Over time, and still today, our church has been known variously as "The Community Church," "The Congregational Church," "The little blue church," and "Pinedale Community Church." Founded as a Sunday School in 1904, we began as a group of Methodists, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists, none of whom had enough members to form a church alone. We gathered together and chose to affiliate with the majority denomination: the Congregationalists. In 1907 we became "The First Congregational Church of Pinedale." At that time, there was no other church in town. We incorporated in 1908 and purchased land to build on in 1909. The building was dedicated in 1910. Our church bell was the town fire alarm. The building, still on it's original site, has been well maintained, added on to, and remodeled. At some point, our name was changed from "Pinedale Congregational Church" to "Community Congregational Church." Then in 1957, the Congregational Christian Churches came together with the Evangelical and Reformed Church to create the United Church of Christ. Locally our name changed once again, to "Pinedale Community United Church of Christ."We are affiliated with the United Church of Christ, a mainline Protestant denomination. However, members of our congregation have a diversity of theological beliefs, ranging from quite conservative to very liberal. We accept each person where he or she is on their faith journey, and we encourage questions as we all seek to deepen our relationship with God. Sometimes we agree to disagree yet meet at the Table together. Our Communion, which is served the first Sunday of each month, is open to all who claim belief in Jesus Christ: All are welcome to participate.
Although we are affiliated with the UCC (United Church of Christ), we function as an independent congregational body. That means that we live in a covenantal relationship with our local Wyoming Association, our Rocky Mountain Conference, and our National UCC offices. Being part of this larger body gives us access to greater resources, enlarges our mission field, and lends mutual accountability. The national body can recommend a course of action, make a statement, even set a policy, but ultimately our local church body can choose to agree or disagree, cooperate, comply, or ignore those actions and opinions.
We are participating in the God is Still Speaking Campaign of the UCC.