June 17, 2021
I was glad when they said unto me,
“Let us go to the house of the Lord!”
Psalm 122:1
My Dear Doubters of Great Faith,
It is with a mixture of great joy, anticipation, and relief that I bring to you the great good news that this Sunday, June 20, the congregation of St. Thomas the Apostle Church will finally, after a long sojourn throughout the desert of COVID-19, go into our “House of the Lord,” that place where so many of you have worshipped, and celebrated, and grieved, and lost, and found, and met God, in so many different ways, for so many years! The long winter is over; spring is finally here! And for that, we can sing our joy with the psalmist David!
As of Monday, June 14, Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins lowered the COVID-19 threat level to “yellow” for Dallas County, saying this applies only to the unvaccinated. Vaccinated individuals are now able to return to normal life.
As a result, we will return to worship in the Nave, remembering that there are still those among us who are not eligible to be vaccinated, particularly those under the age of 12 (our dear Henry, for one!). So, we will continue with several components of our COVID-19 protocol for the foreseeable future.
- We will continue with our current worship schedule, including Zoom worship at 9 am and in-person worship in the Nave at 10:30 am.
- Registration for attendance will no longer be required.
- Masks and social distancing will no longer be required; however, please remain sensitive to those who need to or wish to remain masked and socially distanced.
- Attendees will need to register when they arrive for contact tracing purposes.
- Temperatures will continue to be taken to screen for temps 100 or above.
- We will continue with communion in one kind, however, we will no longer utilize pre-package wafers.
As you may recall, the Vestry authorized the installation of “air scrubbers” in the HVAC equipment in both the Parish Hall and Nave, and so the same quality of air that we have benefitted from in our previous services will continue.
I believe we are now at a point in the pandemic where we can come back together safely and worship in the ways our parish has grown so wonderfully accustomed. That being said, we will continue to honor what works best for each person as best we can, and so, we will continue our virtual offerings for those who are not yet comfortable worshipping in person. And for those who wish to come but continue to remain masked and/or socially distanced, those wishes will be honored as well. We are working at putting all of the various ministries back in place, such as Eucharistic Ministers, Visitors, Acolytes, etc., and so I urge your patience as we bring the different guilds back on line. I promise we will get where everyone wants to go!
This really is a joy-filled time, and I am so excited that we are on the cusp of the new day that we all have been dreaming of for so many, many months for our beloved parish.
For I really was glad when they said unto me, “We’re going into the house of God!”
Yours in joy,
Fr. Christopher+
