Stewardship of the Rectory

Stewardship of the Rectory

On Sunday, March 13th at 2:00 PM, one hundred twenty-one parishioners and some guests met to discuss and vote on whether to sell the church rectory located at 40 Main Street in Essex. Following the opening prayer and procedural steps of this special called meeting, the floor opened up for discussion and parishioners shared their respective opinions. After the ballots were cast and counted, it was determined by a vote of 101 to 19 to sell the rectory. As per diocesan protocol, the issue of the rectory will now be forwarded to the Diocese of Connecticut for approval.

The Wardens and Vestry members wish to thank everyone who attended the Vestry meetings when this matter was discussed, everyone who attended and who participated in the forums, all who attended and participated in this special meeting, and all who took the time to write or otherwise share their opinions about this matter. We also wish to thank Scott Konrad, Jim Richmond, Bob Scherrer, Bill Scharfenstein, and Matt DuHaine for the considerable time and effort they put into researching this issue, and for presenting their material to the congregation for discernment. We also want to thank Canon Jack Spaeth from the diocesan office for making four trips to St. John’s: his first to make a presentation and answer questions for the Vestry in November; his second and third to make presentations and answer questions at the two forums in January; and his fourth to come and be present at this March meeting to answer any questions should they arise (which they did). Most of all, we wish to thank everyone who has held this issue in their prayers and for the hard work of discernment that has taken place over the past year.

We will continue to keep the congregation apprised as to how this project is progressing through the newsletters, E-news, church bulletins, and verbal announcements on Sunday mornings (when necessary).