Learning to love

This building is one of my churches that I care for.
Personally, I would rather try caring for the folk who gather within it, but a fair amount of resources and energies must be invested in this building.
In their wisdom, someone decided to get it registered with the heritage council, which means that it must be maintained, not as a living place of worship, but as a memorial to a pioneer culture.
It was painted white inside, until someone (who must have had a direct connection to the original painters) decreed that it had to be a dingy light sucking green inside.

The building itself was closed down for 9 years just 20 years after it was built due to dangerous structural problems caused by building on a fault line and clay soils. Due to struts and large metal ties, it has been open for another 120 years but at a significant on-going cost to the worshippers who attend it.

The heritage listing implies that despite the cost and the impracticality of it, I as leader of this parish must beg, borrow and fundraise as much as I can to ensure this place continues to be safe, and remains as a familiar landmark in a neighbourhood where the majority of residents would never consider setting foot inside it.

It is a mill stone that l must learn to love.