Greetings friends,
Here are the headlines, below is a longer message and update:
–Winter Cross was last weekend, we had a great time. Thank you to all who came, and all who helped make it happen. Looking forward to next year!
–Camp Cross summer staff applications are live now. Apply online via: https://campcross.campbrainstaff.com/
–Summer Camp registration will be live very soon, please keep an eye on your inbox and the Camp Cross facebook page for the announcement when it goes live. Bring a friend for the first time to receive a $50 discount!
–Summer Camp schedule – save the dates, the full Camp Cross schedule is available now at: https://campcross.org/Camps%20and%20Groups/sessions.html
–Labyrinth Project – we’re building a labyrinth at camp as part of Labor of Love, May 15-20. If you can only come for the weekend, that’s fine too. Registration will open with the rest of summer camp. It’s $20, the perfect opportunity to come to camp for cheap!
-New cabins and retreat house. Oh my goodness. They’re looking great and construction is set to wrap up in July. We need help furnishing the rooms! Expect a more comprehensive update soon, but for now if you’re interested in helping please email me alexf@spokanediocese.org. Specifically we’re looking for congregations to come together and sponsor a bedroom or a full cabin. There are 4 new cabins, 16 new bedrooms. Each bedroom has a private bathroom. I am beyond jazzed to host you and your group once they’re finished. This is a wonderful addition to Camp Cross and will help us serve more people.
-I’m available at Paulsen House, to the greater Spokane area, and to visit churches until May. Please make an appointment if you would like to: talk about Camp Cross, talk about youth ministry at your church, find new resources or ideas for your programs, get to know each other a little better and see how we can support each other. I’m always happy to come and preach at your church on a Sunday or come to coffee hour and meet folks! I’ll be at Walla Walla this Spring Gathering Day.
-Camp conferences and professional development. Andy Hartwig and I went to the American Camp Association regional conference at Lutherhaven in Coeur d’Alene in the fall, and the Episcopal Camps and Conference Centers annual conference at the Barbara C Harris Center in New Hampshire last month. We spent time with fellow camp professionals talking about trends and best practices for summer camps in 2026, all things from staff training, to hospitality, to program ideas, and enjoyed a keynote from Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe. It’s exciting to represent Camp Cross at these gatherings and develop relationships with peers and camp pros. Andy especially came away with some ideas to implement this summer at camp.
Those are the headlines! Here’s a longer read for those who are interested. I write to you having recently returned from Winter Cross – a weekend retreat for 6-12 graders at Lazy F Camp & Retreat Center in Ellensburg, WA. I’ve been in this role now just long enough to start seeing campers becoming staff, and to watch the staff who are sticking around grow as mentors as they develop their own leadership style. It’s very exciting and fills me with confidence as these ministries continue.
I was advised by a friend that when it came to Camp Cross, I would need to walk with one foot in the past – the history and traditions – and the other foot in the future, guiding and shepherding boldly. Year one was a fact-finding mission: to humbly ask what makes this camp great? Why do people love it so much? What opportunities might lie before us? What potential threats and pitfalls await? Year two was applying what was learned. What needs to be preserved and lifted up here? What needs to be let go of or moved on from? What things at camp are really a big deal? What’s really not a big deal after all…? I still have lots to learn, but I can speak with some confidence about what makes Camp Cross (and Winter Cross, and our other programs) great. It boils down to three things: the people, the place, and the potential.
First and foremost: the people. It seems to me this diocese is filled with salt-of-the-earth types, who show up and make time for you, who drive kids across the state to drop off at a youth retreat, who come and wash dishes at camp, who buy snacks for and write loving notes to the campers and staff, who drop by with a case of my favorite fizzy water before the last week of camp. There is so much care. Camp Cross is these people, and it invites you to become like these people. I experienced such a warm welcome when I arrived here in the Diocese of Spokane, and that welcome is wholly embodied at camp in particular. That is so worth lifting up.
The place. Everyone I’ve met had a story to share about this place and what it means to them; they found God at Camp Cross, met the love of their life at Camp Cross, learned to swim at Camp Cross, proudly send their kids to Camp Cross every summer. Spent some of their favorite days ever at Camp Cross. This is one of the last places I would think to put a summer camp. Seriously. No road access, camp is surrounded by lake to the north and east, a ridge to the south, and a marshy ravine to the west. But it works. And it works so well. This place holds people. It is a place set aside, the perfect backdrop for transformation and rejuvenation. I get why people love the place. I love it too. It’s something to be proud of and to care for, to insure it’s here for generations to come, as it already has been for so many.
The potential. The what if? Camp Cross lovingly dares you to venture outside of your comfort zone and try something new, to be brave and bold, and to go after that which you seek. To dream up new ways of being, new ways of doing, new ways of playing and praying. It offers a safe place to fail, because we know that to fail is to learn, is to grow, is to go beyond. Folks have been failing at things at Camp Cross for years, I’m sure of it, then going beyond that “failure”, turning it into experience and knowledge, and bringing back what they’ve learned to their families, churches, and communities. Camp Cross helps us to realize our own potential, while also reassuring us that God loves us for exactly who we are, as we are. That’s pretty powerful.
There you have it, the people, the place, and the potential. So if year one was fact-finding, and year two was application, what does year three hold?
Refining. I feel really solid in my understanding of what makes Camp Cross great, so now it’s about details, and shoring up the systems so that the program, kitchen, facilities, and fundraising become more robust and sustainable. It’s about capturing data and mapping that data so it can be shared with those doing the work. So that training and philosophy and culture are aligned and consistent with the vision:
To be a creative and compelling witness to Jesus Christ by unlocking the radical power of all people to embody inclusive love, transform each other & and their communities and take their experiences out into the world.
So here I stand with one foot in the past and one foot in the future. This is a very cool time to be at Camp Cross. It will always be an awesome summer camp, and pretty soon we’ll be ready to better serve adults in an extended Spring and Fall season too. We’re not losing anything; it’s just more Camp Cross for more people. I hope you know you are invited to join me out there, and I hope that you will! And to those who already have, thank you again for the warm welcome and for helping to me to grow my own love for the people, the place, and the potential – for helping me to understand what makes Camp Cross so great.
Warm blessings,
Alex Flannagan
Canon for Camp, Youth, and Family Ministries for the Episcopal Diocese of Spokane,
and Executive Director at Camp Cross.