Attracted by sheer proximity, (I can walk to FCC) and that my favorite theologians regularly present the juiciest of Christian thought from its pulpit, I began to show up at First Congregational Church. One Sunday, I was sitting by myself and Richard was preaching in a way that I rarely, if ever, have heard. He was asking Christian people to be accountable politically...something about how no truly Christian nation could preemptively attack people. I clapped. I joined the choir that day. In a few months, I joined our church.
I’m deeply grateful that our ministry is inclusive and takes on the difficult task of sticking to Divine Justice. It has been my experience that most churches don’t.
FCC is a place of deep hospitality, a good fit for a house of worship. A small group of us requested some space for a community garden on FCC grounds and notice that the soil by the railroad tracks is tilled. Transition Hendersonville needed a place to meet for a Transition Handbook book study and we were welcomed into the fellowship hall. While we were meeting, Rick Bayless engaged the church in an energy audit and our church has been responsive to making our carbon footprint more responsible. ECO’s fundraiser needed plates for their Marvelous Malarkey annual fundraiser and it was FCC’s small plates that saved the day.
At present, the West Asheville Community Chorus has been meeting at FCC on Tuesday evenings. If you hear songs in Croatian, Georgian, Bosnian, South African, from the choir room, that is us. We will perform soon for the Hendersonville community and I hope you will come and enjoy our remarkable sound.
Pastor Weidler married our daughter in June. You don’t trust that sacred job to just anyone and my family is delighted to have Richard perform the ceremony.
My friends have been showing up at church because for one experience or another, they get how alive and loving and generous in Christ’s teachings we are. Given that much of the congregation is elderly, that kind of aliveness and love is very deliberate.
Diane Rhoades, Easter Sunday, April 24, 2011
