never enough time to say it. This morning I have three things I want to accomplish: I want

Transcription

1 1 STATE OF THE CONFERENCE ADDRESS June 2018 (Greetings/thanks) [OPENING SLIDE] There s always so much that fills my heart and yearns to be said in this time together, but never enough time to say it. This morning I have three things I want to accomplish: I want to update you on our 2020Vision, tell you about a new phase of life in the Conference that you re invited to be part of, and then leave a few minutes at the end for your questions and answers. [SLIDE 2] And I want to frame it all by talking about movements : movements in the world around us and a movement taking shape within our own Conference. Think for a moment about how multiple movements over the course of our own U.S. history have shaped who we are today. Consider just the last few years Our nation has witnessed a cascade of new social movements that have re-defined our national narrative and mobilized millions of people. [SLIDE 3] The Black Lives Matter movement, founded in the wake of the July 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman in the Florida shooting death of African American teen Trayvon Martin.

2 2 [SLIDE 4] Standing Rock, a stunning movement showcasing the intersection of the climate change movement with indigenous rights when local tribal communities protested the Dakota Access Pipeline and attracted the world s attention and presence. [SLIDE 5] The Women s March that flooded Washington, DC and other cities across the globe with women and allies determined to protect women s rights, health and families in January 2017 [SLIDE 6] The Sanctuary movement, a recent re-birth of a movement actually started in the 1980 s, focused on protecting immigrants and their families from deportation [SLIDE 7] The #NeverAgain & March for our Lives movement, a gun control movement inspired, organized, and led by students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High school in Parkland, Florida in the aftermath of the shooting on Valentine s Day this year, in which 17 students and staff members were killed by a former student wielding an AR-15 style semi-automatic rifle.

3 3 [SLIDE 8] #MeToo, a movement that spread like wildfire on social media, laying bare just how endemic sexual harassment and assault is in all aspects of our culture and life today. [SLIDE 9] Poor People s Campaign originally conceived by Martin Luther King, Jr 50 years ago to coalesce a new and unsettling force for justice in our nation. The newly inaugurated movement today is uniting tens of thousands of people to challenge the evils of racism, poverty, ecological harm, and war. All these movements! And this is just a sampling. My question for us today is this: [SLIDE 10] where is the Church where are WE in the midst of all these movements? Is the Church which itself began as a movement still a movement today, working collectively to passionately fulfill our purpose and share our cause as people of faith? Some would unfortunately answer NO without hesitation. They feel the Church as a whole has lost our way, that far from being an impassioned movement of love and hope and faith and possibility, we have instead become an immovable, staid institution that no longer lives the values and beliefs we profess. Case in point: the Atlanta-based pastor, Creflo Dollar, who launched a fundraising scheme to raise $65 million for a private jet to

4 4 safely and swiftly share the Good News of the Gospel worldwide on behalf of his World Changers Ministry. You just can t make this stuff up! There are ample examples of the Church losing its way, becoming something that bears no resemblance to the Gospel we claim. But there are SO many other stories worth celebrating, stories of a church that is striving to be faithful, passionate about sharing the love and mercy of Jesus Christ, a Church across the globe that has an amazing capacity and willingness to be a driver of change, a crafter of hope, and an authentic embodiment of extravagant love and deep faithfulness in the world. Our churches and our members right here in the MN Conference UCC bear witness to this. It is you who are often on the front lines of many of the current-day movements I mentioned earlier, and it is pure inspiration! I want to thank you for being Christ s Church is so many life-giving, hope-dealing ways. For every time you ve stood in a protest line to demand greater justice, wider welcome, and a call for peace, thank you. For every time you ve countered ugliness and hatred with love and mercy, thank you. For every hour you ve worked and minute you ve volunteered to make your congregation stronger, to make your community better, to embody and share the Good News in word and in

5 5 deed, thank you. For every small thing you personally have done, with no fanfare or acknowledgement, to offer a glimpse to another of a kind of love and healing that feels so scarce in the world around us, thank you. You evidence every day the movement of the Spirit, the movement that IS our beloved Church, a rolling tide of love and justice and faithfulness and peace. In many ways, our job as a Conference is to create and nurture the spaces where that unflinching movement of the Spirit of the Living God can flourish and grow for the good of the Church and for the good of our communities and world, or to recognize those places where something life-giving is already at work and support further growth. [SLIDE 11] You may remember that last year at this meeting we announced our 2020 Vision for the Minnesota Conference, a collection of bold strategic objectives that the staff and Board hoped would create that space for the flourishing of the Spirit. At the conclusion of Annual Meeting, the staff s work alongside many of you in the Conference and in partnership with others outside this Conference began in earnest. And I am delighted to report that the results have far exceeded our imagining!

6 6 A quick review of what those strategic objectives were and some very brief updates on the work thus far: [SLIDE 11A] Engage at least 3 congregations in each of 2017 & 2018 in an intentional revitalization and renewal program. o Here s the update: at this moment, seven of our congregations are engaged in our brand new Crossroads program. Two retreats have been held where the leadership teams of each of those congregations were present, and in-depth assessment work of each congregation is underway. [SLIDE 11B] Engage at least 10% of our congregations in use of the UCC s White Privilege curriculum in o Nine congregations attended a fall training of facilitators for the curriculum last Fall, and three additional churches also utilized the curriculum in their settings but did not attend the training. That means we are just one church shy of already meeting our 3-year benchmark! Stay tuned for the next training opportunity your church can take part in soon.

7 7 [SLIDE 11C] During engage up to 5 congregational leadership teams in a 12-month coaching and mentoring process to develop a ministry plan for lifelong spiritual formation in their churches. o Leading Well: Nurturing Faith-Forming Congregations has been launched with three congregations participating. These congregational teams have met together in retreat twice, have done monthly videoconferencing with our Vibrant Faith Coach, and will benefit from one-onone coaching now as they each develop their unique ministry plans. [SLIDE 11D] During 2018, launch a 6-month leadership formation initiative for up to 25 faith formation leaders to support peer connection and learning. o A cohort of 15 people 10 from the MN Conference UCC and 5 from other UCC Conferences and ecumenical partners has been formed. They will meet in retreat together for the first time next week. [SLIDE 12 & 12A] By year-end 2018, launch a lay leadership development program that grows our capacity across the Conference for strong lay leadership,

8 8 provides for multiple paths to authorized ministry, and equips the Church for the future. o You heard Vicki Wunsch, our Director of Leadership Development, report on this yesterday. The Damascus Project! This amazing collaboration between the MN and Wisconsin Conferences of the UCC has been challenging, invigorating, thoughtful, and productive. The first course will be offered this Fall, and the Winter and Spring courses are already planned. All they need is YOU to be part of it. Already, 5 people from the MN Conference and 6 from the WI Conference have registered for the Fall course. This is exciting work that is foundational to the future strength and vitality of all our churches. I hope you ll encourage people in your churches to be part of this, and consider doing so yourself. [SLIDE 12B] Identify and nurture two or more post-modern, 3.0 communities of faith by the end of o Because our benchmark is farther out, work on this objective is only just beginning, but it HAS begun! 13 people participated in an inaugural

9 9 conversation and brainstorming session via video conference. 9 additional people have raised their hands to be involved moving forward. This work will continue as a generative conversation this year and we ll see where it leads! [SLIDE 12C] Launch a collaborative, multi-church Young Adult Service Community. o On this one, we hit more snags and challenges than we would have liked and a Young Adult Service Community as we conceived of it will not launch this Fall. BUT we are so grateful to Macalester Plymouth Church in St Paul, which has already launched the program with one intern this past year, and other congregations have signaled interest in being host churches next year. We are also thrilled to welcome Naiomi to our staff team this summer, as an intern in a companion program, Summer Communities of Service. So while our path is a little slower than anticipated, we are staying the course.

10 10 [SLIDE 13] I hope you can easily hear for yourselves that we have made tremendous progress in this work. And here are a few learnings we ve had along the way: [CLICK AGAIN] We underestimated you! In many cases, your interest has outweighed the outcomes we projected. Over the last year, we have witnessed an amazing energy and receptivity around this work, evident in your phone calls, s, volunteerism, and participation. Your enthusiasm has fueled our efforts and helped us to know that our 2020 Vision was on the right track. The strategic objectives crafted for our 2020 Vision have appeal for churches across the Conference spectrum: greater Minnesota and metro, small and large, multi-staff and limited staff. We have been absolutely delighted to see the diversity of churches responding and participating, and it is exactly what we hoped for: a plan and work that serves the entirety of the Conference and has relevance for our congregations, wherever you are and whatever your circumstance.

11 11 And finally, what we have loved watching is the way our 2020 Vision work has resulted in strengthened relationships church-to-church and peer-to-peer, bold new partnerships within and outside of the Conference, and a beautiful sense of new community all the way around. All in all, our 2020 Vision has been a wonderful experience, producing unanticipated benefits that are strengthening all of us. We thank you for your interest and engagement; keep it coming! And I want to particularly thank our staff who have run point on these new ministries, while still attending to other essential and ongoing work. Without their commitment and creativity, we could not celebrate all these amazing accomplishments today. Kevin Brown, Vicki Wunsch, Rick Wagner, and Anita Bradshaw have been the primary drivers in this work, of course supported brilliantly by Sandy Kellen, Marita Karlisch, and Curtis Griesl. Will you please join me in thanking them? Friends, can you sense the movement afoot in the Minnesota Conference? Can you detect the renewed purpose and re-dedication to our collective calling? I hope I m helping you to

12 12 catch a glimpse today of this uptick in energy I ve been witnessing all year, and for which I am grateful beyond words. [SLIDE 14] But this is no time to rest on our laurels or pat ourselves on the back. I want to be sure that we are paying attention to the Holy Spirit s unfolding movement among us as we step into our future. I want you in your congregations and all of us in the Conference to be in prayerful discernment about how the Spirit would have us Be the Church, acting in faith, in just such a time as this. And so the Board of Directors is announcing a period of Strategic Discernment in our life together beginning this weekend. Over the next 6-9 months we will be engaging in some soulful searching and information-gathering designed to help us envision and plan for a future that is vital and a ministry of meaning in the MN Conference. You might wonder: WHY do this NOW? I want to be clear that we re engaging in this intentional time of discernment in order to be proactive about planning our future together, not because we are reacting to any crisis. We are a healthy Conference tremendously blessed by vital churches, unique resources, and enormous potential. We are also a Conference that is now more regularly faced with expenses that outpace our

13 13 revenue, closing and struggling churches, and a stubborn downward trend in congregational giving to Our Church s Wider Mission. We want to pay attention to those factors, and we want to actively explore what you need of us today, how we can best steward the gifts and possibilities we have available to us for the sake of our collective ministry in Christ s Church. [SLIDE 15] So over the next months we will be asking each other these guiding questions: [SLIDE 15A] What must the Conference offer to its constituents to YOU that no one else likely can or will? [SLIDE 15B] What strategic choices must Conference leadership make, considering input gathered, available and projected resources, and our best guesses about the future? [SLIDE 15C] And above all: What is God up to in the life of the Minnesota Conference UCC? How are we being called afresh to serve Christ s Church moving forward? Where is the Holy Spirit leading us, and how might we follow? To get to the heart of these questions, we will be and already are actively pursuing input from a variety of sources to inform the journey.

14 14 [SLIDE 16] Over the next few months we ll be seeking your wisdom: in workshops later today, through electronic surveys, in focus groups and other interviews. We ll look at trends in membership and in giving at local and wider levels; and Consider the changing landscape of Church more broadly in our society. We ll be talking with our partners in the national setting of the UCC, other UCC Conferences, and ecumenical partners too about what they re seeing and how their ministries and their structures are adapting to meet today s needs of Church. We ll be taking a thorough and hard look at the Conference s own financial picture, looking at current trends in giving to Our Church s Wider Mission and per capita (our largest operating revenue sources), projected expenses over a longer term, growing financial needs at Pilgrim Point Camp, and opportunities for new giving overall.

15 15 Pilgrim Point Camp will be an important part of our discernment in this process. Already a joint task force of the Board of Directors and Pilgrim Point Camp Committee has been working for several months to explore some of the unique opportunities and challenges relative to our outdoor ministries in the Conference. Our work here, as with all other facets of our Conference life, will be diligent and thorough as we consider pressing capital and staffing needs at Pilgrim Point alongside a worrisome decline in camp registrations. So that s the what, the why, and the how. [SLIDE 17] And now this much more: I need you to know that we ve pledged to one another a willingness to put everything on the table and to prayerfully examine every angle in order to make the best, most informed decisions about our priorities and plan moving forward. We are entering into this process with no presumptions about what the outcomes will be, and with a deep commitment to honesty, transparency, and faithful imagination. We want to practice what we as Conference staff preach to you as congregational leadership, and what we ve seen you preach from your own pulpits. [SLIDE 18] A radical openness to what the Holy Spirit is doing in our midst;

16 16 A profound trust that in all our wonderings and questioning and exploring God will be undeniably present as our Guide and Wisdom; A firm pledge to faithfully steward each good gift that God has so richly given; and [SLIDE 19] A commitment to bold courage that overcomes the fears and anxieties that will likely emerge as we ask the hard questions and struggle toward answers. [SLIDE 20] Brothers and sisters, I ask your prayers for this very important process of discernment, and I ask you to engage in it as you are invited to do so. This is about all of us together and the future we dare to create in service to Christ s mission in all the world. Let us craft our own movement, Spirit-led and vision-driven. And let us go forward together with ample measures of faithfulness, grace, courage, and hope. Thank you..