Rimbey’s Pastor Marco Ste-Marie has come up with a way to shine a light on local agencies and non-profit organizations that are making a difference in the community.
‘Walking Through Rimbey’ is available to view on each organization’s Facebook page as well as that of Rimbey United Church.
“I wanted to give the opportunity for some non-profit associations here in town to be highlighted. There are so many people doing so many great things,” he explained, adding that in some cases, the general population isn’t fully aware of the range of services that these agencies offer to the public.
“My goal is to simply have a conversation with them and talk to them about what they are doing.”
To date, he has done one segment with the local library and another with folks from FCSS.
“I’m doing this simply as someone who loves the community and wants to share what is being done through the community as well,” he added.
“This is not a ‘religious’ show by any means, it just happens that I have this platform as a leader here in town so why not use it to help promote other non-profit associations. So it isn’t from the church; it’s my involvement for the community,” he said.
“I’ve also tried to make it coincide with, for example, FCSS had a fundraiser so I made the (segment) coincide with that to help promote the fundraiser.”
With the Library, he also focused on their fundraising efforts for an extension plus he wanted to showcase that a library has numerous services - it’s not just about books, he said.
“So I took the opportunity to highlight that. And I’ll be doing something similar with other associations here in town.”
Meanwhile, despite the impact of the pandemic, Ste-Marie has been keeping busy over the past many months offering ways for the community to connect.
He hosted a book club in the fall which went really well.
“I thought to myself at the time, okay, if we have four or five people it’s going to be pretty amazing, and we had 18 people signing up for it! We had four sessions through the month of September,” he said.
“After that, we had information sessions about racism - inter-relationship awareness kinds of workshops as well.”
Currently, services at Rimbey United Church are on hold but Ste-Marie streams services every Sunday morning.
“Even before the pandemic, we were streaming on Sunday mornings so it wasn’t a big deal (to adjust),” he explained.
Initially, in-person services were stopped for about six months starting last March, then the church did reopen from about September to December.
And then from December till now, in-person services are again on hold until further notice.
Still, the congregation is moving forward despite the restrictions.
“The church is doing well - we have found new ways to connect, because church is not only about the Sunday mornings,” he added. “It’s much more than that.”