Pitt Meadows United Church History Project:
Stories of Faith and Community
The Story Of The History Project
The idea of recording the stories of the folks who attend Pitt Meadows United came up at a discussion about the amazing memory of one particular long-time member of the congregation. We always knew that Eileen was the go-to for anything about what happened in or to PMUC going back many, many years. So when someone suggested recording some of her stories, we all knew it would be a winner. And indeed it has been, recording the personal histories, the stories and experiences of our very lovely and wonderful church friends. Just one of the stories you will find in our videos is how Mitchell Road got its name: it’s so cute! Check it out…
The idea grew from there: our Minister Bethan and Board Chair Libby went to work on applying for a grant from some of the known programs of the United Church. We were delighted to find that both programs had approved our proposed project! What we thought would be one or two young interviewers grew to a four-person team, including a Project Leader and three Interviewers. It seemed that God’s grace was with us when we found an enthusiastic and very accomplished young man who was keen to lead the project, Finn Leahy. In a very short timeframe we searched for some interviewers, and three perfect young people were found immediately. It seemed that God’s grace was also very efficient, in sending them so quickly! We set the small team to the task, and turned to the congregation for some folks to interview.
Thanks to the work of Libby in contacting and setting up the interview schedule, and to the willingness of several kind folks to be involved, we now have a little vault of memories and stories. The objective of the effort was to connect with the personal histories of our volunteers. The stories are personal and moving, and are the stories of faith and community of the church in Pitt Meadows. We hope you will enjoy and treasure them, as we have. We wish to thank everyone who has helped and participated: it has been a delight to see it all come together. Pitt Meadows United Church gratefully acknowledges the generous support from the Westminster Presbytery ProVision Fund and the United Church of Canada Foundation Seeds of Hope for the History Project: Stories of Faith and Community.
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Richard Day, on behalf of the Project Team: Rev. Bethan Theunissen, Libby Nelson, Anne MacDonald and Bud Tiedeman.