Mount Hamilton United to close in May after 100 years
Rising costs and a declining membership has forced the congregation at Mount Hamilton United Church to disband and sell the property.
The final service for the Summit Avenue church, which will mark its 100th anniversary next month, will be held on May 17.
Colleen Medeiros, chair of the Mount Hamilton church council, said the congregation voted 50-8 by secret ballot in the church hall on Feb. 5 to disband.
“It’s a sign of the times,” said Medeiros, who noted the congregation has 129 members, of which about 50 attend Sunday services regularly and most are seniors and a few young families.
The small numbers fill up a few pews at the front of the church hall, which can hold about 500 people, including the back balcony which is seldom used.
“It looks so sparse,” said Medeiros, a life-long Mount Hamilton member, who began going to the church with her parents in the ‘60s.
She was married there, so were her parents and both of her children were baptized there.
Medeiros recalled the church “was packed” when she attended as a youngster and there were two services every Sunday morning.
In those days, Medeiros noted, the church was not only a place of worship, but it was also the centre for social activity such as dances, youth groups and other events.
“The church was part of your community, everybody belonged,” said Medeiros.
She noted young people are now turning to social media such as Facebook for their social activities and are expressing faith in a different way.
“They just feel they don’t have to actually physically go to a building to belong to a church,” she said.
According to the church’s website, the membership totaled 1,054 with an annual revenue or receipts of nearly $51,000 in 1960.
Membership numbers have been steadily declining since then, but the cost of building maintenance and utilities has been rising.
Medeiros noted the monthly cost of running the building and church programs plus the salaries of a full-time minister and a part-time church secretary and organist total about $13,000 per month.
The cost is not sustainable and the congregation decided to disband before the financial situation became critical.
“It was going to be too much for the amount of people that are left, so we just figured we’d close gracefully,” Medeiros said. “There was sadness, but at the same time a lot of people said the next day that a burden had been lifted, it was kind of a relief, now we can move on.”
Medeiros said the membership had been mulling over the future of the church for the past two years and there was even talk of possibly amalgamating with another Mountain church.
“It didn’t pan out,” she said.
Medeiros said a group of trustees is overseeing the sale of the church building and land and another committee is looking after the disbursement of church furnishings, including books and music.
They hope to sell the building which sits on a 150 foot by 140 foot lot near Concession Street to another church group.
The move to disband the congregation and sell the property has the blessing of the United Church of Canada.
“It’s sad any time a congregation is faced with that choice,” said Reverend Fred Monteith, executive secretary of the Hamilton Conference of the United Church which covers a wide portion of southern Ontario from Tobermory to Fort Erie and from Mississauga to Delhi and has nearly 59,000 members. “We’re looking at declining numbers in what were traditional church members.”
Monteith said funds gathered from the sale will go back to the United Church of Canada and the Mountain congregation will have a say in which church projects they want the money to help fund.
Monteith said he was not aware of any other United Church congregations in the city that are facing a decision similar to Mount Hamilton.
He noted some congregations in the conference are looking at creative ways to maintain their numbers, including sharing a building with another church, establishing church cafes where members meet in coffee shops or providing church services and other ministry offerings on-line.
In 2001, Stats Canada reported three million Canadians identified the United Church when asked about their religion.
When the doors close for a final time in May, Medeiros said many of the members will miss seeing the Walk to Emmaus, a large stained glass window at the front of the sanctuary that was installed in 1977 in memory of Reverend Arthur William Lewis, a former church minister who died in 1976.
They will also miss hearing the old Casavant organ that was dedicated to the church in 1946 and refurbished in 1966.
All of this comes as Mount Hamilton United prepares to celebrate its 100th anniversary.
“We’re going to share the memories,” said Medeiros, who noted part of the church’s history will be celebrated each Sunday in March and former ministers have been invited to return and join the celebration.
A special 100th anniversary dinner is slated for the Powerhouse restaurant in Stoney Creek on March 10.
Medeiros said members are free to join another congregation.
One Sunday, likely in April, will be set aside where there is no service at Mount Hamilton so members can attend other churches on the Mountain and then share there experiences with the congregation the following Sunday.
The congregation dates back to 1911 with the establishment of a Sunday School in the old Mission building on Concession Street near Upper Wentworth and the Mount Hamilton Methodist Church was formed in 1912.
Services were moved to the former Cotter’s Hotel at Concession and Upper Wentworth that had been purchased by a group of church women.
In in 1920 the first church building was erected on Summit Avenue and in 1925 the congregation, along with a few members from nearby Chalmers Presbyterian Church, became the Mount Hamilton United Church.
The church building was originally designed as a Sunday school and the current sanctuary was erected in 1955-56
Fire destroyed the original church building in 1984 and there was smoke damage to the sanctuary.
The church reopened in 1985.
