The Pandemic is Changing Camp Magruder

I indulge in these thoughts that maybe you also do sometimes, where I think back to my pre-pandemic self in January 2020 and wonder what I'd think if I was dropped into the present day. I imagine being a little dumbfounded about how quickly and decisively things would change in just a few weeks. I wonder if I would look at the year to come and be overwhelmed or excited. Like most things, a lot of it would depend on how future me tells the story. 

It's no secret 2020 and likely all of 2021 too have and will be challenging for Camp Magruder. We are moving closer to picking back up with the work we were doing in the middle of March last year that was promptly cut short. We have been changed by this time, as everyone has. I wonder how strange and overwhelming it will be when we gather together in larger groups. I imagine a heightened cautiousness will persist with us for many years to come. But, we also have seen new parts of ourselves emerge during this time of isolation when many of our regular, time consuming routines were leveled. 

In the early days of the pandemic, Camp Magruder found itself looking to serve without one of its great superpowers--the ability to gather lots of people together. Our natural instinct for how to help people heal became a major way to spread Covid-19. This caused us to do some soul-searching, to dig deeper into who we are, all the things we are good at, and how many different ways we might serve. We've pitched lots of ideas. Some crashed and burned, some were shelved for better times, some are in slow process, but a few have sprouted wings and begun to fly. 

We don't intend to put these new developments up on the shelf as the pandemic eases and campers and retreat groups return. In fact, we hope these new practices grow and flourish, enhancing our traditional work. These new focuses address dreams we've tossed around for years but have rarely had time to explore. One has us looking inward in our own back yard, the other has us looking outward across the entire world. 

Feeding the Hungry, Helping Our Home

When a payroll protection grant ensured the Magruder staff would continue to work through late spring and early summer 2020, most of our staff had no trouble finding work to do. But, the kitchen staff had no guests to cook for. A meeting with a few local United Methodist Church leaders spring-boarded us into partnerships with several UMCs, our local school district, Fred Meyer, and a local youth non-profit to feed hungry people in Tillamook County. 

When money ran out from the PPP grant, funds emerged from other organizations and individuals to keep the meals going. Every week the Camp Magruder kitchen and Nehalem Bay UMC send out between 50-100 meals to families in our region, and during every school holiday or break, the kitchen is part of an awesome collective that provides meals for students on free/reduced lunch throughout the county. In summer 2020, we distributed around 6,700 meals to local kids.

Though we expect guests to return to the Magruder dining hall in July, we will figure out the logistics of continuing to prepare meals, possibly expand our efforts. This work has helped us be more of an acting member of this beautiful area we live in, connecting us with our neighbors doing important work. With this work we are not just a destination for retreat, we are sustainers for this place so many people love. 

As this program grows and takes shape, we hope to open up possibilities for retreat guests to understand what is happening during their stay. The kitchen will likely be preparing meals for guests and for hungry people in our county simultaneously. As we learn more about food insecurity issues in Tillamook County, we hope to shine a light on it for our guests and even offer ways they might join this life giving work, creating some beautiful unlikely connections. 

Digital Camp Magruder, Reaching Far Beyond the Beach

Even before the pandemic, we'd been having conversations at Camp Magruder about how we could connect with campers and guests digitally in a way that felt authentic to who we are. When it became one of our only options for connecting with our traditional campers and guests, we poured our energy into producing videos, posting pictures, starting conversations, and writing thoughtful posts about faith, growth, learning, and nature. 

We hope you've been impacted by, felt connected to, and shared with friends the posts over the past year that have been meaningful to you. We all know our youth are integrating web-based technology into their everyday life more and more, but the truth is we all are. This is a tricky balance to walk, being a place for people to get away from normal life to be outdoors and connect in face to face interaction. We suspect, though, the future we are all growing into will create some sort of hybrid that fuses camp and virtual, creating something that's not exactly what either one looked like on its own. 

We don't think it will replace what happens in person at camp, and we don't think it will look exactly like a bunch of kids in the woods on devices. We do think, being more virtually connected could offer something of the camp experience for campers and guests who have more difficulty being in the wilderness or with large groups of people. It could make the camp experience more available to people without time or means to get away that far for that long. And, it could enhance the camp experience year-round, allowing campers to visit camp during the low times, reflective moments, times of renewed joy, and to have their spiritual cup filled when physically being at camp is not so easy. 

We are also excited about how the content we produce through our staff and campers may cultivate deeper connections with churches in our region and strengthen our ability to be in ministry together. We will continue our progress in being a leaders among the other United Methodist Camps of the United States. Our training videos are used by the National Camp and Retreat Ministries Board to train counselors. Our videos and blog posts are being shared in national camp circles and churches throughout our conference. As we share the lessons camp life teaches us, it can reach far beyond these 160 acres here on the coast and the guests who show up in person. We can truly share camp with the whole world. 

I would never have wished for an over year long shut down for camp, but in this quiet time we have grown in ways that might not have been possible in a typical busy year. We have reflected, we have appreciated what happens here, and we have dreamed big for how much will happen as we reemerge from our hibernation. We look forward to sharing more.