To our Sonlight Family and Friends,
First, thank you to everyone who has supported Sonlight through this journey of 2020. Your prayers, words of encouragement and financial support have sustained us thus far, and for that we are so grateful.
To our High School friends: we are so sorry that we are unable to hold Fall Retreat this year. While we tried, we could not come up with a safe way to hold Fall Retreat in good conscience. We miss you all!
And to all our Camper Families: by now you know that we would have excitedly marked out a calendar for summer 2021. We would be posting dates, designing brochures and working towards the next summer. Like everything else since March, the process this year has been different.
We firmly believe that Sonlight is God’s camp and that Sonlight has been a place of community building for 42 years. That’s not going to stop. In this time of COVID-19 when precautions call us to distance, we believe that in-person-face-to-face community is more important now than ever before. Sonlight is a place where people come together, friendships are formed and strengthened, and campers of all ages can meet God in a new way. COVID did not stop this tradition in 2020, and we plan to keep on the mission in 2021.
We are optimistic about next summer. Last summer gave us a chance to lock in our safety practices and to try out something new: Family Camps. It is very likely that we will be offering Family Camps in 2021, open to everyone but with specific sessions especially planned and programmed for families with children in specific age ranges (Families with Pre-schoolers, Younger-Elementary, and Older Elementary).
We are also watching with anticipation for data to be released from studies of camps that ran youth programs this year. Then we can fully examine our program and see if we are able to operate Youth Camps for our campers entering grades 6 through graduating seniors.
We anticipate that summer 2021 will be composed with 3 day programs: Sunday afternoon to Wednesday morning and Wednesday afternoon through Saturday morning.
It is with great difficulty we came to the decision that with all challenges facing residential camps in light of required COVID precautions and restrictions, running full-week youth camps in 2021 will not be an option for us. It is our goal to return to full-week youth camps as soon as we can do so safely. Pray that we get there soon, because we miss all that time with your kids!
We hope to see you in summer of 2021. More information will come soon.
We love you all and pray you are well,
Emrys & Sara Tyler
Co-Directors