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United Methodists should invest more in people, Day says

 


United Methodists should invest more in people, Day says

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The Rev. R. Randy Day
Oct. 20, 2004

By Linda Bloom*

STAMFORD, Conn. (UMNS) - United Methodists spend too much time, energy and money maintaining their institutions.

Instead, the denomination should be investing more heavily in people and their communities, according to the Rev. R. Randy Day, chief executive of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries.

Day pledged to move the denomination’s mission agency away from "institutional maintenance only" and talked about the need to "pursue love" when he addressed board directors Oct. 18 during their annual meeting.

"God has led me to the firm conviction that our entire United Methodist Church needs to look beyond itself, to get a better focus on the urgent spiritual and physical needs of the world’s people," Day said. That understanding came after spending months conversing with church members and leaders, he said.

The board’s mission goals for the next four years are to make disciples of Jesus Christ, develop and strengthen congregations, alleviate human suffering, and promote justice, freedom and peace. The energy to accomplish such goals, he added, comes from Christian love.

Day would like the Board of Global Ministries to increase its efforts in working with children and young people, people in crisis or emerging from crisis, and those who are cast out or marginalized.

Child evangelism and early Christian education are priorities for new mission congregations in parts of the world such as Senegal, Cambodia, Lithuania and Honduras, Day noted.

But such education does not always occur today. "I fear that in the United States we have raised several generations of United Methodist young people - and perhaps even seminary graduates - who know little or nothing about the history of missions and the importance of this work," he said.

He applauded the current mission study on U.S. public education and the new program to educate AIDS orphans in Zimbabwe, thanks to the generosity of an anonymous gift from a United Methodist family. Promoting better health and nutrition for children who still die of preventable diseases also is a priority for Day.

People in crisis require direct services, too. An example of United Methodists responding to crisis, Day pointed out, occurred after the recent hurricanes in the Caribbean and Southeastern United States. He quoted Bishop Larry Goodpaster of Montgomery, Ala., a new board director, who spoke of the satisfaction of seeing "thousands of United Methodists" working side by side with others in hurricane cleanups.

In addition to work like disaster response and rehabilitation, Day asked, "What more should we be doing to promote more effective diplomacy, better global agriculture policies, fairer judicial systems and economic systems that are more just?"

He reminded the directors of the outreach by Jesus to "nobodies and outcasts" and urged more mission work "on the edges."

Those "nearly invisible to mainstream society" include marginalized Native American tribes in the United States with low life expectancy and high unemployment, and people suffering from HIV/AIDS in any part of the world.

He recalled meeting Laverne, a mother with full-blown AIDS struggling to care for her three HIV-positive children, during a visit to Soweto, South Africa, in August.

"I stood in the hot summer sun, wondering how the church, as the collective body of Christ, the reservoir of love, could become the spiritual and physical safety net for the Lavernes of South Africa or the South Bronx," Day said. "I think we must keep struggling to find the Christlike way in this enormous area of ministry."

*Bloom is a United Methodist News Service news writer.

News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.

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