It’s a celebration!
Calumet church\'s 150th
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CALUMET -- Community and worship go hand-in-hand at Faith Lutheran Church, in Calumet. The congregation celebrated its 150th anniversary Saturday, with food, games and prizes in the church parking lot.
Faith Lutheran Pastor Jared Howard said the event was a way to give back to the community. "We just love giving to the community," Howard said. "This is kind of that final outreach of us continuing that idea of helping the community, inviting them all to celebrate all that we've done together for 150 years."
Celebration Coordinator Michelle Meneguzzo said planning for the event was a long process. One where she had to get creative in order to raise the needed funds. "We started about a year ago. First thing was, how do we raise the money to put on a community event?" she said. "We started with our community outreach: Faith Community Quench. We started selling lemonade at the farmer's markets to raise money to put on this event."
Michelle's husband Jason helped run the lemonade stand at the farmer's markets and at Saturday’s celebration where event-goers could mix different flavors in the tasty treats.
Family was a big theme at the 150th. Kids activities were sprawled across the parking lot, including a bouncy house, ring toss and a dunk tank. Meneguzzo said the children get a lot out of the event besides fun and games. "It gives the kids that sense of community," she said. "We are lucky to have our kids be around so many great people."
41 different raffle prizes and a top 50/50 prize of $2,000 were available for participants to win. Howard stepped into a dunk tank for the opportunity for kids and others to dunk their pastor for a $5 buy-in.
Howard said Faith Lutheran's mission is to open people’s hearts without fear of judgement.
"When people come around a common idea of faith, it opens our hearts up a little bit differently," he said. "It lets us see the person for who they are on the inside and not always the judgemental outside and really understand someone from the inside out... church has always been a place where we can rally around that idea."
Along with Community Quench, the Lake Linden Depot and Jim's Pizza in Calumet made an appearance to serve food to those in attendance. Live music and dancing also brought the community together. Howard said the support Faith Lutheran received Saturday was more than he could have ever hoped.
"I'm so proud of all of the volunteers who put this together," he said. "I'm proud of how much this church has done for the community and so happy that people are gathering around and all the businesses that help support us."