Interim Minister and President Steve Sterner’s Report to the Plenary of the

207th Annual Meeting

Saturday, June 10, 2006

Good morning.  I’d like to invite you to open your hearts and spirits for a word of prayer.  Will you pray with me?

Holy One, you are ancient wisdom and fresh spoken word, and out of your wisdom we have drawn our faith and our strength, and in your new spoken word we hear our direction and our hope.  As we come into this place today we come as your children seeking to remember your wisdom and hear your word and receive your hope.  Bless us in our time with the spirit only you can bring.  Bless us in our time with the presence only you can offer.  In the name of Jesus Christ we pray.  Amen.

When I was walking out of the dormitory this morning someone stopped me and said, “Oh, you’re still here.”  Wasn’t my choice.  I wondered about the timing of the State of the Conference after you’ve secured Jim Antal as your new Conference minister-  I noticed you wrapped him up before you talked about the state of the Conference!  

The first and most pleasant task I have today is to say a little bit about our Conference staff.  Jim introduced them or asked them to stand yesterday during his presentation so I will not repeat that exercise.  But I cannot emphasize often enough or strongly enough how fortunate and blessed you are to have called a staff like the one that serves you and this Conference.

This has been a difficult and tense year for all of them.  It has been a time when they have wondered about the security of their positions, and a time when they have said good-bye to beloved colleagues.  In all of those experiences and throughout this year they have acted with faith, with integrity and with ongoing commitment and dedication to the life and ministries of the Massachusetts Conference, the United Church of Christ, and even more importantly, the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  And I would invite you to take a moment to stand and express your appreciation to these, your servants and leaders.  (Keep going, I don’t have a whole lot to say.)

I also have the opportunity to thank those members of the Massachusetts Conference who serve as representatives from this Conference to the wider church.  Jennifer Craig serves as our representative to the Executive Council; Sara Penn-Strah to the Local Church Ministries Board; Joe Gartland to the Office of General Ministries Board; and we are currently in the nominating process for two individuals to serve in other capacities.  Vilma Thompson also serves as our delegate to the Justice and Witness Ministries Board.  And we’re grateful for all of their work on behalf of the United Church of Christ and the Massachusetts Conference.

There is, of course, around this day, something of a cloud of sadness.  All of us are deep in prayer and thought for Nancy Taylor on the death of Peter.  As we know, so far today, there are arrangements pending, probably in a few weeks, and we will certainly get that information out to the churches in the Conference as soon as we have it.  But we continue to pray for Nancy and her family and Peter’s family and Old South Church as they move through these days. 

It would not be possible to reflect on the last 12 months apart from the sadness and anger that a balanced budget and the subsequent reductions in staff has meant for many if not all of our Conference and all of the people who have been touched by these decisions.  As I said yesterday to the laity, this has been a burden reluctantly shouldered by all who are asked to bear it, and personally, when I leave here I will leave bearing the weight of that burden in my own heart and soul.  And I know there is much that has to be done after I leave to work on restoring trust in relationships, to continue to move through reconciliation and to continue to make clear the bright hope that is inherent in the gifts and the abundance of this Conference.  You will be blessed in these upcoming years not only by Jim’s leadership, but by the continuing dedication of the staff and of a Board of Directors who in my experience in the life of the church, rises to the top.  They have been exceptional in their devotion, careful in their deliberations, prayerful in their planning. 

But even as you move through those reconciling, trust-restoring exercises, and certainly the grief that will remain more in some parts of the Conference than in others, it is absolutely essential that you continue to keep before you the new life and possibilities that God has called you to; to not defer or delay the process of listening too long, for the time of your opportunity to become something new will diminish the longer you delay embracing it. 

I understand there’s a curse that says, “May you have an interesting year.”  This has been a really interesting year.  When I spoke to you a year ago, I mentioned in theory some of the things that have actually come to pass, and we have learned that theory sounds better than practice.  We’re on the verge of a General Synod that even a year ago would make some differences in our common life and in our relationship with communities of faith both in our land and around the globe. Although the Massachusetts Conference did not have quite the same level of anger about Synod’s action on equality in marriage as other Conferences did, we have had some churches that are beginning to re-evaluate their relationship to the Massachusetts Conference and the United Church of Christ, and that is always a difficult time.  But it is important to note that the General Synod action on equality in marriage also provided the opportunity for many of our congregations to enter into the Open and Affirming process, and I believe we now have 64 Open and Affirming congregations in the Massachusetts Conference of the United Church of-  67, I’m sorry!  Thank you very much.  And that seems to be increasing weekly, so next year we’ll have even more to add to that total.

And many congregations, even those that did not engage in the ONA process have had serious conversations about performing marriages for all couples in our Commonwealth.  And those have been carried on with a great deal of faith and a spirit of discernment.

The General Synod resolutions relating to the Middle East, particularly Israel and Palestine, have caused a strain on our relationship with the Jewish community in Massachusetts, but it has also provided an opportunity for us to engage in more serious dialogue with them than we have for many years, and we are on the verge of establishing some new relationships, new possibilities and conversations with the interfaith community that surrounds us in this great Commonwealth. 

Much has already been said in this meeting and will be said in just a few moments about the strain of local church financing and its impact on the Conference budget.  The year 2005 did see the long projected deficit for the Conference materializing.  And we saw our long, almost 40 year trend of membership loss continue.  The challenges that are before you are great and it would be possible to throw up your hands in despair.  We are not the church we used to be, and for that, many grieve. 

But-  don’t you always like those buts!- but, to paraphrase Paul, we are not like others who have no hope.  In 2005, on an average Sunday in Massachusetts, between 30 and 35,000 people gathered in Massachusetts Conference, United Church of Christ congregations.  30 to 35,000 people praying, praising God, listening for God’s new word to be spoken, transforming their lives and the lives of their communities.  Sunday after Sunday, 35,000 people excited about their church, open to God’s word, centered on the Gospel, come together in praise and prayer.  We are not without hope. 

In 2005, Massachusetts Conference churches supported over 100 different  programs geared toward affordable housing and homelessness.  And just a few weeks ago, Scudder House on the Framingham campus was dedicated and opened as a transitional housing for women in recovery.  We are not without hope.

In 2005, almost $1,000,000 was contributed by our members for tsunami, hurricane and earthquake relief, and work teams have begun to travel to New Orleans in support of our Katrina partnership for Good Shepard Church, which continues to grow, and we’re delighted that Pastor Arndt and Karen could be with us for our meeting today.  All told, the Massachusetts Conference churches of the United Church of Christ in 2005 contributed over $7,000,000 to local mission, Basic Support, Fellowship Dues and special offerings.  We are not without hope.

In 2005, we worked with the Massachusetts Council of Churches and our ecumenical and interfaith partners to defeat a proposed death penalty bill in the Massachusetts legislature.  We worked with the human rights campaign to educate legislators about the values of equality in marriage.  The Massachusetts Conference, Dr. Nancy Taylor, the First Churches of Northampton and United Church in Auburndale received awards from the Massachusetts Religious Coalition for the Freedom to Marry.  We are not without hope.

Throughout the Conference, churches are coming alive.  The long-awaited Timothy Project, a trial project with a few churches in the Conference to nurture vitality, is off and running and already producing results.  New churches are being planned and those new churches that have most recently been started are thriving beyond our wildest expectations.  We are not without hope.

Clergy are being supported through communities of practice and new clergy are provided communities of support in their transitions into ministry.  We are not without hope. 

And the strength and wonder of the Massachusetts Conference, the brightness of its promise and the blessing of its abundance has brought to you a leader of the faith, ability and integrity of Jim Antal.  We are not without hope. 

God is speaking to and through the ministries of the churches and clergy of the Massachusetts Conference of the United Church of Christ.  We are not without hope.  You may see a theme emerging here…  In fact, I think you ought to stand and give yourselves a hand. 

This year as I went through Day of Covenants, several times, people asked me toward the end, to offer my impressions of the Massachusetts Conference.  “Be brutally honest,” someone said.  I still have a few months to go so I’ll just try to be honest.  Well here are a few impressions-  take ‘em or leave ‘em:

You’re not what you used to be-  get over it!  I think you might be becoming something better.  You have such tremendous strength and resources that they’ve blinded you to their existence.  You take for granted what almost every other Conference in the United Church of Christ would die to have.  You do that because you’ve had them for so long you no longer count them, or because you remember what they used to look like and no longer see them.  Appreciate what you have, and use it to build your ministry going forward as a strong community of faith in this Commonwealth.

I have noted often that the geographical, theological, and historical risks that are a part of this Conference are present in almost every conversation.  Those differences are important, and they ought not be discarded or glossed over lightly.  But sometimes the intensity with which you focus on them limits your ability to be the prophetic voice our communities need to hear, and the transformed and transforming communities people want to join. 

In my opinion, one of the tragedies of our time is that our churches are so often caught up in internal issues that the great injustices of our time go unchallenged and the spiritual hunger of our people goes unmet.  You have the gifts, you have the resources, you have the faith. 

In my brief time here I’ve come to more fully appreciate your history.  I did do what my young friend from Phoenix encouraged me to do- I mentioned it a year ago-  I went to see the rock where the penguins landed.  And then I went to the aquarium to look for pilgrims.  But from that history, I’ve been struck by a few words from John Winthrop in his historic sermon, “A Model of Christian Charity.”  As he closes this sermon on the ship that he is on coming to this new land, he’s already laid out the powerful vision of the city on a hill.  And in the end he raises the question of its failure.  And so he closes with these words:  “The only way to avoid that shipwreck and to provide for our posterity is to follow the council of Micah:  ‘To do justice, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God.  For this end we must be knit together; in this work as one.  We must delight in each other, make each other’s conditions our own.  Rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work of Jesus Christ.  For we are all members of one body.’”

I was not installed as your Interim Minister and President, so there’s no service of parting planned.  I want to thank you for allowing this simple parish pastor the privilege of serving with you, and I ask those that I have harmed to forgive me; and for those who have provided harm I extend my forgiveness as well.  For mistakes made, I ask your forgiveness.  May God bless you as you continue to nurture the vitality of local churches and the covenant you share as the Massachusetts Conference of the United Church of Christ, a community of people not without hope.  Amen.