Borough resident Shirley Gerhardt, 88, remembers her early days at the Christ Episcopal Church on Totowa Road. She started going there as a teenager.
“My father used to say I spent more time there than I spent at home because I used to do yard work in the garden, planted plants and all kinds of stuff, in addition to actually worshiping there,” Gerhardt said.
She would go on to represent the church before the Diocese Council, which with the working group that governs the church, and last week recalled some of the outreach efforts that the church conducted in its prime.
Going from a dead church to EFM speaks volumes. He can indoctrinate lay people in the things he learned in seminary that contribute to the closing of churches. They will learn that scripture is the evolving record of man’s understanding of God, our stories are stories just like those in scripture and theological reflection involves the blending of these stories. I have a friend who quit EFM after studying Leviticus, The leader said that it was a xenophobic, cultic, tract. He asked why they had wasted time on it and received no answer.
Income about 80K until 2011 when it dropped to 40K. Steady decline from 40 ASA to less than 20 in 2011. Diocese of Newark.
[blockquote] Although the Episcopal church is closing, she hopes that its building will remain intact. “We just hope that it doesn’t get torn down and turned into a mall or something,” Gerhardt said. [/blockquote]
Good luck lady. As TEC continues to lose more parishioners and more income, that is exactly what will happen. Your parish church is just a speed bump on TEC’s road to “modernity”.
Hey, it might end up as a mosque.