 from
the Minister & President
Let's go to Annual Meetilng and make
history
January-February 2004
By
Nancy S. Taylor
In the midst of the
season of Epiphany (which means, appearing ) I am
hopeful that our full allowance of delegates, and all clergy
who are able, will appear at Mount Holyoke College
in South Hadley for the 205 th Annual Meeting of the Massachusetts
Conference of the United Church of Christ, June 11-12. It
is with joy and confidence that I invite each congregation
to ensure that you are represented and each ordained minister
of the Conference to attend. Participation in the Annual
Meeting is not only a privilege for those who follow the
Congregational Way, but also a responsibility.
To attend
Annual Meeting is to participate in passionate discussion
of contemporary matters of theology, faith, and practice;
to explore opportunities for education and edification; to
commune with one another as we worship and adore the Living
God; to encourage and inspire each other in the Christian
life; to hear and meditate upon the Word; to open ourselves
to the fresh winds of the Spirit in our world and lives today;
to conduct the business of the Conference; to exult in the
sound of nearly a thousand voices singing hymns and psalms
and spiritual songs; to express our essential unity as the
one body of Christ and to embody a living answer to the prayer
of Jesus, "that they may all be one."
In case
you are in any doubt, our Annual Meetings do matter.
Over the past two centuries, Annual Meeting actions have
had a profound effect on the discernment and moral conscience
of member churches, as well as upon the civil body politic.
For instance, in 1837, delegates declared that slavery is "offensive
to God, offensive to men, and ought to cease." Delegates
to the 1867 Meeting submitted a bill to the state legislature
to prohibit laborers from being forced to work more than
six days in a week. In 1932, delegates voiced their support
for Federal aid for the unemployed. In 1959 delegates declared
that "segregation is a sin." From opposition to
gambling and the death penalty, to support for universal
education and restrictions on child labor, we have brought
our moral conscience - informed by theological deliberation,
biblical study and ethical reflection - to speak to the common
good. Who knows with what matters the delegates to the 205
th Annual Meeting will wrestle? Clergy and churches - don't
miss out by your absence or lack of representation!
Attendance
at Annual Meeting is a precious opportunity to exercise the
freedoms and responsibilities for which our forebears so
arduously labored. The Congregational Way means nothing if
we are merely a disconnected collection of churches. As early
1648, in the Cambridge Platform, our Congregational forebears
codified their belief that churches are enjoined to meet
together as "spiritual and ecclesiastical assemblies .to
debate and determine controversies of faith and cases of
conscience." They believed such assemblies, "being
met together in Christ", were "necessary to the
well-being of churches, for the establishment of truth and
peace therein."
The theme
for 205 th Annual Meeting, Word, Worship, and Wonder:
Declare It Boldly! , is built upon the fourth initiative
in our Conference's Vision for Growth and Renewal: Communicating
the Gospel in the Twenty-First Century . In anticipation
of an abundance of delegates and visitors, we are planning
more opportunities, activities, speakers, and workshops than
in recent years.
Laity:
have the full allowance of delegates from your church been
chosen? If not, will you urge your congregation's leadership
to ensure that your church is fully represented? Clergy:
are these two days in June saved in your calendar? Every
ordained UCC minister with standing in our Conference is,
by right and privilege, a voting delegate. Regrettably, in
the recent past, only about a fourth of our clergy have attended
Annual Meeting. It is my Epiphany wish that more will appear this
year.
Friends
in Christ, I look forward to your appearance, attendance
and participation at the 205 th Annual Meeting of the largest
Protestant denomination in the Commonwealth. When we gather
together in all our splendid, God-given multiplicity and
diversity, we embody Christ's prayer and plea "that
they may all be one." And who knows? We may make history
together!
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