Who We Are

Who We Are

It is almost impossible to imagine our lives in these hill towns without the presence of the Charlemont Federated Church. It remains a unique source of spiritual, educational, physical, social, and financial support to the hill town communities. We witness the message of Jesus, not only by nurturing the larger communities of Charlemont, Heath, Hawley and Rowe but also by extending our spiritual concern, our energy, our time and our money to more distant places be they Nicaragua, Indonesia, or the flood victims of Hurricane Katrina.

We come together as a community of individuals committed to living out the Good News. We are a diverse congregation, welcoming people of many different faiths, denominations, and backgrounds. Our Sunday service and the various ministries that manage the affairs of the church combine to celebrate life, reflect on the Gospel message, and support individual members of our church as they experience the fullness of life in all its dimensions. At the same time, our church community seeks to ensure that our younger children grow to understand and appreciate Christianity as a positive force in shaping our personal and collective values and in creating a world that is bound together in love and social justice.

In our church we recognize and celebrate important rites of passage-baptisms, weddings and funerals-for people from the hill town communities. Where there are individual financial emergencies, both within and without the immediate church family, our pastor responds on behalf of our congregation. Likewise, through the Good Neighbors project we join our energies, time, and talent with other faith and secular groups to provide support to 75 families in need of food. We also support Habitat for Humanity, a program in which our own members actively engage in the physical construction of houses. All these efforts reflect our on-going concern for the problem of poverty in Franklin County and our desire to find solutions.

Our church building serves as a physical resource for a weekly senior citizens fellowship, a local musical instruction program for children, and as the setting for the renowned Mohawk Trail Concerts whose distinguished professional talent bring the sound of music to these hills during the summer months. Our church is also the locale for the bagging of groceries for each Good Neighbors distribution and provides a storage place for food.

Beyond the boundaries of the hill towns, touched by the outreach of our church, we acknowledge that we live in a larger world which also has needs. Our church partners with a rural community in Nicaragua to include reciprocal visits and an on-going examination of the causes of poverty in that country as well as our own. Our membership-adults and children alike-walk six and a half miles annually under the aegis of Crop Walk to generate funds for Church World Service as our response to areas of concern worldwide.

In short, the Charlemont Federated Church is of this world and in this world, celebrating life and fully engaged in responding to the joys, the sorrows, and the spiritual and physical needs of our own community and beyond.