What's happening? Recap of Pr. Mark's adult forum on March 12
Between worship services on March 12, I (Pr. Mark) led another session where people can gather to simply ask questions about what is happening in the church. Here is a brief recap of the questions and the discussion. As always, please come to these sessions if you can, it is a great way to stay in the loop! Membership: how is it going? 2022 saw the first net increase in membership at St. Olaf in years. Due to demographics, we will almost always have more funerals than transfers and baptisms combined, but not in 2022. More important than membership though is engagement. The number of people engaging in our ministries is slowly but surely increasing. An anecdote: In Advent, for our Wednesday worship services, we would have between 40-55 people present. This Lent, through the first two weeks, we are averaging over 100 in worship. Not just the confirmands and their mentors, we have more people present. There is a meal served ...