us either to have attached a password (“passcode” in their language) to the internet link you use to get into our virtual worship gathering, or have you placed in a waiting room when you use a link that does not have a passcode. We then admit you from there into the virtual gathering “room.” Our plan is to use the waiting room feature rather than issue passcodes, and to treat the waiting room as a place in which someone welcomes you to the gathering. The Hamilton Spectator published a letter today I sent to the editors in response to the Hamilton Police Association’s June 19 letter on defunding police. You can read my letter here: https://www.thespec.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editors/2020/07/02/july-2-spec-readers-weigh-in-on-defunding-police-we-want-our-michaels-back-and-other-letters-to-the-editor.html This Sunday we will be celebrating communion. We will be making use of the break-out room feature for us to share the bread and the wine as small groups. Each of us will be able to serve each other and name each other as we do so. Eg, Tom says, “Sally, the body of Christ, broken for you,” and Frank then partakes of the beverage he has brought to the worship gathering. New Vision will be gathering for worship on Sundays on Zoom throughout the summer. We will keep in place our phone network to keep in touch with those who are not able to join us on the internet. We will have the schedule for you next week of worship leaders for the Sundays I am on vacation and study leave later in the summer. The weekly Wednesday at 4 pm Covid-19 lectio divina virtual prayer group will meet throughout July. Contact me at revian@newvisionunited.org for more information.Our Thursday Outreach Program remains on hold. Home baking individually wrapped is being highly appreciated by the guests at the Resting and Hygiene Centre! Keep it coming! The next concert in the Music Hall Do Well by Hamilton Live Stream Concert Series takes place Thursday July 9 at 8 pm. The artist is country blues singer/songwriter Jeremie Albino. For more on Jeremie, follow this link http://jeremiealbino.com/. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.Y ou can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.” Hope to see you on Sunday ~ again, or for the first time. Rev Ian

1. As Phase 2 in the Province’s recovery from the social and economic shut down takes hold in Hamilton New Vision is developing recovery plans.
2. Our intention is to enter into long-term development as beloved community as early as is practical in the return period. This intention will inform our decisions and actions through the recovery period we are now entering.
3. At this time New Vision’s priority is supporting the COVID-19 response uses of 24 Main W.: the Caremongering Supply Depot in the Lower Hall and the 7-days-a-week Resting and Hygiene Centre for People Sleeping Rough in the Music Hall upper and lower lobbies. There is no certainty yet regarding the length of time these responses will remain in place.
4. The Music Hall auditorium (the former sanctuary) is not suitable for our use as we enter into recovery from the COVID-19 emergency because it both heats up and is very poorly ventilated.
5. New Vision will thus be gathering for worship on Sundays on Zoom throughout the summer. We will keep in place our phone network to keep in touch with those who are not able to join us on the internet.
6. We are working on a plan to develop a congregate setting for limited numbers somewhere in 24 Main St. W that follows COVID-19 guidelines for those unable to access our virtual worship at home. We will have more details on this plan in the next few weeks.
7. Our Thursday Outreach Program remains on hold.
8. New Vision’s sixth anniversary worship gathering last Sunday June 21 was meaningful. Our guest speakers were coordinators and physician consultant of the Resting and Hygiene Centre for People Sleeping Rough. The New Vision Choir and our Music Leader Martine collaborated with others in the New Vision faith community to produce a “Here I am to Worship” music video, and Pippa sang and Erick accompanied her in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Love Changes Everything.”
9. This Sunday we are going to do a “flip service” in which we break up into small groups to think and talk about actions we can take to support Black Lives Matter as individuals and as a faith community.
10. Home baking individually wrapped is being highly appreciated by the guests at the Resting and Hygiene Centre! Keep it coming!
11. New Vision Virtual Worship is experiential, participatory, image-rich and collective, just like worship in person at New Vision! Join us on Sunday mornings 10:30 am week to week during the Covid-19 emergency by clicking here. If you want to put the link someplace easy to find each week, here it is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/782292511. Please share it with others and invite them to a “different” kind of time on Zoom from the usual.
12. You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 855 703 8985, then, when prompted, input the Meeting ID 782 292 511 followed by the # sign. Ignore the prompts for Participant ID and Password. You are in when the recorded voice says, “You are in the meeting.”

Hope to see you on Sunday ~ again, or for the first time.

Rev Ian