TLDR: I am thrilled and incredibly grateful to have been met with such support for our decision to return the 11:00am service to 11:15am. Read on to learn more about our plans to grow Christian fellowship through a full formation hour.

The prevailing wisdom in seminary is that change is extremely hard. You simply don’t mess with service times, you don’t move historic furniture from their customary places to create more space, you don’t close a service lightly, etc. The running joke in seminary goes like this, “How do you move a chair from the left side of the sanctuary to the right?” The answer, “you move it two inches to the right for twenty years, eventually everyone thinks it was always on the right side of the altar.” Now, there is a loophole to this prevailing wisdom: need. In other words, “Do not change a service time, unless you have to!”

When congregations confront too much change imposed from above, all at once, there are a number of responses: Some accept the changes enthusiastically and continue to engage in ministry, some resist the changes and throw in the towel (what can I do anyway?) often abandoning ministries they have done for years. Some resist the change, but go on as usual, secretly planning their revenge. Now, you will find no books where these theories can be proven, but this is my personal experience as someone who has been in ministry for many years. This is the reason why I was fairly nervous proposing a change in time for our 11:00am service. Now, I want to explain my reasoning in more clear language.

1. Saint Dunstan’s does not have a proper Adult Christian Formation hour, what traditionally is called, “Sunday School.” We have excellent programs for children and youth, but the time for adult study is truncated by a number of factors. The 9:00 am service ends at 10:10, and if we have a baptism, a particularly long piece of music, a longer than usual sermon, or a visiting clergy this can be 10:15 or 10:20. After the service is done, folks take some time to great the celebrants, get their coffee, find the Sunday School room, settle down… By then, it is already 10:25 to 10:30. The teacher begins his lesson, but half of the attendees leave at 10:55 because they have to go to the 11:00 service. Moving the service to 11:15AM grants the teacher the ability to have a class of 45 to 50 minutes.
2. Christian formation will be fundamentally important to the growth of the congregation as we move forward. We want to offer our traditional “Listening” and “Lectionary Bible Study” classes, but we intend to add three incredible offerings as well to the 10:20-11:05 Sunday School Hour: 
   1. “Clergy Musings” to replace the Tuesday Night Bible Musings, which was hard for people to attend. The Curate and the Rector will rotate in this classroom for those who want a deeper understanding of a small portion of Scripture. Offering this Sunday School class has been my dream since I came to Saint Dunstan’s, but I never had the time before.
   2. ESL (English as a Second Language) for anyone in our parish who wants to learn or improve the language.
   3. “Estudio Bíblico Para Adultos” (Adult Bible Study) taught by Fr. Alvaro Pinzon and myself (from time to time,) completely in Spanish for anyone who speaks the language, regardless of the service they attend.
3. For the great majority of the life of the parish that service was at 11:15AM, so rather than creating anything new, we are returning that service to its original schedule. The resurrection of the 11:15AM service allows us the opportunity to offer Sunday School for the 9:00, the 9:01, and 11:00 services, giving us the opportunity to get to know each other as we learn together and enjoy Christian fellowship. For those who do not want to attend a Sunday School class, coffee and refreshments will be provided in the Mace Room and they can spend the hour in fellowship with other parishioners.

I would like to end this blog by thanking all of you for your great support. When I presented this idea to the 11:00AM service this last Sunday, I received a round of applause, which I was not expecting. All at once, my anxiety was calmed and I saw the wisdom of my staff, who were the ones requesting this change.

If any of you have any questions or concerns about this change, please call me. We are planning to change the service time on August 27^th, which is the same day as the 9:01 change. This will give us two weeks to work out any kinks before the start of the program year on September 10^th. Once again, thank you all for your support,

In Jesus’s holy name,

Fr. Roman+