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GLEN WAVERLEY UNITING CHURCH

MEETING OF THE CONGREGATION

held in the Worship Centre at 11:30am on Sunday 31st August 2014 following a combined worship service.

Minutes

1. Welcome and Apologies

JacquiKing, ColinKing, HerbFleming, EvelynFleming, RossMackinnon, KayeMackinnon, GlennHunter, KatieHunter, StevenFraser, RayWagon, AlanCollins, ColinYates, ShirleyYates, WarrenBartlett, LorraineBartlett, DavidWilliams and ShirleyWilliams.

2. Prayer and Devotion

WarrenGreenwood shared a short devotion, reflecting on Rupa Singham’s story. Rupa was once asked, ‘At what age are you old’? She replied, ‘Old people look backwards and think about what was, Young people look forward to the new opportunities’. An opportunity to look forward to the new opportunities in our congregation and to think about those who are no longer attending here with us, and all they have given to us and to this congregation. Warren led us in a prayer.

3. Matters arising from the previous Minutes

Warren confirmed with the congregation that there were no items left from the previous meeting that need discussing that are not in today’s agenda.

4. Correspondence

None.

5. Missional Group Reports: Outreach Committee

Warren explained that the meeting structure is moving to a report from one missional group per meeting, to lessen the reporting load on these groups and make sure that meetings are energised and not too long. Reports are currently available on the wiki, in NewView and when an event is happening, there is the opportunity for announcements from the missional groups. There was a short discussion around this method, with some feeling that once a year is not often, and others noting the availability of the reports online at any time.

AndrewHosking presented the Missional Group Report (attach), with a series of video ‘cameos’ representing groups from around the church.

These included:

• Outreach in the HUB, JanClear: 15 months ago there were a few new arrivals to Australia coming to the hub and were struggling with English, so the team put together a properly structured English classes, with attendance of around 10, and three volunteer tutors every Thursday 11.15am - 12.15pm.

• Outreach in UCAF, GeraldineFleming: last UCAF event had 140 people, with the funds raised being split between water tanks and other causes, Margaret Duncan: events and a trading table have raised funds for Frontier Services, Flying Doctor, Uniting Care, Groceries to CARA or Broadmeadows and several other causes.

• Outreach in Habitat for Humanity, LynMcDonald: GWUC has had over 5 years involvement with this project, building houses for people in need, and following the bushfires, have worked on Habitat’s Brush with Kindness program, clearing land and building houses/gardens.

• Outreach with Uniting Voices, BarbaraHurst: Over the last two years, Uniting Voices has contributed their musical gifts to the ANZAC day service at Cumberland View organised by Evan Laidlaw.

6. Combined Report from Ministry Team

NeilPeters presented the team report (attached).

BelindaClear shared that she has been in a period of discernment for the last 18 months, and as a result of this process, she has been approached by Pakenham Uniting Church to see if she was interested in working as a Children and Family’s Worker. Belinda will work 10 hrs a week at Pakenham, starting from October, and until the end of 2014, she will continue with her 10 hrs a week at GWUC. Following that Belinda will not be seeking renewal at GWUC and will be moving to Pakenham. Neil led us in a prayer for Belinda and Warren passed on from the congregation our excitement and congratulations for Belinda in her new role.

7. Open Forum

Warren introduced the idea of the forum – a chance for anyone in the congregation to bring a question to the meeting, to make sure all processes are transparent and communication is clear. Warren then opened the floor to the congregation.

• "Will we continue with both 9.15 and 11am morning services?"

NeilPeters responded that he has had this question from many people. One of the things affirmed in recent visioning meetings is the diversity of worship options, but there wasn’t discussion as such that anyone particularly wanted to combine services. Neil’s personal view is that the diversity of services is the way we can grow the congregation overall. His previous experience is that when services are combined, people are not satisfied with the balance of components (e.g. band/organ). John Hurst added that he believes we can affirm the diversity, and that separate services do not mean we have to operate in silos, encouraging congregation members to visit a range of services.

There were no other questions.

8. Presentation of Financial Statements for year 2013

AshleyIrvine presented our budget for the first six months (attached) – an idea of where we are tracking for this calendar year. The open plate giving (which is hard to predict) was not as large as expected, but there were also less expenses than expected, leaving us just a few thousand short in income relative to expenses. There was a question about the expense of the solar panels – this money has came out of the deferred maintenance reserve. There was also a question on the number of placements relative to the income and any decisions or actions that the congregation should make in response to this. Warren responded that the congregation has no vacancy at GWUC according to presbytery. When Rosemary resigned, the position ceased to exist. Ashley added that the current budget does not incorporate a third position. A further question was raised regarding the role of the bequest committee. Ashley responded that there have been a number of deposits over the last six months (exact figures are not at hand). Church council has not allocated the funds, given the visioning program is still in progress. The meeting thanked Ashley for his work and report.

9. Reports and Recommendations

9.1. COP report/recommendations

(A typo in the hand-out was noted: $169,000 should be $16,900 per year rent in the Outer Eastern Support Network of Lentara UnitingCare - Asylum Seeker Project description.)

The proposed allocation of funds from the 2014 GWUC Fete was presented by AlanBarnard and SharonHarper-Wilkinson. Alan thanked StevenFraser, who is currently away on work, for his work on the committee. There were COP requests for $44,285, with a budget of around $20,000 to allocate. The recommendation is to allocated them as per (attached).

It was noted that the small discrepancies between the overhead screen and the hand-out are due to the $1,100 carried over from late donations to the fete last year, which has now been distributed between the projects. It was also noted that for the Vanuatu project – the committee allocated one year’s training and hope they will re-apply for the future years in 2015 and 2016.

There was some discussion regarding the allocation of funds locally and internationally. Some were concerned that the allocations locally were less. Andrew Hosking responded that they noticed this imbalance in the requests and placed phone calls to local and past applicants in the days before the deadline, but did not hear back from these organisations. There was discussion on both the importance of looking after local causes that might not otherwise receive support and the huge impact that funds can make in addressing need overseas. There was also discussion on the opportunities to give to local projects individually. It was noted that there were no projects submitted to the COP committee within Glen Waverley. There was also discussion on the number of projects to receive funding, whether it would be better in the future to give larger amounts to fewer organisations (in case some projects require the full budget to be filled in order to go ahead). Stephen Emms asked if, in a future meeting, we could have an overview of the church’s entire contribution to all outreach projects, not just the COP funding from the Fete, over the past year. Warren will talk with Steve to discuss how this could be done.

The proposed allocation of funds was approved by consensus. Warren thanked the COP committee for their work. Warren also suggested that he could put together a document on some of the priorities and thoughts of the meeting on allocation of funds for future committees.

9.2. Church Council Report

HelenStewart presented the report from Church Council. Helen first presented the GWUC Organic Vision Document, an evolving, growing vision, highlighting the Biblical Narrative section and how the scriptures inform and enable our vision. Helen also explained the two internal and two external priorities in the document. Internal: 1. Continue to build connectedness and genuine community, 2. To nurture faith development, sharing, questioning and exploration. External: 3. Kingsway ministry, 4. Raising Glen Waverley Uniting Church’s profile, by serving our local community. She also spoke on the ministry questions in the document – keeping our identified ministry areas within the questions in the document, for example, relating the project to our vision.

Helen encouraged the congregation to read the document (possible via the wiki and through the office, or in person from Judy Lowe today), a product of many months work, and provide feedback before the 28th of September. Around October, a special congregational meeting will be held to discuss this document.

Helen also noted that Church Council will shortly receive a report from the Bequest Committee (KenDevos, HelenBoucher and RogerVass), in response to questions earlier in the meeting.

9.3. Future Planning report

MarkEaston reported on the planned giving process - ‘Growing faith, reaching community’. The process will begin on 5th, 12th and 19th October (the day after the Fete).

9.4. Human Resources report

Helen informed the meeting that church council is putting forward a recommendation that a HR committee is put together. This committee would assist church council in HR matters including OHR and risk management, which are becoming more onerous due to the government legislation and Synod rules. Council does not have the time or expertise to do these justice and it would be better that they focus on spiritual direction, not legal/administrative matters. KenCoutts has put together a document for church council and having been through Council, this item will come to the next Congregational meeting.

9.5. Communications report

AaronBlakemore showed the congregation the new Glen Waverley Uniting Church website, which will go live in 6-8 weeks, complete with social media integration, podcasts etc. Warren thanked Aaron for all his work on the site.

9.6. Presbytery report

JohnHurst and AlisonClarkson are currently our presbytery representatives. Reports on presbytery are available at (link). In future meetings, this report will be moved further up in the agenda.

10. Benediction

ElwynPederson led us in grace, before a shared lunch.