Bishop Woodie White to Keynote San Antonio Martin Luther King, Jr. Interfaith Service

A wide cross-section of the religious and civic community of San Antonio will be reflected at the 30th Annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., City-wide Interfaith Worship Service to be held Sunday, Jan. 15, 2017, at 4 p.m., at the New Creation Christian Fellowship at 8700 Fourwinds Drive in San Antonio. The event is hosted by the MLK Commission of San Antonio; all are invited and welcomed to attend. The service includes members of the Muslim, Jewish, Protestant, Catholic, Sikh, Buddhist, Hindu, and Baha’i communities. 

Guest speaker for the event is United Methodist Bishop Woodie W. White, retired bishop-in-residence at Candler School of Theology at Emory University in Atlanta. An active leader in the Civil Rights Movement, every January he writes a “birthday letter” to Martin Luther King, Jr., chronicling the strides and missteps in matters of race during the previous year. White has also written extensively for both popular and scholarly publications. Each year, White also takes seminary students to Selma, Alabama to participate in the annual march across Edmund Pettus Bridge in commemoration of “Bloody Sunday.” 

The gathering will feature praise and reflective dance from members of the Arathi School of Indian Dance and Holy Redeemer Catholic Church, hymns from the combined choirs of San Antonio Presbyterian churches, Sikh chant, Buddhist chant, and the blowing of the Shofar (ram’s horn) from a representative of Temple Beth-El; among other activities. 

Proceeds from an offertory collected at the gathering will be used to benefit the MLK Scholarship Fund. The event traditionally concludes with the powerful singing of, “We Shall Overcome.” Following the worship service, a reception will be held in the Fellowship gymnasium, where attendees can view an MLK Exhibit from Allee A Wallace and listen to music by the Raindrop Ensemble from Turkish House. The interfaith gathering precedes the city-sponsored MLK, Jr. Commission yearly march and commemorative program, which is held the following day.
 

Letter from Conference Secretary: 3rd Rio Texas Annual Conference

En español      

3rd Rio Texas Annual Conference
June 7-June 10, 2017
Corpus Christi, TX

The 3rd Session of The Rio Texas Annual Conference will be held June 7-10, 2017 at the American Bank Center in Corpus Christi. This year's theme is "Focus on Fruitfulness." The conference will open Wednesday evening with worship to inspire and ground us as spiritual leaders from across the conference. During the three days, we will dialogue with one another, learn from one another, pray and worship together, and be renewed and inspired for the work to which Christ is calling us.
 
We are excited to announce that the Rev. Adam Hamilton, author, and pastor of the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas will be our conference teacher. Rev. Hamilton will teach three ninety-minute sessions during our plenary time.

This year's service of commissioning, ordination and recognition will take place on Friday evening. Annual Conference will end at noon, Saturday, June 10, 2017, with the fixing of appointments and sending forth. 

Together the faith leaders of the Rio Texas Annual Conference will be formed to boldly follow Jesus Christ with excellence and fruitfulness.
 
There will be more details to come through Unidos and riotexas.org.

Mickey T. McCandless
Rio Texas Conference Secretary

From the Moderators of the Commission on a Way Forward

Dear Friends in Christ,

It is Advent, the season of expectation, preparation, and new birth. This Advent season seems more poignant this year than in years past in the midst of beginning the work with the Commission on a Way Forward.

The church is in a high state of expectation, similar to the time of John the Baptist when expectant people flocked to the Jordan for John’s message of repentance and baptism for the forgiveness of sin (Matthew 3). Expectant people experienced in the strange and unusual presence and message of John what they perceived as a divine intersection. They listened as John bore witness to the light and life that was in the midst of them, but not yet fully known. He told them that the movement they were experiencing was not about him or about them, but about someone coming after him that would baptize them with the Spirit and with fire. This judgment was not so much about what they had done right or wrong, as God's desire to get them into alignment with the coming of Jesus. This baptism would lead to new life and they needed to be ready.

People are expectantly waiting, preparing for the new thing, the new life that God will bring through the church today. The external cleansing and the inner fire come together to wash and purge us of our self-righteousness and cynicism, prejudice and apathy. Again, in this season, we need to prepare, and to be expectantly ready for God’s movement, Christ’s new birth in our hearts and in the life of the church in this time and within our global context.

The members of the Commission and its moderators are in a time of preparation and we are expectant. We are seeking the arrival, emergence, appearance of Christ’s presence and the direction, movement of God’s Spirit and fire among us in a new way. Visas are in process. Meeting locations are being set. Conversations about collaboration are taking place. “Praying our way forward” is helping set the ground work not only for the commission, but the work that each of us will need to do in order to perceive and ultimately receive the new birth that Christ seeks to bring to our present as well as our future.

The Commission will come together by conference call in about a week primarily to pray. Each of the Commission members will spend time sharing prayer for our process. What prayers are you writing and sharing as we seek to bear witness to the movement of God’s Spirit among us? The members of the Commission are each being asked to share a scripture that will guide the work of the Commission individually and corporately. What scripture are you meditating on, using to guide the examination and preparation for the new birth of Christ in your life and in the life of The United Methodist Church?

People of faith, God is here and God is searching us out (Psalm 139) so that our Savior may be seen and heard and touched through us. God is here and searching us out so that others, as well as we ourselves, might be raised from struggle and discord to a new way and a new life!

The God who is light in the midst of shadow, the God who shows love and destroys hate, the God who searches without end, the God who overcomes death with life, the God whose Son is working to bring peace through us, this God is with us (Matthew 1. 23) in the work of the Commission and in our preparation for Christ to be born anew through us and in the ministry and mission of The United Methodist Church!

In this Advent season, there is no better time for us to allow Christ to be born anew in each of us! As we allow Christ to be reborn in us, God’s Spirit will fill us in ways that we can be the presence of Christ, Emmanuel, God with us, to a world that desperately needs to see and hear Jesus! Our prayer is that each of us will intentionally search for and prepare for Christ to be born anew in us, so that together, we might be the Body of Christ that brings God’s life, hope, love, joy and peace to all people, to the nations to which Christ commissioned his disciples to go!

Bishop David Yemba
Bishop Sandra Steiner Bal
Bishop Ken Carter

UM Army Releases New Camp Dates

UMC students and families who need service hours or volunteer opportunities will have their chance thanks to the upcoming UM Army season. UM Army announced new mission opportunities for middle, high school and college students for Summer 2017.

There is even a UM Army especially for families wanting to grow their spiritual bond.

UM Army is a mission-based organization that brings together students and churches to do home repairs such as constructing handicap access ramps and painting old homes. Students will be housed at local UMC’s and transported to homes in need of improvements and beautification.

Rio Texas churches can send youth teams as small as two and as big as 50 or more to UM Army.

Volunteers are also needed to help supervise the projects.

For more information please visit riotx.umarmy.org or contact Jenny Monahan at jennymonahan@umarmy.org

There are several types of Mission opportunities.

Update Feb. 1, 2017: Online Registration is NOW available. Click Here to register

High School UM ARMY:

• Camps run Sunday-Saturday
• Takes place June and July
• For students grades 9-12
• Sites are made up of community residents who need help with home repairs and upkeep
• Client Night – UM Army invites those whom we have served to a dinner at our host church and they are given the opportunity to speak to the young people about what their service has meant. (Definitely a highlight of the week!)
• Prayer Stations
• Youth Advisory Board Member
• Cost is $250/participant
• 4 mission weeks available
• Lockhart FUMC; June 18-24
• LaGrange FUMC; June 25-July 1
• Brackettville; FUMC July 16-22

Homefront UM Army:

• Camps run Sunday-Saturday
• Takes place May 21-27, 2017
• College students and young adults
• Provide home repairs for residents
• Participants transform neighborhoods
• Cost is $250/participant
• Deeper service to community beyond worksites
• Disc Golf tournament to offset camp registration fees by $100 for all the past two years!

UM Army Basic:

• Camps run Sunday-Thursday
• Takes place June and July
• Sites include nonprofit organizations and churches
• Students grade 6-8
• Cost is $200/participant
• Prayer Stations
• Youth Advisory Board Members
• 3 mission weeks available
• Dates:
• BASIC @ Rockport FUMC; June 11-15, 2017
• BASIC @ Dripping Springs UMC; June 25-29, 2017
• BASIC @ San Angelo FUMC; July 16-20, 2017

UM Army Family:

• Camps run Saturday-Wednesday
• July 1-5 at Cathedral Oaks Retreat Center
• Separate rooms for families with young children
• All families are welcome from young to old
• 2 tracks at camp
• One large site
• Cost is $200/person for sixth grade through adults
• Cost is $150 for kids 3 years old through fifth grade
• Children 2 years and under are no cost
• Family friendly hometown 4th of July celebration

UM Army mixed age:

• Camps run Sunday-Saturday
• June 11-17, 2017 in Austin
• Middle and High School Youth
• Combining Urban Ministry with traditional UM Army Sites
• Cost is $250/participant
• Evening programs will include outreach and celebration with folks in local community

Below is the full chronological list of 2016-17 UM Army dates:

• UM ARMY Homefront @ Asbury UMC in Corpus Christi; May 21-27, 2017
• BASIC @ Rockport FUMC; June 11-15, 2017
• UM ARMY Mixed Age in Austin; June 11-17, 2017
• UM ARMY @ Lockhart FUMC; June 18-24, 2017
• BASIC @ Dripping Springs UMC; June 25-29, 2017
• UM ARMY @ La Grange FUMC; June 25-July 1, 2017
• UM ARMY Family @ Cathedral Oaks; July 1-5, 2017
• BASIC @ San Angelo FUMC; July 16-20, 2017
• UM ARMY @ Brackettville FUMC; July 16-22, 2017

Council of Bishops to call for 2019 General Conference

The following is a press release from UMCOM: 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 2, 2016

Council of Bishops to call for 2019 General Conference
Sets forth actions to involve the whole church in prayer and conversation

St. Simons Island, Ga.: Through an affirmative vote at their fall meeting this week, the United Methodist Council of Bishops expressed their intent to call for a special session of the General Conference in either February or March of 2019 and asked the business manager of the General Conference to move forward with exploring venues and a bid search.

The Constitution of The United Methodist Church provides that the Council of Bishops may call a special session of the General Conference possessing the authority and exercising all the powers of the General Conference. Business to be considered during such a session would be limited to the purpose defined within the call, which also would include the time and place.

The Council’s action stops short of making the actual call for a special session, which is expected to come at some point after the Commission on a Way Forward begins its work.

The Council’s Executive Committee brought the recommendation to the full Council for consideration and action after exploring the feasibility of meeting in either 2018 or 2019.

“A requirement that materials be in the hands of delegates at least 230 days before such a session makes it unlikely that the Commission could complete its work in time to meet that deadline for a 2018 meeting, so 2019 seemed to us to be the best option,” said Bishop Bruce R. Ough, president of the Council. “The purpose of broadening the time frame to either February or March is to afford more flexibility in finding a suitable and available location.”

Such a special session would be composed of delegates to the preceding General Conference – or their lawful successors – unless a conference prefers to have a new election.

The Council received a report from the moderators of the Way Forward about composition of commission membership, a plan for the first meetings and a strategy for communication.

The Council also voted to approve a recommendation from the Executive Committee to initiate a conversational process among clergy and laity within annual and central conferences that would parallel the work of the Commission on a Way Forward. Each bishop would be free to structure the process and timeline according to the specific needs and context of their area, using some suggested questions as a starting point.

Bishop Debra Wallace-Padgett and Bishop Al Gwinn, co-chairs of the Praying Our Way Forward Initiative, announced the second phase of the appeal, which involves each conference making a commitment to come together in prayer during a designated week. The effort would begin January 1, 2017 and continue into 2018. The first phase involved a commitment from bishops for daily prayer focused on the selection and initial efforts of the Commission.

“We want the church and the Commission on a Way Forward to be led by God. This prayer emphasis puts us in a posture where as a church we are asking and listening for God’s leadership,” said Bishop Wallace-Padgett. “Our prayer focus is two fold: We are praying that God will help us to more effectively fulfill the mission of the church.  And we are praying to be one in Christ.”

She said they are inviting persons to:

• pray daily for the church’s effectiveness in fulfilling our mission of making disciples and for the outcome of the work of the Commission on a Way Forward
• participate in their conference’s week of prayer;
• fast weekly as they are able for The United Methodist Church and our future

Bishop Gwinn said the Council is working in partnership The Upper Room, which has developed a website called UMCprays.org. “The website features many tools and resources to help you to plan your week of prayer,” said Bishop Gwinn. “Each week will feature information about what is happening in the conference that is praying that week, including a prayer-focused blog written by the bishop in that area.”

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Media contact:
Diane Degnan
ddegnan@umcom.org
615.483.1765 (c)