By James V. Heidinger II,
President and Publisher
GOOD NEWS PERSPECTIVE – No. 8, December 3, 2007
Welcome to another issue of our e-newsletter, Perspective. We hope you are finding this helpful and of interest on important issues facing our church. If so, share Perspective with friends and colleagues. Those interested in receiving our newsletter every two weeks need only to send an email to: perspective@goodnewsmag.org.
STATE OF THE CHURCH REPORT MERITS OUR FEEDBACK – The United Methodist Connectional Table authorized a major study of the church in 2005 to get feedback from leaders and lay members about how we are doing as a denomination. The report of the in-depth survey was released to the church this past June.
Bishop John Hopkins, the chair of the Connectional Table, has invited United Methodists to respond to the State of the Church report, saying: “I invite you into a conversation about the state of our church. How well are we fulfilling the great commandment to love God and our neighbors? How well are we fulfilling the great commission to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world?”
Many of us need to take Bishop Hopkins up on his invitation.
To read his letter to the church and get links to more information about the State
of the Church report, click on: http://www.umc.org/site/apps/nl/content3.asp?
c=lwL4KnN1LtH&b=2739159&ct=3966779
PRESIDENT OBSERVES WORLD AIDS DAY AT UM CHURCH – Several weeks ago a reader proudly sent me information about the UM church he had been attending until he moved from the area. Visiting the church’s web site, I read about its many study groups, ministries, and outreach programs—all very impressive. Then I saw the missions budget and gasped at what the church was doing in second-mile missions giving! I had never heard of Mt. Zion United Methodist Church, in Bel Air, Maryland, or its pastor, the Rev. Craig McLaughlin.
Then, yesterday, I saw the UMNS story reporting that President George W. Bush observed World AIDS Day by calling on the U.S. Congress to double the funding to treat and prevent HIV/AIDS overseas. The President came to Calvary UM Church in Mt. Airy on November 30 to make his call for the added funds. Calvary’s pastor, the Rev. Dennis Yokum was there, along with McLaughlin from Mt. Zion UM Church.
In reading about the President’s visit, I learned that McLaughlin’s Mt. Zion congregation financed and provided volunteers to build the Children of Zion Village, a home for 55 orphans in Namibia, children left parentless from the ravages of AIDS. Mt. Zion gives more than 40 percent of its offering collections to missions and provides most of the $14,000 a month operating expenses for the orphanage. Calvary UM Church and others in the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference have joined Mt. Zion in supporting the Children of Zion Village.
McLaughlin hopes other churches will use Mt. Zion as a model for creating orphanages and other facilities. He and his congregation are willing to work with anyone who is interested. “I told the President, every church in the United States could do this,” said Pastor McLaughlin.
Thanks to Melissa Lauber for this excellent and inspiring story.
There is much more to it. Don’t miss it. Read it and share it with others. Go
to: http://www.umc.org/site/apps/nl/content3.asp?
c=lwL4KnN1LtH&b=2072519&ct=4711139&printmode=1
GINGHAMSBURG UM CHURCH SEEKS $1.5 MILLION ‘MIRACLE OFFERING’—While we’re thinking of missions and sacrificial giving, you need to know about the Ginghamsburg UM Church in Tipp City, Ohio. It is challenging its members and partner schools, businesses and churches to raise $1.5 million during the Christmas season for relief work in Sudan.
This will be the church’s fourth “Christmas miracle offering,” which has resulted in $1.8 million having been raised thus far for The Sudan Project, as the church has partnered with the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR). The funds raised have provided critical relief for refugees in Darfur, where an estimated 300,000 people have died since 2003 as a result of civil war, unrest, disease, and lack of food.
Ginghamsburg, headed by long-time senior pastor Mike Slaughter, is asking that people contribute the same amount of money that they intend to spend celebrating Christmas with family and friends
For the full story and further information about what the funds
raised have accomplished, go to: http://www.umc.org/site/apps/nl/content3.asp?
c=lwL4KnN1LtH&b=2072529&ct=4702873
MARYLAND HIGH COURT DENIES GAY MARRIAGE – In case you missed it, the Christian Century (10/16/2007) reported that Maryland’s highest court narrowly ruled that the Maryland Constitution does not confer upon gays the right to marry each other.
A divided Maryland Court of Appeals ruled September 18 that a 1973 state law that bans gay marriage does not violate the Maryland Constitution’s equal-rights provisions.
“In the absence of some generally accepted scientific conclusions identifying sexuality as an immutable characteristic, we decline on the record in the present case to recognize sexual orientation as an immutable trait,” wrote Judge Glenn Harrell, who penned the court’s majority opinion. (The Century’s news source was the Associated Baptist Press.)
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