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Panelists Quinn Caldwell, Rachel Culmo, Kaji Spellman and Hans Holznagel (l to r) |
TOLLAND (10/24/2007) -- Over 465 delegates, authorized ministers, and local church members of the Connecticut Conference came to Tolland High School for the Fall Session of the 2007 Annual Meeting, to help prepare the Conference for its next year of ministry, and to consider the question of inviting, attracting, and retaining the participation of young adults in the life of the Church. Participants heard from keynoter Hans Holznagel, the "UCC Answer Guy," a three-person panel, and Conference Minister Davida Foy Crabtree; engaged in small group conversations; attended workshops; approved a $4.3 million budget; and voted a resolution calling for Universal Health Care Coverage.
Hans Holznagel, who serves the national setting of the United Church of Christ as Associate for Leadership Gifts and has played the role of the "UCC Answer Guy" in the "Yesterday's Visionaries/Today's Voices" DVD, spoke of how he had been formed and encouraged in his faith journey, using language from the Preamble to the UCC's Constitution. As a child in Forest Grove, Oregon, Forest Grove UCC (Congregational) nurtured him as "kindred in Christ" through Christian Education and youth programs. Further, when he moved to New York to study as a religious journalist, his Conference Minister called the national offices to ask if they could use his help. They could, and it began a twenty-year career in the national offices.
Reflecting on the "creative and redemptive" work of Christ, Holznagel spoke of the UCC's efforts to speak out on moral crisis issues of the day, including the recent pastoral letter on the war in Iraq and the 1967 action burning draft cards at Arlington Street Church in Boston. He then noted that it is the responsibility of the church in each generation to make the faith its own. "But automatically expecting the forms of church that attracted and nurtured me to do the same for people half my age," he said, "makes about as much sense as expecting them to put on a 60s wig and turn in their draft cards." [Click here for the full text of Holznagel's keynote address]
In the panel, Holznagel interviewed the Rev. Kaji Spellman, Pastoral Associate at the Wellesley, MA, Congregational Church; the Rev. Quinn G. Caldwell, Associate Pastor at Old South Church in Boston; and Rachel Culmo, Office Services Clerk for the Connecticut Conference. The three reflected on the appeal, the barriers, and the challenges of the church for young people today. Culmo noted the transient lifestyle many young adults live, without a settled residence, which makes commitment to a local congregation difficult, and she spoke of the value of a community like Silver Lake that values reflection and debates over certainty.
The three agreed that committees and conflict held very little appeal to them, while community and work for important causes did. "I think my generation has a shorter attention span," observed Spellman, "because I have difficulty sitting through a sermon, and I'm a preacher!" They also advised that nobody should consider their opinions definitive of their generation. If you want to know what attracts young people to church, they said, you should ask the young people who are there.
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| Attendees in small group session |
On Saturday afternoon, the conversation continued in smaller groups, who were asked to provide some short statements about what they heard:
Friday evening brought Conference Minister the Rev. Dr. Davida Foy Crabtree to the podium to deliver her twelfth address to the Annual Meeting. Much of it took the form of a conversation with one of her predecessors, the late Conference Minister Nathanael Guptill, who passed away in September. "The United Church of Christ is an amazing instrument of God's grace," she explained. "It has been able to receive the gifts of both Nathanael Guptill and Davida Foy Crabtree and to enable us in reconciling relationship, discovering our mutual conviction in Christ." [Click here for the complete address]
In the conversation, Crabtree celebrated the blessings of a grand General Synod in June, the fiftieth anniversary of Silver Lake Conference Center, and the work to bring disaster relief to so many places in the country and the world. She reflected on the difficulties of encouraging support from local churches for common mission, and quoted Dr. Guptill's response:
"I do understand what you are facing, but just keep at it. I trust them to listen and eventually they'll get it. Just help them understand that without their giving generously to Our Church's Wider Mission, we wouldn't have schools, colleges, hospitals and missionaries all over the world, partners who are there long-term and make a real difference in times of trouble - like hurricanes, typhoons, earthquakes, wars and famines. And we wouldn't have new churches in gospel-lacking places in this country. We wouldn't even have Silver Lake!"
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| Davida Foy Crabtree |
Looking ahead, Crabtree spoke of the "forgotten generation," those who have not been served by a full-time youth minister at the Conference level, a position which will shortly exist for the first time in twenty-nine years. "Throughout that time," she said, "churches have lamented the disappearance of youth after confirmation and into young adulthood."
"Our churches have focused on married young adults with children because we know how to support them. The absence of the unmarried young adults -- which is the majority of the people in their 20's and now into their 30's -- goes unnoticed. Yet their need for community, for belonging, for a faith that speaks to their life decisions and dilemmas is very strong. We have much to learn."
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Kate McLean (West Church), Anne Hughes (Large Church), Bruce Barrett (East Church), and Tim Hughes (Small Church) wake up to share the vision |
The Now, for the Future Campaign Steering Committee took the stage on Saturday morning and performed an energetic and entertaining skit driven by a rap beat titled "Discover the Joy of Giving Now, For the Future of Silver Lake." Written by Major Gifts Chair Bruce Barrett, the skit opened with the announcement of a vision for the future given by God (the voice of Bonnie Bardot). "Local Churches" played by Barrett, Tim Hughes, Anne Hughes, Kate McLean, Hugh McLean, and Bev Hughes heard the news confirmed by Conference Minister Crabtree and narrator Mary Kuchenbrod, and in a series of "telephone conversations" found their way through a successful campaign with "help when we need it."
The steps, delivered in rapid-fire poetry, were:
We Pray as a Church: Make a Silver Lake Trip
We Pray as a Church: Choosing Leadership
We Pray as a Church: And Count our Blessing
We Pray as a Church: Set a Goal for Giving
We Pray as a Church: Plan to Raise the Money
We Pray as a Church: For the Joy of Giving
And the assembly joined in the chorus, chanting:
Going on a Journey, Oh boy Oh boy,
Going on a Journey, Discovering Joy,
God is going to lead us, Oh girl Oh girl,
Bringing Silver Lake To a Struggling World
Now, for the Future
Now, for the Future
Now, for the Future of Silver Lake!
"Giving is transforming," said Barrett's character. "By giving deeply, we open our hearts to God's spirit and are transformed into new beings focused on what is right and true and worthy of our gifts."
In his greetings to the assembly from the Connecticut Conference's Korean mission partners, the Rev. Moonhee Kim, Secretary of the Kyungki Presbytery in South Korea, celebrated the October 4 summit meeting between the heads of state of North and South Korea, only the second since the cease-fire that halted combat on the peninsula. "Gaining peace and reconciliation is the only way to meet, to know, and to understand each other," he said. "Therefore I believe that our partnership will serve as a messenger of peace in a world that has experienced increased tension between people to people, society to society and nation to nation." [Click here for Rev. Kim's full remarks]
Dr. Crabtree presented the Korean delegation with one of the chalices used to celebrate communion during the United Church of Christ General Synod in June. The Kyungki Presbytery announced a $1,000 gift to the Now, for the Future Campaign for Silver Lake.
With the assistance of Moderator Dr. Eileen Sypher of Chester, the delegates approved the single resolution presented to them on Saturday afternoon, "Seeking Support for Universal Health Care/Universal Health Care coverage in CT." The resolution endorses the moral principle of universal access to health care, and urges support for interfaith efforts to bring it to the citizens of Connecticut. [Text as proposed (PDF)]
The delegates also approved the Our Church's Wider Mission (OCWM) Basic Support Goal for 2008 of $2,268,323, a 4.5% increase over 2007 and the first recommended increase in some years. Treasurer Martin Ewing and Budget Committee Chair Bob Giles both noted with pleasure the increase in OCWM Basic Support in 2007, with hope that it marked a turning point in contributions to the ministry of other settings of the church. Delegates also voted to send 63% of OCWM Basic funds to national and international work of the UCC, to ask a $5.00 per member contribution for each local church for conference work, the $4,340,592 budget of the Missionary Society of Connecticut, and the $547,112 budget of the Trustees of the Fund for Ministers.
The delegates also heard reports from the General Synod Local Arrangements Committee (to the accompaniment of Synod photos), the Comm,unity Team, and the Rev. Shari Prestemon, Executive Director of hurricane-struck Back Bay Mission in Biloxi, Mississippi.
The work of the meeting nestled within worship. Dr. Crabtree celebrated communion Friday evening, and Conference Preacher the Rev. Deborah Blood spoke on Saturday morning, leading a sung version of the Lord's Prayer which touched the spirit of the assembly. The meeting closed as the delegates sang "We are marching in the light of God," and left to bring that light to their homes, local churches, and communities: letting it shine into the future.
