BUNDY ROADMAP TO REGATHERING

Bundy Services commencing on November 7th

On September 19th, the State government released a roadmap for the state to come out of lockdown.  The details of this roadmap can be found here.  Based on this, if vaccination rates are reached, the likely date for the regathering of in-person church services is November 7th.  As we have been told by the government, this date is subject to changing circumstances

The elders have engaged with the requirements of the government and have made the decision to re-commence our Sunday gatherings:

Nov 7

Service (*attendees required to check in and show their vaccination status the first time they attend)

9am

184 people maximum (double vaccinated) *

11am

184 people maximum (double vaccinated) *

3pm30 people maximum (vaccination status unknown) check in required but not vaccination status.  Registration will be required for this service in the event that we need to run more services like this 
5pm 184 people maximum (double vaccinated) *

Pastors will be present at all four services.  If the government changes the requirement for the distinction between those vaccinated and unvaccinated, the elders will also make the neccesary changes to the requirements above.

Livestream services for 9am, 11am and 5pm will continue for those watching from home. 

If you have any questions about the re-commencing of our services, please speak to any of the pastors or elders.

Key Dates of the Government Roadmap

 

Oct 21

70% of 16+ fully vaccinated

Public gatherings

Religious Services

15 people including dependents (vaccination strongly recommended)

50 people fully vaccinated (outdoor only) / 20 people unknown vaccination status (outdoor only)

20 people fully vaccinated (indoor only) / 10 people unknown vaccination status (indoor only)

Nov 5

80% of 16+ fully vaccinated

Private gatherings

Public gatherings

Religious Services

 

Up to 10 people including dependants

30 people fully vaccinated outdoors / 5 people unknown vaccination status outdoors

150 people fully vaccinated indoors

500 people fully vaccinated outdoors

20 people unknown vaccination status

1. A COVID Conversation over the Bible

Pastors Neil Chambers and Andy May have a conversation regarding a number of issues that have been raised during the pandemic.  Timestamped chapters are availaible if you watch the video on YouTube and all Bible references are listed in the video.

Audio version

Video Content Timestamps

2. About Vaccines

Pastors Neil Chambers and Andy May have a conversation with Professor Nathan Grills and Associate Professor Stephen Tong about COVID vaccines.   Dr Grills is based at Melboune University and Dr Tong at the Doherty Institute and Royal Melbourne Hospital.  Both Dr Grills and Dr Tong are followers of Jesus.  Timestamped chapters are availaible if you watch the video on YouTube as listed below.

Video Content Timestamps

3. An Online Meeting

Session invites you to a Zoom meeting where you can ask questions about Session’s decisions.
 

This is not a meeting to debate the virtues of vaccines or the rights and wrongs of requiring proof of vaccination to meet in a larger group, but to get clarification about Session’s approach and the decisions it has made, and to help us think through the many details that will be involved in implementing these decisions.
Please Join Us On Zoom if you have any questions.

(Please read or listen to Neil's Update (15.10.21) before the meeting. If you do not recieve our weekly updates and would like to attend please contact the office)

4. A reminder to love one another

Neil reminds us from 1 Peter 1 to show love to one another even if we hold different views about COVID and about vaccination. 

(Sermon starts at 32.10)
 

5. A letter to our Government from our elders

The elders of Bundoora Presbyterian have written a letter to the State Government addressed to our local state member.  

 

24th October 2021

To: The Hon. Colin Brooks

Speaker of the Legislative Assembly

 

Dear Colin, 

We hope you and your family are well and have survived the lockdown in good heart. 

We, the elders of Bundoora Presbyterian Church, write in the light of the Premier’s and Health Minister’s comments that a distinction will be made between the vaccinated and unvaccinated in what they can participate in for many months to come. 

 

We ask that you would make representations to them on our behalf for the earlier removal of that distinction in relation to church attendance. For believers attendance at church is not a discretionary recreational activity but part of their identity, an expression of a life lived in trusting and obeying the Lord Jesus Christ. While the unvaccinated amongst us are few the maintenance of the distinction in the size of the meeting they can attend [as is planned at 80% fully vaccinated] is a cause of grief to many. In our understanding becoming a Christian is to be welcomed into a family and to be committed to love one another, to love people of very different backgrounds and views simply because they are fellow believers. To be unable to meet together with brothers and sisters because of a difference in vaccination status wounds us and slows our recovery from what has been a disruptive and tiring time. 

 

We acknowledge and are thankful that in the current plan when the 80% fully vaccinated target is reached there is opportunity for the not yet fully vaccinated to meet in groups of up to thirty at church. Though we wish it otherwise we understand that in the initial weeks of coming out of lockdown the health advice might be saying that it is important to limit the size of unvaccinated groups to slow the spread of the virus. But we also note that the NSW Government has recognised that attendance at church is different from voluntary recreational activities and that meetings that keep to their Covid Safe plan can be reckoned to be of low risk for transmission, and so has permitted both vaccinated and unvaccinated believers to meet together from the 80% double dosed mark, commencing for many next weekend. 

 

To help our recovery and for the health of our congregations we desire that same liberty, to all meet together whatever our vaccination status. We are fully committed to maintaining Covid safety, as we have been for the preceding eighteen months, but we would find it hard to understand and difficult to support the maintenance of any distinction beyond reaching the 90% fully vaccinated rate in early December.  Our hope, as expressed above, is that we would not have to wait until then for the requirement to check the vaccination of those attending to be removed.  

 

We know you are concerned for the welfare of all the groups in your electorate and so ask that you would advocate for the early removal of that requirement, and for the Government to indicate that will be the case. It would be helpful to us now to be able to plan for and look forwards to that day when we can all meet together as one community. 

 

Yours faithfully, 

Neil Chambers

Senior Pastor

 

Kevin Thorpe

Session Clerk