Today, for the first time, people in Western Australia will take part in Lent Event. There’s a sense of anticipation in the air… Sarah Mummé, Justice and Mission Officer from WA, writes about what it’s like to be part of the National Movement.
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or over 40 congregations in Western Australia, 2012 will be the first year they have taken part in Lent Event.
The thing I see as the greatest strength of Lent Event, and the reason I’ve been so passionate about getting WA congregations involved, is Lent Event’s ability to contribute towards the building of communities. As I’ve said to anyone over the last 4 months who has (perhaps naively) given me a few minutes to talk to them about getting involved in Lent Event — Lent Event is a program all about community building, both internationally and locally.
Here’s what I mean:
- Building our international community — Lent Event provides an opportunity for participants to make connections with, and grow their understanding of, the life and faith experiences of the Uniting Church in Australia’s partner churches in developing countries like the Philippines, Zambia, East Timor and PNG.
- Building the national church community — WA often feels like it’s a really long way away from the rest of Australia. So, sometimes it’s nice to have a reminder that we are a part of a bigger, national, Australian, church. Lent Event helps with this — there’s 800+ communities across Australia all exploring the same themes and messages at the same time, and it feels pretty awesome to be a part of it!
- Building your local community — when you’ve got multiple congregations in one geographic all participating in Lent Event, there are all sorts of opportunities for building connections and community! It’s about lay leaders and ministers of different congregations finding ways to work together —to run joint services/Bible studies/events, or to support one another through the share resources and enthusiasm. Finding such opportunities can only strengthen those congregations (and the church more broadly) in the long term!
- Building your congregation community — A key community building activity within a congregation comes from the need for congregation members to support one another as they give something from their daily life up for Lent (and I don’t necessarily mean eating all the chocolate yourself so that they don’t feel tempted by it). Suddenly, everyone in a participating congregation has something in common. A point of connection. Something to talk about. It’s pretty powerful when you start to think about it…
From the conversations I’ve had with participating congregations and groups, each has taken up Lent Event in their own way. Lent Event provides a pretty comprehensive set of resources — Bible studies, worship resources and children’s ministry resources, so it’s well suited both to congregations who like to have a full set of resources provided, and to those who like to pick and choose from the resources to suit their own particular congregation’s style of worship/study.
Here in WA, each congregation or group participating in Lent Event has found ways to make the program suit their own particular context — location, size, available time and skills. Some are running Bible studies. Others are using the worship material on Sundays. Some are using the worship materials and hosting Bible studies. Some are running movie nights with other congregations in their local area, have invited international mission volunteers to come and speak to them about their experiences, or are holding a water walk.
When it comes to Lent Event, I think there’s a lot to be excited about! For congregations taking on Lent Event this year, I’m really hopeful that they will experience Lent Event as the energising and life-giving program that it has the potential to be. What a wonderful way to lead into the season of Easter!
[...] Article originally published: http://unitingworld.org.au/blogs/its-all-go-in-the-west/ [...]