Conference News
In the life of any organization, priorities and function change. Overtime the structure begins to show its age and needs to catch up with how we do things now and leave room to anticipate who we are becoming. We have outgrown our current structure. We are undertaking to create amended and restated bylaws for you to review and vote on at the next Annual Meeting. Our goal is to conclude our work by February 2023 to provide ample time for notice and discussion.
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Learn more and register for these UCC events: How to Grow a Movement: Invest to End Racism, UCC Summit, Clergywomen’s* Leadership Event of the Antoinette Brown Society, and the Partners in Building Event.
Read MoreA biennial event for women in ministry will be different this time, its organizers say.
The 2022 United Church of Christ Clergywomen’s Leadership Event, Sept. 27-29, will focus on “the intersection of race and gender and ministry.” The meeting will be in person in Decatur, Ga., with a vigorous online option as well.
The Rev. Tara Barber, who staffs the event’s planning team, said there are three new things this year:
The event will “de-center whiteness” and focus on the experiences of Black people, Indigenous people, and people of color.
It is deliberate about inviting cis women, trans women and non-binary people.
Online participants will get special, exclusive content.
written by Kay Klinkenborg, Church of the Palms UCC
“Anytime, any day in America, dial 988 to reach a mental health crisis worker” to talk about your feelings of despair, being suicidal or if you are a family member worried about someone you love. 988 is available to anyone experiencing mental-health related distress, substance abuse or any type of emotional distress.
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Learn about UCC digital programming coming our way.
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There are many ways we can be on a “pilgrimage.” You don’t have to be in top shape and able to walk long distances. Pilgrimage can describe any journey or process when we seek intentionally to experience and be transformed by the Holy while undertaking or living through experiences that can feel far from Holy! They are experiences that take us out of our comfort zones, knock us off balance, require us to sacrifice or endure great losses, make hard choices, function while out of control and vulnerable, invite us to entrust our wellbeing to strangers or even to God who feels absent.
Read MoreAll are welcome to attend Carson’s ordination in-person or to watch the livestream.
Congrats, Carson!
Read MoreTwo popular giving strategies that can help you to save on taxes next year and support our mission.
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Zoom Workshop: Wednesday August 3, 2022, 1-3pm AZ / 2-4pm NM-EP
Presenters: Donna Cavedon and Rich Doerrer-Peacock
We’re all aging! In addition to complaining about it (LOL), we can explore how we can enrich our senior years with opportunities to approach life more deeply and to make this stage profoundly fulfilling in its own way. Join us in learning more about the concept of elderhood which offers wise, sacred, and innovative new possibilities for this last stage of life. We'll also exchange our own ideas and experiences about how we can enhance life, for ourselves and others, as we continue to mature.
Read MoreRev. Dean Hokel and Rev. Drew Terry will be offering a "De-Centering Whiteness" 6-hour class for clergy. This is a basic course (via Zoom) that will employ a series of readings, videos, and small group discussions around issues of race in our culture and within one's own sense of identity and experience.
Registration is limited to nine people in order to maximize time that participants can share and explore deeply their own racial biases and identities, and discuss with each other.
Read More“The Holy Spirit informed me that I have a duty and responsibility to address the mental health crises through a pastoral response,” says Dr. Thomas. “I believe that am charged to provide my Cornerstone student interns to serve your congregation by supplying 7 sessions of professional, HIPPA compliant compassionate relationship counseling (family, marriage/couples, any relationship) at no cost to the client. The sessions will be conducted through our HIPPA compliant Video platform called Simple Practice.”
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From the UCC Open and Affirming Coalition:
Join us Aug. 5-7 for our first National ONA Gathering since 2019! Our virtual event celebrate the 50th anniversaries of the ONA Coalition and Bill Johnson's ordination as the first openly gay man authorized to serve an historic Christian church as a minister of word and sacrament.
From Friday to Sunday evenings, our celebration will offer inspiring worship, powerful testimonies, and stories from our growing movement. We'll honor the past, lift up the present, and claim our visions for the future.
Read MoreWe had a great Pilgrimage to Batworld last night. Some of us met here at the Phoenix Batcave (near 40th St. & Camelback), hosted by Scottsdale UCC, and another group met at a bat bridge in north Tucson. Wonderfully valuable & vitally important creatures, yet very misunderstood.
Read MoreOn June 25, 1972, the United Church of Christ made history when William R. Johnson became the first openly gay man ordained to ministry in an historic Christian church. Bill’s ordination, by the Golden Gate Association in the Northern California/Nevada Conference, opened doors for a new generation of openly LGBTQ leaders in our church.
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Join participants throughout the Southwest Conference for a 6-session online series for adults ages 55+. Topics include:
Sexuality and Aging
Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity
Intimacy and Boundaries
Body Image
Check out some of the UCC digital programming coming up soon.
Read MoreWe invite you to plan with your families, church friends, or youth groups to find a bat colony location near you and gather around dusk on Friday, June 24, to be pilgrims, visitors and learners to the BatWorld. If that night doesn’t work for you, choose another.
But…why BATS?!
Read MoreRegistration is now open for a major United Church of Christ summit “to imagine a church alive and vital in the world.” It will be held Sept. 19-21, online and in-person in St. Louis.
Read MoreThe world of hybrid learning will be the focus of a two-day event for people who teach in local churches of the United Church of Christ.
“A New Turn: Hybrid Faith Formation” will take place online Wednesday, June 8, and Thursday, June 9. Its sponsor is the Association of United Church Educators. People can register here.
“The pandemic has shaken up everything we once knew about church ministry, and we are now facing a new turn,” said the event’s lead organizer, the Rev. Kim Nagy. She is minister of faith formation at Kent (Ohio) UCC and vice chair of AUCE’s Board of Directors. “This virtual conference will help leaders live into this new era of ministry.”
Read MoreCheck out the June webinars: Thursdays for the Soul, Bold Climate Action, and Juneteenth.
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