Open door July/August 2015
Letter
Table of Contents
from the
Editors
1
Kate Nintcheu
Story is everything. Ask me the story of my name or of my birth and I will smile and spill them out. Christians and Jews are suckers for stories: Creation (heck, we like this one so much we stuffed two of them into the first two chapters of Genesis), the tower of Babel, Noah and the flood, freedom from bondage in Egypt, Joseph with his coat of many colors. And Moses, why he is God’s best story teller. Whenever the ancient people of Israel doubted God and panicked (which they did a lot), Moses would sit them down and tell them the stories of God’s abiding love for them. He would remind them of the times God came to their rescue. And the retelling and remembering of these stories were enough to pluck up their courage and recharge their hope and get their old feet moving again. Stories have power. For Christians, it is Jesus who is God’s best story and the Jesus story is told by some of the best story tellers ever: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. As Christians we are bound together by stories of magi and angels, shepherd abiding and Good Samaritans doing good. At the center of our corporate lives as Christians is the story of the multiplication of loaves and fishes, the healing of blind Bartemaus, the Last Supper and, not least, an early morning, sunrise breakfast on the beach with Jesus serving as cook and host.
Telling Stories Amy Perry
Featured
2
Bee Happy Lois Corman
4
Spiritual Calling Joyce Akintola
6
Embracing the Here & Now Kathleen Simone
Savor and linger over the stories in this issue of Open Door. Stories of Old South Church Christians engaged in spinning out the stories of their lives intentionally, Christianly, beautifully and poignantly. And your story? If you were writing for this issue of Open Door, what story would you tell?
Ministry Spotlight
Opinion
8
Mouth-house
Rev. Nancy Taylor
EDITORIAL Amy Perry
EDITOR & PUBLISHER
Chris Breen CHAIR, COMMUNICATIONS COMMITTEE: David Albaugh, Brian Fluharty, Chris Breen, Jackie Geilfuss, Jim Hood, Amy Perry, Corey Spence, Nancy Taylor, William Wei
Old South Church in Boston 645 Boylston Street, Boston, MA 02116 Ph. (617) 536-1970 OldSouth.org Facebook.com/OldSouthChurch | @OSCboston
CREDITS Cover, 1 Brian Fluharty 3, 6 Used by permission from the author
Open door 1
ministry spotlight
Children & Family Ministries Welcomes Glennon Doyle Melton Kate Nintcheu
The parents of Old South Church receive a newsletter from Children and Family ministries every week. In it, I remind them that we’re here on Sunday, announce upcoming events and opportunities, and I link to a few articles that I think they might find useful as parents. I realized this past winter that nearly every single week I was including an article from the blog called Momastery.com, written by Glennon Doyle Melton. She has a way of speaking the truth in love that cuts across age, race, socioeconomic levels, and touches a place inside where you say, “Oh Yes! That’s how I feel too!” She’s honest about her own struggles to be an adult, a parent, a partner, and a Christian with a mixture of contagious selfawareness and hysterical attitude. In my newsletters, I started referring to her as “our friend Glennon.” On June 30, 2015, our friend Glennon joined 850 of her closest Boston friends in Old South Church’s sanctuary for an evening of stories and encouragement. She began by sharing her journey of recovery, and how it is the deepest valleys, the “rock bottom” that she came to embrace not with shame, but with gentleness. Once you accept that you have hit rock bottom, then you can see what you have that can never be taken away. God’s love is one of those things, she reminded us. Glennon shares her uniquely charming message of progressive Christianity and encouragement across America every day through her blog, her non-profit Women Rising, and her book, Carry On, Warrior.
Telling Stories
Compiled by Amy Perry
Old South Church started with 28 members – our original founders. Over the course of nearly 350 years, we have welcomed thousands of men and women into the special covenant of church membership. Our impressive ranks include well-known figures like Samuel Adams, William Dawes, and Phillis Wheatley who are raised up and celebrated. But what of the men and women whose likeness may not be carved in stone or immortalized in a poem? Will we ever hear their stories? Following is a sampling of the lesserknown stories of Old South Church. Some are tragic, others interesting. Everyone has a story. What’s yours? In 1712, Jonathan Wardell wed Frances Cook, heir to Boston’s Orange Tree Inn. With their marriage, proprietorship of the inn fell to Wardell. That same year, he set up the first coach for hire stand in Boston outside of the Orange Tree. Ever the enterprising business, in 1716, the Inn became the starting point for the stage coach to Newport, RI. Sisters Patience and Abiah Folger were early members of the church. Though Abiah [Franklin] is best remembered as Benjamin’s mom, the sisters’ family has bragging rights of its own. The Folgers of Nantucket are early ancestors of ... The Best Part of Wakin’ Up! ... Folgers Coffee. Gen. John Winslow enjoyed a long career in the military and local militia. As a young man, John was the first person to identify the body of slain Dr. Joseph Warren following the Battle of Bunker Hill in 1775. During the Siege of Boston, Gen. George Washington was headquartered in Cambridge. The house he used was later named the Longfellow House for its other famous resident. Mary Kettel, who joined Old South in 1727, was a member of Washington’s staff. On October 4, 1689, Capt. Samuel Pease and Lt. Benjamin Gallop, aboard their armed sloop the “Mary”, defeated a band of pirates in Martha’s Vineyard Sound. Pease was mortally wounded. Old South Church collected “21 pounds, 4 shillings, and 6 money” for Pease’s widow and their four children. On July 3, 1728, a dispute led to drawn swords between Old South Church baptizand Henry Phillips and Benjamin Woodbridge. The next day, Woodbridge’s lifeless body was discovered on Boston Common. Phillips fled Boston never to return. This altercation is considered the first fatal duel in America.
2 Open door
bee Happy
Lois Corman
I didn’t set out to be a beekeeper. My intention in 2011 was just to cover the bare ground in my front yard where the crabgrass had died. My parents were vegetable gardeners on a large scale, so I decided to be a vegetable gardener on a small scale. I started the project with two dump trucks full of soil. Gardening books were full of recommendations on digging up or Roto-tilling the existing yard or, for the lazy, laying down several layers of cardboard, covering the cardboard with compost, watering, layering with soil, waiting, etc. I out-lazied the lazy person’s method; I just dumped the dirt in the yard and then spread it out. What to grow and how to do so did not take much thought either: throw some manure and compost on the ground in the spring, plant the vegetable seeds or nursery seedlings, weed occasionally, avoid all pesticides, hope for the best, and harvest the food when it was ready. Other people might have considered planting grass or maybe flowers, but my heart has always been in my stomach. The day I found the toad under the zucchini leaf, my sights broadened. He was plump and looked quite content. Suddenly, I wasn’t growing veggies just to cover a patch of dirt and maybe get a few decent-tasting tomatoes, I was creating a diverse wildlife habitat. Our family wasn’t the only one fed by our garden—the local bunnies, bugs, and butterflies ate their share. (Lots of people think that they want butterflies in their garden; fewer are willing to accept the damage that very hungry caterpillars inflict.) To widen the welcome, I stopped removing the milkweed
that comes up every year, in case a monarch butterfly wanted to lay some eggs. I could see the wide variety of plant life bringing in additional animals, both large and small. Just as important, I knew that the garden was nourishing the microbes, nematodes, worms, and fungi in the soil as well. It’s only eight-hundredths of an acre, a speck in the universe, but I was doing my best to repair this section of the world. Doing my best meant both acquiring actual scientific knowledge of agriculture, ecology, and soil science and nurturing my desire to do the unglamorous chores that are required. The annual Flower Show is the place to go for inspiration. While strolling the 2014 Boston Flower Show with a friend, we walked past a vendor of beekeeping services. “Wouldn’t that be fun!” we exclaimed. Ten minutes later, I was pulling out my credit card for a hive, starter bees, and a year of beekeeping services. It’s an awkward thing to tell your spouse that you’ve just spent a non-trivial amount of money on an impulse buy. But David is an accommodating sort, and only asked (hopefully?) whether the hive might violate Arlington zoning regulations. It doesn’t. We prepared for the bees’ arrival. The beekeepers came out to pick a site for the hive, level the ground, and install an empty hive. Our binoculars were on the screened back porch so that we could watch the bees from a safe distance. My daughter, who had never experienced a bee
Open door 3
sting, made plans for carrying an Epi-pen with her in the yard, just in case. Right around Patriots’ Day, the bees arrived in a van with several small boxes in the back. Each small box contained about 10,000 bees. Our little box of bees was unceremoniously dumped into the hive and that was it. Within a week, the Epi-pen was forgotten, David and Ali were watching the bees from five feet away, and I had acquired a reputation as the neighborhood crazy bee lady. I spent many hours stretched out on the grass in front of the hive, peering in as best I could. I brought out a footstool to sit as close as possible. If you don’t interfere with the bee’s flight pattern (a straight line into the hive), it turns out that they don’t much care how close you are. There’s so much to observe, and the longer you watch, the more fascinating it is. Who knew that pollen comes in so many colors, including blue and neon pink? And who knew that bees re-enact Monty Python’s “bring out your dead” sketch on a routine basis? Sometimes you see a guard bee trying to keep a wasp out. If the weather is agreeable, the bees are busy flying out to collect another few drops of nectar or water. But no matter how busy any given bee is, she doesn’t leave much of a tangible legacy: during her lifetime she brings back to the hive enough nectar to make one-twelfth of a teaspoon of honey. That’s not much. Honeybees are in trouble throughout the world. Part of the problem is the spread of a nasty parasite, the varroa
mite. Varroa mites caused the death of my 2014 hive in late November. I mourned the loss, and started again with new bees this spring. Varroa mites are not the only problem facing bees. Modern agricultural practices are antithetical to the needs of bees for a variety of nectar and pollen sources unpolluted by insecticides and available to them over the entire growing season. In fact, honeybees do much better in cities than in the country. This seems both deeply sad and profoundly wrong. Over 60% of the hives in the U.S. are trucked to California just for the two-week period when the almond trees are in bloom. Imagine that. Why did we set up a system that turns roughly 90% of the U.S. honeybees in managed hives into migrant farm workers? I meditate on all this as I walk around my garden and sit with my bees. I do this every morning, looking around the garden to see what has blossomed in the past day, what is almost out, what needs to be removed. Then I go sit with the bees for several minutes. Many days I come back in the afternoon to sit some more. The hum of the hive is comforting, and its smell is delicious. This is as close to how honeybees should live as is possible in the modern world. They have a stable home, and ready access to wholesome food. If only people had the same advantages.
About the Author Lois Corman gardens and sews in Arlington Heights under the watchful eyes of her cats, Belle and Jazzy.
4 Open door
Joyce Akintola
Open door 5
M
emories of my Sunday school experience were always full of joy, love and contentment. These memories remained intact and I presumed them universal to all Sunday schools until I visited the Northern city of Kaduna in Nigeria, West Africa. It was disheartening to witness people of God that are committed Christians praying and fasting daily, but lacking the fundamental resources of updated Christian books. This was a sharp contrast to my environment here in Boston where many church libraries have an abundance of books that are easily replaced as needed while some churches have so many books that appear to be collecting dust. The Christians in Kaduna truly hungered for the things of God despite the hostile environment and potential threats against their safety and that of their loved ones. In my heart I felt a spiritual calling to help the churches in Kaduna and started looking for ways to help provide Sunday school resources to them. I procured copies of David C. Cook’s NIV Bible Lesson Commentary along with other beneficial resources and started shipping the materials through a trusted friend on a yearly basis. So began my Christian commitment for the past 14 years of shipping more than 1,000 Sunday school books and resources to Kaduna regularly and the blessings of God on this undertaking have been more than expected. I discovered through handwritten notes and letters sent from recipients over the years how very important these books are to both Christian and even Muslim adults and children in Kaduna. A natural curiosity arose about the Bible stories, a curiosity that can only be seen in children. But among the adults there was also a spiritual hunger, people took clear satisfaction in reading about matters of the spirit. People would even read aloud to those who were illiterate. This enthusiasm and spread of the Word of God encouraged me to increase the numbers of books sent and to also source out other inexpensive expedient shipping methods. I strongly believe that when we accept the calling of the Holy Spirit to do the Lord’s work, not only the big projects are impactful but also the small incremental projects make a significant difference and draw people to the kingdom of God. I am reassured by Acts 1:8 (NIV), “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” In all my small efforts and doings, the Lord is using me to reach His people right here in Boston, other states within the United States and even as far away as in Kaduna, Nigeria. I am able to continue not by my power but simply for the Grace of God. I consider myself so blessed and highly favored that giving back even in small amounts seems like the right thing to do. I wake up every day and ask the Lord for Grace and wisdom to be of use and purpose in any way that He chooses to use me.
Just as with anything we work on daily, there are always disappointments or road blocks that present themselves to discourage me or make it all the more difficult to send the books to Nigeria. For example, the shipping costs have increased significantly since I started this service. At times, the cost of shipping can be significantly higher than the expenses of procuring the books. Once the books are in Nigeria, in some cases they have been tampered with or destroyed by those in opposition to the spreading of the Word of God. These obstacles force me to source out more sophisticated shipping options and potentially pay more. The poverty of the Christian community in Kaduna and the stranglehold the Muslim neighbors have on the economy has made the procurement of Christian commentaries including children’s books for Sunday school well-nigh impossible by the Christians themselves. Nevertheless I am encouraged to continue my missionary work because of my favorite benediction in Deuteronomy 6:4-25. A prayer from The New Century Hymnal sums up the thrust of these key verses that begin with the “great commandment” (6:4-5; Mark 12:29-30) to love God above all else with all our heart, soul, and might. “May you love God so much that you love nothing else too much; May you fear God enough that you need fear nothing at all.” (Hymnal #874) This outlook breaks the grip of any possessiveness that inhibits generosity; this has become a part of my daily morning devotion. Because of my love for the things of God, I am encouraged daily to continue His work in my little way of being a witness to the masses and living my purpose each and every single day. As time passes and newer versions of the Sunday school commentaries and other materials are released, it has been exciting and encouraging to see increasing numbers of children’s Bible stories that have a multicultural illustration approach. It is powerful that the children can relate easily to the illustrations and see the potential of God’s work in their own lives regardless of their environment and circumstances. I have also been amazed at the kindness of many Good Samaritans who donate to the cause in one way or the other. Their willingness to be compassionate towards the work that I am doing for the Lord encourages me daily and pushes me to want to give more as the Lord helps me. This whole exercise reminds me constantly, that we can live the Christian life in so many ordinary ways by just the simplest of actions. I thank God that I am blessed with the certainty that God is still using ordinary people to do His will and I am blessed to be one of His chosen vessels. Indeed it is my soul’s desire to serve the Lord and I shall continue as long as I am able to.
About the Author Joyce Akintola has been a member of Old South since 1996. She volunteers throughout Boston at shelters for unhoused women, including The Women’s Lunch Place.
6 Open door
embracing the
Here & Now Kathleen Simone
In the last four and a half years, since becoming a mother, I have started to learn what it means to live intentionally, to consider my daily choices in light of God’s call to love God, my neighbor, and myself, and to understand my decisions in terms of how they affect my relationships with God and all those both near and far whose lives touch mine. I have started to learn how to live “in the moment” in order to give full attention to the people I am with now. I try not to allow my worries for the future to overtake my ability to embrace today’s joys and face today’s challenges. One of my favorite Bible verses is Mathew 6:34, “So do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.” If I worry too much about my future and my children’s futures, I run the risk of ignoring the current needs of my neighbors and their children. If I worry too much about the future, I also forget to be grateful to God for today’s blessings. Like many first-time expectant moms, I read a great deal while pregnant about the importance of breastfeeding. In the hospital after Alessia was born, she nursed very little. She preferred sleep. The nurses encouraged me to keep trying. They said she was latching on correctly and would wake up more each day. Once we got home though, she wanted to sleep all the time, and when I did get her to wake up enough to nurse, she fell right back into deep sleep. In her first week of life, she lost over 19% of her body weight. Her skin became wrinkly as her body began to consume her subcutaneous fat. It was very frightening. When we started feeding her formula she started to gain weight. I tried pumping, but I produced very little milk, and once Alessia had a full belly she went from being sleepy to needing to be held all the time. I couldn’t figure out how I was going to pump milk and hold her once my husband went back to work. So I stopped pumping as well. I felt so guilty. I had failed at my first job as a mom, and according to many voices out there I was failing her future as well. I was very lucky to have a doctor who encouraged my efforts at breastfeeding, but also assured me that Alessia would be fine either way. At a certain point I realized that rather than feel guilty about not being able to breastfeed my baby, I needed to be grateful that I lived in a time and a place where formula was available and safe. I also realized that some of what I was feeling was not guilt, but regret at having to give up my own ideal of breastfeeding. For the sake of my relationships with Alessia, God, and myself, I had to let go of that regret.
Open door 7
I consoled myself thinking that it would only be a year dealing with formula and bottles. At six months, I introduced Alessia to solids. The first attempt was classic. The eager baby face and open mouth, followed by the tongue thrust out and the face twisted in disgust. At the second attempt she gagged and threw up. Alessia had both reflux and a very sensitive gag reflex, and at a year, she still wasn’t eating solid foods. Every two months she was checked by the doctor and weighed. She continued to grow, although a little more slowly. My mother worried. Our friends worried. And at first Adam and I were beside ourselves with worry. The guilt crept in again. Why can’t I feed this baby? Alessia was healthy and happy though, and Adam and I decided that as long as she continued to be healthy and happy, we wouldn’t worry. A week before her 16-month doctor appointment she swallowed a pea. A pea. For months she had been munching individual peas and then spitting them out, and now finally she had swallowed one. From there she slowly started to eat more, and she drank her last bottle of formula right before she turned two. In contrast, my younger daughter, Olivia, nursed three times before leaving the delivery room. When we got home she nursed every hour for 45 minutes from 8:00 am until noon with 15-minute naps on my lap in between feedings. I could put her down swaddled for a two-hour nap, but she went right back to nursing for 45 minutes from 2:00 pm until 8:00 pm. This went on for weeks, and I began to learn how it feels for someone to ask everything of me. At about four months old Olivia started waking up every two hours at night. The doctor assured me that this was normal and not to worry, her sleep would improve. At six months she woke up once an hour for ten days straight. It was the first of two periods of complete sleep deprivation for me, and I started to learn that living in the moment sometimes means not giving into the despair that comes from believing present painful moments will stretch on into the future without end. I still needed to care for Olivia and Alessia and for myself, even though there were days I wanted to crawl into bed and never come out. Slowly over time we discovered that the root cause of Olivia’s erratic sleeping was allergies and a sensitive digestive system. At one point due to her allergies, I couldn’t eat gluten, egg, dairy, beans, soy, fish, or chicken. Nursing a baby consumes a great deal of calories. Nursing a baby while caring for an active toddler and not owning a car consumes even more. I was hungry all the time, and I lost too much weight. Even though I had once been a vegetarian, I started eating meat, and red meat at that, at least once a day. Once again, I learned what it means to give up my own ideals for someone else’s sake, and I learned again to practice gratitude. There were days when I was so angry that I couldn’t eat all of my favorite foods, and it took effort to be grateful to God for the abundance of food that I did enjoy. I am trying to live my daily life in an intentional way because I believe that the big things of this world are made up of countless small things. The whole of my marriage is based on my daily interactions with my husband. The quality of life in my city is based on the tens of thousands of daily interactions between the people who live and work there. The quality of life on this planet is made up of billions of daily interactions and choices made by people like me. This is not to discount the need to make big societal changes, to confront the powers and systems that support and enforce racism, poverty, environmental degradation, and many of society’s other ills. I believe though that our ability to face the big things depends on our being grounded in the small things. About the Author Kathleen Simone lives in Malden with her two daughters, her husband, and a fat cat. Most of her favorite hobbies involve food.
8 Open door
mouth-house
(opinion)
Q
If you could only pass down one story from the Bible to future generations, which would you choose?
“The Parable of the Good Samaritan, Luke 10:25-37, resonates with so many people even those with little or no faith. I would want that story to be passed on so that future generations would know of the spectacular nature of Christianity’s limitless and sometimes very inconvenient love and mercy. Before Jesus gets to the parable, he and an expert in Jewish law begin to verbally spar back and forth with questions and answers. Then the man poses the bigger question, the am-I-my-brother’s-keeper type question. ‘And who is my neighbor?’ I am so glad he asked. These are the questions in the Bible that truly excite me. In the parable, Jesus doesn’t identify the beaten man as Jew, Samaritan, or other. That tells me that my neighbor is anyone wounded by life without any distinction of religion, ethnic ID, nationality, or other superficial trait. I get who my neighbor is.
“Noah’s Ark is the most important lesson on how God designed the Earth. In listening to God and the planet about changing weather patterns, Noah was able to save existing animals and humanity.”
Now the hard part … I don’t know about you but I am astonished at the amount of time and effort the Samaritan expends in caring for the wounded stranger as Jesus relates the story. Wasn’t the Samaritan busy? He was on his way somewhere, right? I get what I am supposed to do. Doing it is the challenge presented in this parable.”
“Noah’s Ark is the most important lesson on how God designed the Earth. In listening to God and the planet about changing weather patterns, Noah was able to save existing animals and humanity. I think we are given a very important warning, those that listen to God’s design will be able to save the Earth and themselves. As we face the very obvious nature of Global Warming and the severe weather devastation that comes with it, I wonder, what type of ark can we build when the storm comes?”
Bev Hanna
Katie May Tucker
“Jesus and the Woman at the Well (John 4) conveys how God through Jesus fully knows us and fully accepts us despite our sins. In addition, the story demonstrates that God’s love and Jesus’ ministry is for all – including women and all those considered other in his and our society. There is no ‘in-crowd’ with Jesus. He knows, loves, and accepts all humanity.”
“If I have to choose just one story to take with me, I choose the parable of the Good Samaritan. To me, it exemplifies what Jesus’ message to us is all about: to help someone else in need, be it a friend, a stranger or an enemy, is the most important thing we can do. At times we are needed in a sudden, critical situation; at others, it’s more of a slow, steady gift. Sometimes we must leave our comfort zone – take the leap!”
Annamarie Ross Shu
Pam Roberts
Open door 9
“I was talking with my good friend Jim McDonnel about our favorite Bible stories we would pass down to the next generation and the story of Joseph came up. Yes, that Joseph, the one with the fancy coat! Joseph spent his whole life being pushed around by his brothers, the slave traders, and Potiphar and his wife. Yet even when he is placed in a position of power, he chooses not to do evil towards his family. He chooses love over hatred. It reminds me that no matter what life sends my way, I can choose to lash out at others or show mercy and love.” Corey Spence
“I would choose the Gospel story of Jesus: that a child was born among miraculous signs, his life to age 30 is largely undocumented, that he approached a prophet John the Baptist, and was baptized, that he then preached a gospel of God’s love for humanity and our duty to love each other. I would slip in briefly the parables of the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan, touch on the Transfiguration, and tell how his preaching threatened the leadership of his time, so they had him executed, but he came back to repeat his call for loving relationship with God and each other – is that one story or about eight?” Larry Bowers
“I would choose the parable of the Good Samaritan. This story emphasizes the importance of noticing, caring for, and loving those we encounter in life, even when doing so is in contradiction with societal norms or religious rules. And even when those we encounter are very different from us. I think this is what I would most want future generations to know of Jesus’ message – that ultimately, whatever other guidelines, regulations, laws, and habits are out there, our core value should be to love others and to put that love into action.” Sara Chatfield
“I’d choose Luke’s parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37.) Even the phrasing of the question is interesting. The lawyer asks what to do to ‘inherit eternal life;’ that’s a reminder that we sometimes think of the Bible as not about this world. Jesus’ answer starts with two Torah quotes, so you get three Bible stories for the price of one. The parable itself shows a way of living that appears universally admirable and possible; and yet a way to which we all need to be directed again and again. The story makes the Bible completely and finally about this world.” David Vogan
“The story of the loaves and fishes because it illustrates God’s abundance and the interaction between holy and human power. We have needs, God seeks to fill them through Jesus’ hands, but Jesus asks for our participation and then transforms it into something that is beyond our capability. And trust in abundance means that we don’t have to be stingy in our giving or afraid in our loving.” Laura Stone
“The story that looms large for me is Jesus’ presentation to a large crowd gathered on a hillside. We call it the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5,6,7). It’s quite a sermon! For me, it is not a call for comfort or for affirming God’s all embracive love. All of that is important, too. For me, especially Matthew 5:1-14, it is a clarion call for us to be disciples and sets the guidelines for how we are to live in a troubled world. It brings challenge – just what the larger Christian movement needs today.” Don Wells
Old South Church is a vibrant and historic congregation of the United Church of Christ in the heart of Boston’s Back Bay. To check out our Adult or Children & Family Ministries, visit us online at OldSouth.org. Or better yet, walk through our open doors seven days a week.