Episcopal Church Foundation Vestry Papers - for leading congregations

For a decade, I’ve been telling readers of our diocesan newspaper about summer camp. It’s an amazing, life-changing experience for most kids, but I couldn’t bring myself to use those same words for the tenth time to promote camp.

I suspect fellow communicators and parish administrators suffer the same event fatigue. How can you present in fun and creative ways the annual spaghetti dinner/Christmas bazaar/work day/pancake breakfast?

Here’s what I did with summer camp this year:

With one of the camping coordinators, we took a cue from the playfulness of camp and created a board game of sorts. Instead of the typical “move three spaces,” we added some fun instructions. Time for rest. Don’t move. Grow closer to God. Be moved. Make new friends. Move over. 

We also used the cartoon-izer program that I shared with you a few weeks ago and transformed camp pictures into cartoon images. 

In a cool, woodsy-inspired font, we spelled out the name of the game: Campland. 

The response has been great. For young campers, it’s like an updated Candyland. For older campers and counselors, it’s a reminder of one of the aspects they love about camp – the opportunity to indulge in child-like fun without being childish. 

Our conference center director wants to print and laminate the game and sell it in the camp store. 

For me, it’s a lesson to not let redundancy quash creativity. If we’re in the same jobs year after year, we’re going to be telling some of the same stories. But we don’t have to tell them the same way. 

Consider doing a series of photos for the spaghetti dinner, from the empty fellowship hall to boiling water and dishing out sauce to clean-up. Maybe the photos are even of the same space, but tracking the event throughout the evening. 

Or write about the Christmas bazaar from the perspective of some of the items that will be sold. Tell about the 1985 prom and a ruffled dress donated by a new couple and the set of Derby glasses given by the widow. 

For the pancake supper, tell the story through numbers. 22 volunteers. 14 pounds of sausage. 169 plates washed. 

There are lots of great examples out there of new ways to tell the same story. But really we need look no further than the Gospel. Time and again, Jesus tells different parables with the same message: Love your neighbor. Love God. 

That story still sings after 2,000 years. Surely we can find creative ways to spice up the third re-telling of the church work day.