During my childhood, school started on the Wednesday after Labor Day. We counted on summer ending on a specific Tuesday. The moment of transition was predictable, certain.
It’s mid-August. Students have already returned to classrooms. At a summer listening tour stop, a high school student hesitated to say his year in school but then asserted: I’m a junior because I’m no longer a sophomore. Alas, a transition is not confined to a single day. Endings and beginnings are hard to pinpoint.
The NACCC, like its member churches, knows enduring transition. As a concrete example, we are implementing new accounting procedures, intentionally disrupting routine to increase efficiency. Other changes are subtle. Congregations miss members who once occupied the pews. Neighbors have needs previous generations would not have imagined. Amid abiding transition, support of one another, collaboration, can be our constant.
