Dear Friends,
Many people have been wondering what the idea/plan is behind the move to expand our yellow house. Here’s the explanation I can give so far.
The Hillsdale community has been the favored place for priest synods, conferences, Seminary classes and retreats for many years. As we look at the congregations across North America we can see that we are in the best location to provide a real center of activity, so that more of us can gather together to work, celebrate, create, meet, have conversations, learn and cultivate Christian Community. There is a perceived need for a Conference/ Retreat center.
One imagination is that we could expand the “yellow house” to include a larger kitchen, dining space, meeting space and a “dormitory” where people could stay. Maybe we can retain the cozy house feeling in the old living room with the fireplace. We don’t want to lose our “identity” in this expansion! We want to become “hosts” for visitors, in a gracious and abundant way.
Obviously, many questions come into the foreground:
How would this addition affect our congregation?
Will there be a manager to monitor the use, cleaning and renting of the space once it is built
How do we know that enough people want this to happen?
Whom will it serve?
How will the money for it be raised?
I would hope that our congregation would be excited about such an idea. I think that such a space could bring more people/ activity to our church. I do not think that it would have a great effect on our sacramental or congregational life. It might just bring more people to church.
We would surely have to hire someone to manage the building, rentals, etc...
I have spoken about this idea to the Regional Board on more than one occasion. They seem very positive about this idea. Many people in other congregations are also enthusiastic about it. We won’t really know how many people are behind it until we have a capital campaign and see if the idea can be supported.
It would serve the congregations of North America, first and foremost. Secondly, it would serve groups of people who come to the area for artistic workshops, Biodynamic farming, Spiritual Science studies and the like, to provide living space for participants.
It would also provide a better place for our own congregation to have festivals, potlucks and gatherings, as we continue to grow and expand.
It might also serve a home school group or two. The possibilities are quite open.
Once we have the feeling that our people in the Hillsdale congregation are behind the idea, and that we have fleshed out an imagination of the new space to the point where architectural drawings can be made, then we would have to hire a person to run a capital campaign to raise the money. We would need many conversations in order to have our congregation fully on board before we would begin anything.
Please feel free to come to me with any questions you may have. But better yet, come to the meeting on Sunday, Whitsun, and let’s find out what the future is bringing towards us!
With all good wishes,
Carol Kelly