community

Like most early meeting houses, the Union Church has served a variety of civic and social functions, well beyond its spiritual purposes. Within its walls, many community connections have been made and renewed, and practical town gatherings, including Town Meetings, have convened here since its earliest days.

Monthly Elder Services lunches, Paint ‘n Sip gatherings, lectures for the Hop Brook Club and the Bidwell House Museum have brought residents and their friends together for festive and informative occasions.

The church basement provided critical rehearsal space for two local theatrical productions – Thorton Wilder’s “Our Town” in 2018 and an original outdoor oral history project “Women of Tyringham” in 2021.

The Tyringham Town Quilt, made over the course of the 1990s by so many talented Tyringham hands, regularly hangs in the Town Hall. It is a splendid sight in the grand interior of the church sanctuary on special occasions.

On New Year’s Eve of 1999, the Church overflowed with Tyringham residents for a civic celebration to greet the new Millennium and share in a potluck supper downstairs and a bonfire in the field behind the church.