An Eventful Sunday
Posted on Oct 28, 2025 by Shari Van Baale
If you look at the Weekly Announcements page on our website, you can see there is a lot going on this Sunday at church — the end of Daylight Savings Time, All Saints Sunday, noisy offering, Commitment Sunday, and the Commitment Sunday brunch.
Daylight Savings Time ends this Sunday, Nov. 2 at 2:00 a.m. We will gain an hour of sleep but lose an hour of daylight, as sunset will now be an hour earlier. The amount of daylight each day will get shorter until the winter solstice on Dec. 21. Don’t forget to set your clocks back one hour before you go to bed Saturday night, though most clocks now change automatically unless you have an old-school alarm clock or a clock or watch with hands.
Salem also will celebrate All Saints Sunday at both services. As in past years, we will light candles commemorating all the saints we have known in our lives who have gone on to heaven on a beautiful, hand-carved wooden cross. We light candles and say prayers in their memory each year on the first Sunday in November.
We will also collect our noisy offering. In case you were wondering the origins of this, our first noisy offering was during the youth-led service Oct. 6, 2024. A month before, on our first day of Sunday school, the children and youth decorated coin banks to collect change throughout the month. We wanted to add an element in worship that would regularly involve the kids, so we have continued collecting coins on the first Sunday of every month to symbolize the change we want to make in the world.
Sunday is also Commitment Sunday. You are invited to bring forward a formal commitment of your intended generosity for 2026 at either worship service. Please remember to bring your Statement of Intent and Time and Talent surveys. Additional copies can be found on our website.
A fifth event on Sunday is the brunch. We will celebrate Commitment Sunday in community together between worship services with a potluck brunch. Please sign up for the potluck if you have not already done so.
After this Sunday, we will have Town Hall meetings on Nov. 9 and the Annual Meeting on Nov. 16. Christ the King Sunday is Nov. 23, and then comes Thanksgiving, Advent, Christmas, and the end of the year. The next couple of months will be busy at Salem!
Shari Van Baale
Salem Communications Coordinator