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It’s Annual Conference time! In June each year the pastors and laity from the 539 New England churches in Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and a portion of Connecticut gather together to celebrate our ministries, vote on legislation and worship God together. This year the conference will be held in Danvers, a location relatively central to those states and big enough to accommodate us. They happen to have a waterpark on site which was a great draw to include MANY youth members who came. They participated in one particularly lively session of worship where a praise band from one of our Brazilian churches played and sang songs that energized all of us!
A livestream of the conference is available for viewing at neumc.org. There is proposed legislation available in a Pre-Conference booklet on that site as well.
One piece of legislation pertains to Mission Shares which are an amount, calculated by the conference on the basis of information taken from our Statistical Reports, that we pay to Annual Conference each year. This pays a variety of administration fees for our camps, bishop and district superintendents. It also provides for regional and worldwide mission. You may know that Oakdale paid its Mission Shares in full many years ago but in more recent years had not been able to. Three years ago we applied for Mission Share Relief which gave us permission to pay a smaller amount covering our share of conference administrative costs.
One of the pieces of proposed legislation at Annual Conference this year is to cancel the Mission Share Relief program. I will be voting in favor of this legislation because I believe this is good for our church and good for the conference. Part of the supporting rationale which is especially elucidating reads, “canceling the program does enable the Conference to clarify its budget picture aligned to what churches can realistically sustain, which will consequently benefit local churches with mission share apportionments that they can indeed sustain.” Preconference materials, p. 116.
Other legislation deals with a variety of topics including the relationships between our conferences and others throughout the world, pastoral compensation, health insurance rates, codifying a policy around parental leave and the closure of five churches throughout the conference.
Each church sends their pastor and a lay delegate to the hybrid conference which can be attended in person or via Zoom. Oakdale’s representatives are Pastor Cheryl and Laurene Nichols. Please be in prayer for us, our bishop, our District Superintendent Megan Stowe and all of the people who will be representing you at this year’s conference.
Bible Study: We are taking the summer off and will start up again in early September on Wednesdays at 10:30am. As you may know, we tried an evening format for this last study and had several members who work days, including a couple from another church. Please touch base with me if you’d like to join an evening study or if you like the idea of “pub church” or “theology on tap.” This would be a casual gathering in a local establishment where we would discuss current events from the standpoint of our faith with a few guiding questions but no reading necessary.
Worship: Our summer worship will kick off on June 8th with a celebration of Pentecost. Please remember to wear red to symbolize the fiery appearance of the Holy Spirit. You are also invited to order a memorial geranium to fill the altar with red beauty on that day. Orders are due by June 1st and are $12 each. Please use the form below to indicate who you are giving the geranium in honor of (if they are living) or in memory of (if they have passed).
Please join us for worship each Sunday at 10:30 at the church or on our YouTube livestream at this link.
Pastoral Care: Please contact me when you have a graduation, anniversary, or other special event that you would like me to pray for. When you are facing a difficult decision and would like someone to discuss it with, I am a trained Spiritual Director, here to listen and to offer prayer for wisdom and guidance. When planning a wedding, I can provide premarital counseling and planning for a Christian ceremony. When anticipating a death in the family, let me pray for you and your loved one as they transition from this life to the eternal. I am here to serve you and encourage you in all of life’s situations. I am available by appointment or by chance at the church office.
In Christ's Love,
Pastor Cheryl
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