 Welcome to this edition of Vantage Point. I'm here with the Reverend Allison Buttrick Patton, who is the pastor of the Soggytuk Congregational Church. Soggytuk has a really interesting story in its most recent history, and Allison has been serving as the pastor there. She has a strong commitment to cooperation and interdependence, not only among United Church of Christ churches, but also on an interfaith and ecumenical basis. So welcome Allison. We're glad you're here. Thank you. Would you tell us a little bit about the story that brings you here today that really helps us understand interdependence in a very significant way? I'd love to. And I think I'd begin by saying that the story is for me an extended expression of gratitude to the wider community of faith around Soggytuk Church. Soggytuk Church has collaboration in its DNA, and I was fortunate to inherit that commitment. But we've experienced the need to collaborate and the gifts of collaboration in a particular way over the course of the last three years. So tell us about what that means. So just over three years ago, Soggytuk suffered a devastating fire that destroyed enough of the church that we had to vacate the premises in order to rebuild. And so for the last three years we have been a church without walls, which doesn't literally mean that we've been on a street corner. On the contrary, we've been hosted by a number of different churches, but most frequently have worshiped a temple Israel, which is the reform synagogue in Westport. And we've worshiped there and at Christ in Holy Trinity on the beach, on our own front lawn, while rebuilding our own church walls. The result of not having our own space is that we have relied on partners for every project that we undertake, that we can't pursue a program or host a worship or undertake an activity without a partner. If for no other reason than we need a space in which to convene that event. So while we have always partnered with folks, we've discovered over the last three years just how much richer ministry can be when we take any of our programs or projects and collaborate to make them bigger and better. So tell me about some of the cooperative spirit and some of the things specifically that have happened between your congregation and other churches. Yeah. So looking first at our United Church of Christ partners in the area, Greens Farms Congregational Church is just up the road. They very graciously said to us during our sojourn, our sanctuary is your sanctuary, in particular for the purpose of hosting memorial services. When families are looking for a familiar space, a congregational sanctuary in which to honor their loved one. So we gathered there every time we said goodbye to one of the saints in our midst. That was on the one hand a unidirectional kind of collaboration where they were host and we arrived and used the space, but it meant that we were hanging out together and getting to know one another along the way and not because of the needs of Saga Tuck Church, but in a happy coincidence our youth minister and the youth minister over at Greens Farms Church discovered one another and during the course of their studies at Yale University and are now married. So just this week the two congregations have launched a joint Bible study for our youth groups both Saga Tuck Church and Greens Farms. And so we're gathering two groups that probably would have been too small individually for this trial Bible study, but together we might light a spark. Another example comes from a partnership with Wilton Congregational Church in the Reverend Arnold Thomas. Reverend Thomas and I struck up conversation around the time that 12 years a slave was being screened in theaters and agreed that we'd both really love to have some deep conversation about the film and that we might try doing that together. So he and I did that first one-on-one, reflected on the film, exchanged our own insights and then co-hosted a conversation with mostly members of Saga Tuck Church because we were hosting the event in Westport. That conversation itself was rich and marvelous and Reverend Thomas brought wisdom and knowledge that I couldn't to the conversation based on his own educational background so it was a deeper conversation since we were both there in the room. An added benefit because we had so much fun doing it the first time, I engaged in some conversation with our public library and Westport Public Library ended up inviting the two of us to facilitate a conversation after a screening of 12 Years a Slave there at the library for a larger audience. So that was an opportunity to model collaboration between our UCC churches in a public setting and that was a ton of fun. And other partnerships you would name outside of the name some UCC connections with area churches. Are there other partnerships that are part of the DNA of Saga Tuck that you'd like to share? There are. So Temple Israel was our host throughout the three years that we were rebuilding our own church. So we worshiped in their sanctuary every Sunday morning. Over the course of that three years I got to know three different rabbis and benefited from their wisdom and leadership on a number of occasions. They hosted us for a Passover Seder that was a teaching Seder. They one of them led a workshop on first century Judaism for our congregation. Some of us worshiped with them on Friday night for Shabbat on a number of different occasions. So we found opportunities along the way to resource one another and to learn from one another. The fun thing about this is that 40 years ago when Temple Israel was building its current synagogue we actually hosted them at Saga Tuck Church. So there is a kind of turning the tables which has been really neat. So they've just called a new senior rabbi within the last few months and I now have the privilege of getting to know him. We meet together routinely and continue to imagine how our partnership will continue even though we're no longer worshiping in their space. One other example I would lift up is with the United Methodist Church of Westport and Weston and the Reverend Ed Horn. He and I are both active with the Interfaith Clergy Network which is a very strong network of clergy that meets every month in Westport and Weston and I again inherited those relationships when I arrived two and a half years ago. I felt very blessed to have that circle of colleagues with whom to work and minister in Westport. Among them Ed has been a particularly valued colleague and when we were looking ahead to the Christmas season I wanted to host a blue Christmas service which is a service designed for those who may be struggling with depression or loss during the advent and Christmas season. The number of our churches host that kind of service but there wasn't one in Westport at the time. Again we didn't have a sanctuary in which to host that service and I reached out to Ed. He kindly said you're welcome to use our space. I said that's great but I'd actually love to do it with you and he gave it enthusiastic yes. We designed and co-led that worship service. We've done that now twice and I look forward to hosting that service next year at Saga Tuk Church but again in collaboration with the Methodist Church which just extends our reach and the number of folks who are touched by an important service. So the spirit of collaboration is part as you said in the beginning part of your DNA. What are the challenges to collaboration? It's not always easy. It's really not and it's a really good question. In some ways the challenge before us is to hold on to the wisdom we've learned in the last three years and not abandon it now that we think we can do it ourselves because we've got our own space. There is always the gnawing sense of competition that I think if we're all honest we bring to ministry. We hope to grow our own churches. We hope to establish our own identity. We worry I think that if we do things with another church that that sense of individual identity might get lost that will it'll get mushy and how will people know whether they should come to us or go to them and maybe they'll go to them. My learning is that being committed to collaboration can be part of our identity and part of what makes us distinct and as I think others have said with you in this series in the end it's a gift to be able to say I have this that I can offer you but you know what my colleague down the street they have something that you might need too and it's probably it's good work and sometimes hard work to to to be honest about naming not only our gifts but the gifts of those around us. The other challenge I think is the challenge of limited time and resources or what I suspect some days is the myth of limited time and resources. I think it may be it feels in my life sometimes like the excuse I use for not collaborating when I don't collaborate that I can get it done quicker myself or that I don't have time to reach out and sort out how to do the creative work of collaborating and it does take time and it takes intentionality and it takes failing right and then regrouping but I suspect maybe in the long run that it's not more time spent but time spent differently. That's my theory. I'm still living into that. I think it works it's really good it's really good. I fully support the theory. I am grateful to you Allison for your coming and sharing the story with our viewers today about the ways in which the Saga Tuck Church partly out of necessity but also part of your DNA to have this impulse to connect with other congregations to connect with in an interfaith ecumenical way but even to connect with a wider community and share the good news of our faith. So I am deeply grateful to you for your time and for your leadership here in the Connecticut Conference. Thank you. One of my favorite authors and poets Mr. Wendell Berry writes and we pray not for the new earth or heaven but to be quiet in heart and in eye clear what we need is here. Holy Week is a week of story. It's a week where we all walk liturgically, spiritually, communally, personally through those last days of Jesus Christ beginning with Palms Sunday the donkey the palm branches the shouts of Hosanna God save us. Mondi Thursday the upper room sharing a bread and cup a new commandment washing the feet of the disciples and betrayal. Good Friday crucifixion death Easter Christ is risen Christ is risen indeed into a world filled with so many unholy moments what we need is here. Holy Week grounds us, Holy Week centers us. May this Holy Week connect us yet again to that week of story which changed and still changes the world in which we live. God's blessings be upon you as we enter this week called Holy. That's it for this edition of Vantage Point. We are grateful that you are a viewer of this series and we look forward to you joining us again in subsequent editions. Blessings to you this day.