10th Annual Music and English Camp in Katerinice

Greetings,
I wanted to share an update with you (and by extension the entire planning committee if you don’t mind forwarding) about our recent work with Zvonky Dobre Zpravy in Katerinice, Czechia. We just finished the 10th Annual Music and English Camp, done virtually via zoom this year as opposed to in person for us Americans.

The youth and young adults who attended the camp in Katerinice did so in person. A group of volunteers from Southminster PC were able to spend some time in the afternoon (dinner time for them) doing devotions and activities ranging from story-telling and memory sharing, to a fun game called “Would I lie To You?” which was based off of a popular UK TV game show. We tried our best to add what we could via zoom and the campers seemed to really enjoy our interactions with them. The devotions were led by Rev. Tara Thompson and she did an amazing job illustrating different bible verses with the theme of 2020 vision and how we see God in our everyday lives and in ourselves and each other during these crazy times we live in. I will include the link for the livestream of the concert which capped the end of the week. This is still available to view on their Facebook page and here is thelivestream linkif you are interested in watching.

This screenshot is Day 1 of camp during the reminiscing activity, going over funny stories and good times we have had together over the past decade. We also spent time putting together a virtual bell choir video, with each part recorded individually and then edited together to form the appearance of playing simultaneously! Everyone in this video is from our congregation here in Pittsburgh, but we have already made plans with our international partners around the world to collaborate on similar virtual music group projects! It was certainly a great project for us to undertake as it gives us a chance to still connect and be in touch despite being apart physically!

Here is the result of our hard work there! https://youtu.be/AA0SC-YnV6Y 

It’s truly amazing what we can do with technology and though we would have definitely preferred being together without question, it was definitely nice to still be in touch and keep the relationships growing. By sharing these experiences, we deepen our faith and strengthen the bonds that tie us so close together.

We felt that while being so far apart physically, we needed to properly send our greetings, so we recorded a greeting video and sent it over. It was played during their livestream concert which I will include as well. Here is the link for the greeting video.

Overall, we truly made the best of a difficult situation and rose above the challenges faced! We look forward to the next time that we can be together again!

Thank you for reading this update from our partnership with the wonderful people of Katerinice, Czechia and Pittsburgh, PA. Yours, Mark Etzel