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A UMNS Report
By Barbara Dunlap-Berg*
1:00 P.M. ET July 16, 2012
The Miracle Offering for the West Ohio Annual (regional) Conference was
dedicated to adding the final dollars needed for the purchase of the
Cessna Grand Caravan for Wings of the Morning, a multi-conference
campaign for $1.6 million started a year ago. Photo courtesy of West
Ohio Annual Conference.
View in Photo Gallery
From the first U.S. United Methodist annual (regional) conference
session to the last, which adjourned in Virginia on June 24, episcopal nominations
highlighted the yearly meetings. In the central conferences outside the
United States, sessions commenced in February and will conclude in
December.
Along with nominating U.S. candidates for bishop, the church’s four areas of focus, hands-on outreach opportunities and a laundry list of other issues also received major attention.
Developing principled Christian leaders for the church and the world
Ordinations were a high point of annual conference sessions, and
several regional bodies celebrated younger-than-usual average ages of
new clergy, many in their 30s.
During the ordination service in the Oklahoma Conference, Bishop
Robert E. Hayes Jr. knelt and washed the feet of three deacons and nine
elders. Establishing a new, comprehensive Office of Mission
“significantly expands our idea of what the conference can do in
equipping and deploying a new generation of people into mission of all
kinds,” said the Rev. Craig Stinson, director of connectional
ministries/congregational development.
Memphis Conference was intentional about including a younger
demographic. In addition to participating in music and worship, young
people opened each business session with prayer. Josh Gonzalez, 18, of
Curve United Methodist Church, Ripley, Tenn., delivered the annual
Young People’s Message.
The Upper New York Conference’s effort to feed a million people in a
year was successful by providing food to more than 1.8 million by May
31, 2012. A web-only photo courtesy of the Upper New York Conference.
Global aspects of this focus area were not forgotten.
During the Virginia Conference sessions, young adult Chenda Lee
offered a personal story of how retiring Bishop Charlene P. Kammerer
touched her life. Struggling with her call, Lee heard Kammerer share
her faith story and was inspired to enroll in seminary. Lee is the
daughter of Bishop John G. Innis, episcopal leader of the Liberia
Conference.
In honor of their bishop’s work in the Democratic Republic of the
Congo, specifically at the Mulungwishi Seminary, the New Mexico and
Northwest Texas conferences established The Bishop D. Max and Valerie
Whitfield Seminary Scholarship Fund. The goal is to raise more than
$100,000 to endow a permanent scholarship.
The Susquehanna Conference welcomed Bishop John K. Yambasu of the
Sierra Leone Conference. “You gave us hope,” Yambasu said, recalling the
10 years of civil war in Sierra Leone before 2002, during which
500,000 people died and an equal number were seriously injured. “Since
2009 alone, $280,000 has been sent (to us) for pastoral support,” he
said. “Over $47,000 in program support was given, and the total of all
support funds has grown to almost $608,000. The number of full-time
clergy has risen from 43 in 2008 to 65 in 2012.”
Hungary Provisional Conference expressed joy at the admission of one
new provisional pastor and another new candidate for the ordained
ministry. “The fact that a new generation of young, gifted and
committed men and women in … is willing to take over responsibility is a
reason for gratitude and hope,” reported a spokesperson from the office
of Bishop Patrick Streiff, Central and Southern Europe Area.
Youth ministry received major attention in the South Germany
Conference sessions. Delegates extended monetary support to the youth
church in Karlsruhe until 2018 and increased the half-time position for
a social worker at the church to 100 percent.
More than 2,000 people from eight cities ran in the April 21 Skeeter Run
benefiting Imagine No Malaria and organized by the Louisiana Annual
Conference. A web-only photo courtesy of the Louisiana Annual
Conference.
New places for new people and renewing existing congregations
“We need to lay aside the desire to hold on to the way church used
to be,” said Bishop John R. Schol, Baltimore-Washington Conference. He
encouraged attendees to develop new ways of starting faith communities,
repurposing buildings, calling and equipping spiritual leaders and
raising money.
Illinois Great Rivers Conference rejoiced in the planting of three
churches, including a new-church start in Bloomington-Normal, with much
of the leadership coming from alumni of the Wesley Foundation at
Illinois State University who have made Bloomington-Normal their home
following graduation.
In the Northern Illinois Conference, Bishop Hee-Soo Jung spoke of
the bold steps taken since the Harvest 2020 movement was announced five
years ago. Thirty faith communities were launched, attracting more
than 2,000 worshippers. “We can allow our changing society to shape the
future for a dying church,” Jung said, “or we can embrace change and
adapt the work of making disciples to address the present and future
age.”
Loving God and God’s people is essential to vital congregations, the
Rev. Jorge Acevedo told Southwest Texas delegates. “Here’s a
church-growth principle: If Jesus will show up in your church, a crowd
will show up in your church,” the pastor of Grace United Methodist
Church, Cape Coral, Fla., said.
The fledgling republic of South Sudan garnered the attention of the
Holston Conference, which committed $100,000 to build four new churches
in the new nation.
A cluster of churches around Uzhgorod, Ukraine, hosted the
Ukraine/Moldova Conference. “These vital congregations show the
diversity of the church in Ukraine,” said Michael Airgood, a United
Methodist Board of Global Ministries missionary. “Some survived the
Soviet days; others are new church plants. A few are in the heart
of their oblast's capital, and others are in small surrounding
villages.”
Engaging in ministry with the poor
“Great living happens in serving,” guest preacher Bishop J. Michael
Lowry, Central Texas Conference, told Greater New Jersey Conference
participants. “We must be vibrant in our witness.”
That theme was evident in many conference sessions.
Upper New York Conference delegates learned that that the yearlong HANDS4NY effort to feed a million people in a year was successful, providing food to more than 1.8 million by May 31, 2012.
Detroit delegates reaffirmed a challenge to all conference clergy to
contribute one-half of one percent of their salary annually to support
pastors’ salaries in the Liberia Annual Conference and set up an
online-giving platform for all people to contribute.
In Nebraska, Simon Benjamin, director of the Nigeria/Nebraska
Partnership Orphanage, provided a status report, addressed the
Nigeria/Nebraska Partnership luncheon and was a special guest of the
Children’s Annual Conference.
“Love, mercy and compassion, especially as we extend them to those
most in need, are the evaluative tools of the reign of God and Christ’s
own dashboard of the report of who is journeying with him and who is
not,” said Bishop Minerva Carcaño of the Desert Southwest Conference.
Stamping out killer diseases of poverty by improving health globally
Imagine No Malaria, The United Methodist Church’s comprehensive
effort to end preventable malaria deaths in Africa, captured the
agendas of several annual conferences. Many received special offerings
for the ministry.
Arkansas Conference invited people to text “malaria” to 27722 to
make $10 gifts from the floor of annual conference. Perhaps the
youngest contributor was 8-month-old Natalie Williams, who gave $10 for
each month of her age.
Bishop Warner H. Brown Jr. quite literally pitched Imagine No
Malaria. At a Sacramento River Cats professional baseball game, Brown
threw the first pitch and was interviewed about Imagine No Malaria.
Youth and young adults distributed fly swatters, wristbands and
leaflets, and gave Imagine No Malaria T-shirts to those who made a $10
contribution through text messaging. An Imagine No Malaria
public-service announcement was played on the stadium's giant screens,
and a portion of each ticket sold through a special online link was
donated to the cause.
A 5K run/walk/stroll in Indiana Conference and a “Skeeter Run” in
Louisiana Conference raised funds for and awareness of Imagine No
Malaria. New York Conference delegates heard a message of challenge
from Bishop Sally Dyck of the Minnesota Conference, which has raised
$2.5 million in gifts and pledges to fight malaria.
In West Michigan, Bishop Jonathan D. Keaton preached from 2 Kings,
“a microcosm of divine health initiatives.” He emphasized the need to
“stamp out killer diseases by stamping out killer situations.”
Following Communion, worship concluded with a blues rendition of The
Lord’s Prayer, by Blest Ellen, a former recluse who was healed, able to
leave her house and live a full life when she heard a voice say,
“Sing!”
HIV/AIDS was on the radar in the Desert Southwest and Holston
conferences. Retired Bishop Albert F. “Fritz” Mutti recognized Holston
as the leading annual conference in giving to the United Methodist
Global AIDS Fund. Holston has donated 10 percent of $3.5 million
raised, said Mutti, campaign chair for the 20/20: Visioning an
AIDS-Free World initiative.
Mental health highlighted the Austria Provisional Conference, where a
new hospital for child and youth psychiatry of the United Methodist
Diaconal Center Spattstrasse was opened. Superintendent Lothar Pöll
reminded conference members that one of John Wesley’s fundamental
concerns was ministry with the poor, which evolved into a primary
feature of Methodism.
Hands-on outreach
Many conferences took time for delegates and visitors to get
involved in hands-on mission. Collecting materials for and assembling
relief-supply kits for the United Methodist Committee on Relief was a popular choice.
Holston Conference took that a step further by sending about 9,000
kits and buckets of food, school and health supplies to Liberia and
Zimbabwe. They overwhelmed the two large ocean-carrier trailers they
pack each year for Africa, necessitating, for the first time, a third
trailer to accommodate the goods.
Arkansas Conference participants engaged in a variety of mission projects. Stop Hunger Now
facilitated the conference’s packaging of more than 40,000 meals, and
three dozen participants learned how knitting hats, prayer shawls and
more could provide much-needed ministries. Other mission efforts put
attendees out in the community for graffiti removal, visits to
assisted-living facilities and helping at food banks and clothes
closets.
More than 150 volunteers from the Indiana Conference connected with
the Indianapolis community by working on two Habitat for Humanity
houses, installing a new playground at a United Methodist-related
community center, repairing homes, preparing and packing meals for
homeless residents and knitting caps for babies at a children’s
hospital.
United Methodists in the Desert Southwest collected $26,000 in gift
cards for conference urban ministries. Iowa delegates gathered nearly
2,000 pairs of eyeglasses for Nigeria and 105 gallons of pull-tabs to
support the Ronald McDonald House and packaged 30,000 meals to
alleviate hunger in Rwanda.
Other conferences reached out through blood drives, prayer walks, food collections and packing potatoes for the Society of St. Andrew.
In Europe, specifically in the Czech Republic and Slovakia Annual
Conference, The United Methodist Church is small. However, local
churches make a difference wherever they are. “The United Methodist
Church,” said Peter Baur, “is also taking care of the underprivileged
Roma. They have established ministries with mothers and children,
students and drug addicts. In many cases, these ministries are only
drops in the ocean — but they are crucial for the individual people
served by the church.”
*Dunlap-Berg is internal content editor for the Content Team, United Methodist Communications, Nashville, Tenn.
News media contact: Barbara Dunlap-Berg, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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