Archive of Writings by Interim Minister & President Stephen L. Sterner
United Church News columns
by Stephen Sterner
We are Not without Hope
August-September, 2006
It's a time to Rekindle and Restore
June-July, 2006
Spring Will Bring Changes to the Massachusetts Conference
April-May, 2006
Staff Changes at the Massachusetts Conference
April 3, 2006
God's Blessing on You
February, 2006
We Believe Things Can Change
December, 2005 - January, 2006 ecember-January 2006
A Season of Change Could Mean a World of Change
October-November, 2005
The Year Ahead Will Be Filled With New Experiences
August-September, 2005
Massachusetts Conference Helps Grow the Bouquet of Congregations
June-July, 2005
Easter is More Than a One-Day Event
March-April, 2005
Worship Services Quench Arid Souls
January-February, 2005
Email Messages from the Interim Minister & President
Letter on Staff Changes at the Massachusetts Conference
April 3, 2006
Letters and Schedule for March Meetings with Members of the Board on a New Conference Direction
March 3 & March 6, 2006
Letter to Churches on the Conference Financial Situation
February 10, 2006
A Prayer for Christmas
December 20, 2005
Pre-Synod Message I
June, 2005
Pre-Synod Message II
June 27, 2005
Holy Week Message from the Interim Minister & President
March 17, 2005
Letter to Churches on the Conference Financial Situation
February 10, 2006
Dear Colleagues in Ministry in the Massachusetts Conference:
I am writing to bring you up to date on some very important happenings within the Massachusetts Conference. This will require a longer message than I normally send, but it is important to place the information in the context of the work the Conference has been about for over 6 years.
The Work We’ve Done
In 1999, the Massachusetts Conference adopted a strategic plan known as the Vision For Renewal and Growth. Over the last six years significant portions of that vision have been implemented, while others have been only partially addressed. Over this period of time we have learned more about our work. We have also refined the vision to a more concise statement: “The mission of the Massachusetts Conference is to nurture local church vitality and the covenant among our churches.” As that mission begins to get clearer definition, both the Conference Staff and the Conference Board of Directors have had conversations about how we might best organize to do our work. Gil Rendle, the Alban Institute Consultant who helped the Conference develop the Vision For Renewal and Growth, has been helping us with the ongoing work of clarifying our mission and organizing to accomplish it. It is worth noting that Gil believes the Massachusetts Conference is far ahead of most other middle judicatories in addressing our mission for the 21st century. You have been served well by your Conference leadership over these last six plus years.
Our Finances
At the same time this work is being done, we have been aware that Conference financial resources are in a slow decline. When measured against increases in the cost of living, that decline looms larger each year. This decline is based on the financial pressures within many of our local congregations. Like many local congregations, we must better align our available resources with our mission. In 2005, both Basic Support and Fellowship Dues receipts were less than the amounts received in 2004. There is no reason to expect this trend to reverse in the near term.
For 2006, we will manage to balance our budget by reducing program expenses and operating costs, and by drawing down some reserve funds. Since we anticipated this decline, we were already trimming some basic operating costs. But the shortage for the 2007 budget will likely be in excess of $200,000. This will require reductions in staffing to accomplish a balanced budget. Nearly every middle judicatory in every denomination is facing these same challenges. The challenges are a reflection of the changing role of middle judicatories in the work of mission with and for the church and the world. Local congregations have often been addressing these changing realities for a number of years. It is now time for the Conference to do so as well.
Responses
I have been asked by several people about the possibility of reducing the amount we forward to the wider church in order to balance our budget without having to reduce staff. That would not, in my opinion, address the issue. Our current staffing structure was developed over forty years ago. We are currently staffed and organized for a mission we no longer have at a size we no longer are. Were we to free up additional dollars we might better use them to support new and revitalized congregations, carry out direct mission and justice work, and support some existing activities that support our Conference mission.
It is clear that the United Church of Christ at the national level will need to do the same planning, re-visioning, and re-aligning that local congregations and now Conferences are about. We will encourage and support that work. But making drastic changes in our allocation of Basic Support will not solve our problems. As Ronald Hiefetz, who spoke to a gathering of pastors and leaders of the Massachusetts Conference last Fall, would say, “that is a technical solution rather than an adaptive one.” I would anticipate that the conversation about allocation and best use of any additional dollars will be part of the Conference’s work with the settled Conference Minister and President. That will also need to include a conversation about the whole Conference structure as well, again, not unlike what local congregations have been engaged in for some years now.
We are also working on increasing our income. But the options open to us represent long term solutions. These options will not help us for the near term.
However, we still need to address the question of staff reduction in the very near term.
We have gathered a significant amount of information about our mission and our current work. We have gathered information from other middle judicatories that are addressing these issues. The Board of Directors will be having several special meetings to continue to gather information and prepare a plan for moving forward. It is our expectation that any staff changes would be announced prior to the Annual Meeting of the Conference. Right now we do not know which staff or how many will be affected. However, we want to give staff ample time to seek new employment as well as provide a fair and just severance package. We also want to make reductions prior to the arrival of a new settled Minister and President. We will provide information on our work to the candidate for that position, but that individual will not be faced with staff cuts as his or her first act among us.
Moving Forward
We do not have all the answers. We will need your support and guidance along the way. There will be some time of uncertainty and adjustment as we move forward. Remaining staff positions will need to be redefined and time reallocated. I know this will not be easy, but it is important work. I also know that this work will continue for some time. When the support we receive from the Lily Foundation grant runs out, additional changes may be needed.
If you have questions, please be in contact with me. I am not able to tell you which staff will be affected, because I do not yet know. I can talk about the process.
Thanks for your support as we move forward. Although this is a difficult moment for us, it is also one of opportunity, in which we hope to focus and hone our ministry as a Conference in order to best nurture vital, connected congregations. I will continue to share information as it becomes available.
I ask for your prayers for the Board of Directors, our staff, and our Conference as we move through these transitions in our life together.
Faithfully,
Stephen L. Sterner
Interim Minister and President
Massachusetts Conference, United Church of Christ
A Prayer for Christmas
December 20, 2005
God of Mary and Joseph, God of shepherdesses and Magi, of cows and camels, and creation’s children in every place and time, we come to You in deepest hope only to find You coming to us in greatest love. As we enter these Holy moments we do so weary of the events of our world. In these last months we have been beset by disasters, beaten in battles over political agendas and cultural conflicts. And all the while the endless drumbeats of terror and war pound through the rhythm of our days. We look for good news in the news of our day and are hard pressed to find it. So in these days we turn hopefully to the Good News of your coming. We await with anxiousness the yet faint crying of the newborn child, a crying that foretells the gift of fulfillment for long held hopes and deeply desired dreams. In the birth of the Christ Child we pray that our hopes and fears indeed are met, and that the awesome power of Your hope will finally overcome the enduring presence of our fears. In this season let the Prophets’ promises be brought to life. Bring comfort to your people, liberation to the oppressed, healing to the hurting, and Good News to the poor. As we gather around the manger this year, gather us in the one faith of your abiding love, your enduring presence, and your promised Christ.
Amen.
Stephen L. Sterner
Interim Minister and President
Massachusetts Conference, United Church of Christ
Pre-Synod Message I
June, 2005
Friends,
As The General Synod in Atlanta draws closer, the resolutions that are coming before Synod are gaining closer scrutiny. The General Synod resolution process allows for opportunities for Conferences, local congregations, and authorized bodies within the church to present resolutions on a variety of topics relating to the theology and witness of the United Church of Christ at the national setting. We must always remember the General Synod speaks to and not for the churches.
I encourage you to go to the General Synod page of the UCC web site and look for the resolutions pages (http://www.ucc.org/synod/resolutions/index.html ). There are many that will elicit differing responses from our church communities. I would like at this time to call your attention to resolutions on the Middle East that have already generated significant conversation within the United Church of Christ and with representatives of the Jewish Community.
The topic that has been the focus of that conversation relates mostly to resolutions that call for either divestment or a study of divestment from corporations involved in providing materials used either by the government of Israel in the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza or by some Palestinians in support of terrorism and violence in those areas. I encourage you to contact Jewish community leaders in your area to discuss the resolutions, as well as provide opportunities for your congregation to become informed about them.
The United Church of Christ is committed to the right of Israel to exist as a free, safe, and independent nation. The United Church of Christ is on record as supporting the "Two State Solution" and the "Road Map." In this we support the position of President Bush. The questions before Synod are about the most effective use of the economic leverage of the United Church of Christ. Divestment and a study of divestment are the current options being presented to General Synod.
Both nationally and in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, we have been having conversations with leaders from the Jewish Community. They are very concerned about the implications of the use of divestment as a strategy in promoting peace in the region. The Palestinian Christian community does not have the same access to us for conversations about their position on this issue. Peter Makari, Area Executive for the Middle East for Common Global Ministries, has prepared a helpful paper that does provide some information from the Palestinian Christian community. It also includes an attachment that is a November response from a spectrum of Jewish organizations in the United States. Our General Synod Delegates will have copies of all of this material. The paper can be found on the UCC web site on the Wider Church Ministries page (http://www.globalministries.org/mee/leverage.pdf ).
Here in Massachusetts I have had serious conversations with Jewish leaders about alternative ways to use economic leverage to promote peace and justice for all in the region. Most of these conversations focus on a proposal put forth by the Evangelical Lutheran Church using the strategy of selective investment. I have agreed to another meeting between Conference representatives and the Jewish Community prior to Synod.
The General Synod process will allow opportunities for additional input and ideas. No matter what the General Synod decides, we will continue to seek ways we can partner with the Jewish community and the Palestinian Christian community in support of peace in the Middle East, security for Israel, and justice for the Palestinians.
Having recently seen a Neo-Nazi demonstration right in our Commonwealth, we are keenly aware of the horrors of anti-Semitism. We must always stand in opposition to hatred in any form. The challenge before us is to find a way to continue to express our solidarity with the Jewish community and to seek justice in solidarity with our historic partners in the Palestinian Christian Community.
Faithfully,
Stephen L. Sterner
Interim Minister and President
Massachusetts Conference, United Church of Christ
Pre-Synod Message II
June 27, 2005
In just a few days, delegates, leaders, and visitors from across the United Church of Christ will gather in Atlanta, Georgia for General Synod. This Synod, more than many in recent times, will be discerning directions for the church in a number of critical areas. We will be asked to affirm the Sovereignty of Jesus Christ as we seek the Holy Spirit’s guidance in the days of Synod deliberations. We will weigh a pronouncement on paths to authorized ministry. We will consider resolutions seeking to strengthen efforts for peace in the Middle East through the use of economic leverage. We will join with colleagues from around the country in the same conversation we in Massachusetts have been having on equality in marriage. A proposal for suspending the normal structure of Synod for the 2007 gathering in Hartford will also come to the floor for action. I encourage you to go to the UCC web site and click on the General Synod page for copies of all actions to be presented at Synod. You can also track the flow of Synod business at this site.
I ask your prayers for our delegates, for General Synod, and for the United Church of Christ as we enter this critical time in our life together.
Stephen L. Sterner
Interim Minister and President
Massachusetts Conference, United Church of Christ
Holy Week Message from the Interim Minister & President
March 17, 2005
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:
If you are among those who elect to celebrate Palm Sunday at the start of Holy Week, it is possible to skip from one festive celebration to another without entering deeply into the Passion of Jesus. Watching the Mel Gibson movie is not necessarily an adequate compromise. It dwells so much on the suffering that the celebration at the end, though certainly welcome, comes with seemingly excessive torment of both the flesh and the spirit. As we enter this sacred time I am reminded that there are some who would opt to skip the suffering around us, just as there are others who might choose not see the light of God breaking into the days of our despair. In Iraq and much of the Middle East we have moved above, or away from, the terrible suffering and death that continue there every day. Now that there are elections held or about to be held, the suffering has receded from the public conscience. On the other hand there is much to celebrate in the first faint and fragile breaths of freedom and the ending of oppression for so many long suffering people. In this Holy Week may we continue to lift up the broken condition of our humanity that leads us to violence and to war. And may we come face to face with God’s own agony because of our continuing to live in it. As this Holy Week gives way to the first light of God’s enduring love, let us rejoice with and in those places and peoples where hope is re-birthed and life is redeemed.
Faithfully,
Stephen L. Sterner
Interim Minister and President
Massachusetts Conference, United Church of Christ
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