Thur Feb 24 2022
- We will begin in-person worship together at 24 Main W. again commencing this Sunday February 27 with the usual attention to social distancing, vaccination and masking. Our person limit will be 25 people.
- It seems that the currently subsiding omicron variant is not being replaced by any new Covid variant as threatening — we could be able fully to gather as a community again in worship in-person by Easter!
- We will keep you posted.
- We are saddened by the death of Helen Howard-Lock, Pippa’s mom and Erick’s mother-in-law, and Josh and Jacob’s grandmother, who became known to many at New Vision as “Sunshine” during our pandemic Sunday virtual worship gatherings. A loving obituary by her family is to be found here on the Kitching, Steepe and Ludwig Funeral Home (Waterdown) website. Visitation is Friday 3 pm – 5 pm at the funeral home and the funeral service will be held at St. James Anglican Church in Dundas at 1 pm Saturday. Pandemic gathering restrictions remain in place, so, to attend the visitation or funeral, please sign up on the funeral home website.
- On Tuesday The Hamilton Spectator published one of the fruits of our Intercultural Relationship Currency Project — a letter to editor I wrote this past week. Since the Spec has a paywall, I’ll post the letter here:
City hall racism
Regarding ‘End systemic racism at city hall’ (Feb. 14): I laud the clarity and urgency of the writer’s observations with respect to what “went down” at the Feb. 3 Audit Committee meeting of City Council. The newly hired Executive Director of the Hamilton Anti-Racism Resource Centre (HARRC), Lyndon George, encouragingly created space in response to Coun. Ferguson’s evident contempt for the various forms of criticism of the city and others demonstrated during the pandemic by activists in marginalized communities in Hamilton. George stated in response to Councillor Ferguson that collaboration across the many individuals and groups who continually experience racism is an important part of HARRC’s mandate, as is entering into the difficult and important conversations about social justice and intercultural experience with all authorities. I hope Mr. George includes New Vision United Church and other faith communities among these authorities, for there is no doubt faith communities across all cultures exercise a certain kind of civic authority in the community. But if that is not in his mandate, certainly I heard him in his remarks plan to address the Hamilton council in its secular authority. The difficult and important conversations he anticipates, in my experience, lead to joy and to better and more productive relationships.
Rev. Dr. Ian B. Sloan, New Vision United Church
- 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.
- You can also call in to the gathering on the telephone toll free. Call 1 647 374 4685, 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.
Hope to see you Sunday again, or for the first time –
Rev Ian