A look at elected delegates for the 2012 General Conference from the Detroit Conference

• By RJ Walters, Editor •

At the 2011 Detroit Annual Conference and West Michigan Annual Conference delegates were elected for the 2012 General Conference and 2012 Jurisdictional Conference.

The 2012 General Conference will take place in Tampa, Fl. from April 24 to May 4 and the North Central Jurisdictional Conference will run from July 17-21 in Akron, Ohio.

The conference will work to set policy and direction for the church, as well as handle other business of the global and national church. General Conference is the only entity that speaks for The United Methodist Church.

Detroit Conference General Conference clergy delegates
Rev. Melanie Carey
Age: 46 Church: Detroit Renaissance District Superintendent
# of times elected: General Conference - 1
The district superintendent for the newly formed Detroit Renaissance District is a major player in Hispanic/Latino Ministries at a national level and she believes strongly in the connectional heritage of the church and inclusion for all people. She said a restructuring of the denomination is inevitable but as changes are rolled out she hopes the UMC doesn’t “throw the baby out with the bathwater” and forget its roots completely. Carey said discussions at conference should focus on how local churches can utilize vibrant missions and ministry to get new people plugged into communities.

Rev. Joy Barrett
Age: 52 Church: Chelsea First United Methodist Church
# of times elected: General Conference – 6
Making her conference-record sixth trip to General Conference Barret continues to have a heart for all people and she desires for ministry to be a means toward helping people deepen their relationships with God. She said General Conference should help determine how transformation and abounding grace can be spread by the UMC without being institutionalized, falling prey to long-held structural conventions that no longer are plentiful. She also hopes to be part of discussions that center around strengthening the Midwest, as the North Central Jurisdictional Conference prepares to merge an Episcopal area and lose one bishop.

Rev. Ed Rowe
Age: Over 65 Church: Central United Methodist Church (Detroit)
# of times elected: Not available
Rowe is a tireless advocate for the poor, marginalized, the GLBT community and working class citizens. He has served on a plethora of boards and committees in the Detroit Conference and he has long focused on inclusiveness and bringing peace to socially volatile issues.

Rev. Charles Boyaue Jr.
Age: 40-55 Church: Second Grace United Methodist Church (Detroit)
# of times elected: Not available
The Liberian native has a unique global perspective of the church and is the founding scribe of the Detroit/Liberia Conference Partnership Agreements. He also helped build a health clinic in Detroit that serves more than 4,000 people annually. Boyaue is passionate about urban ministry and connecting with other local churches to increase the impact of ministries in the city.

Detroit Conference General Conference lay delegates

Jacqueline Euper
Age: 63 Church: Owosso First United Methodist Church
# of times elected: General Conference – 5; Jurisdictional Conference - 6
The former Project Director for the Flint District currently serves on the Michigan Area and North Central Jurisdictional Committees on Episcopacy. Euper believes the number one issue that will be tackled at the conference is church growth, “as the denomination figures out how to turn this ship around.” She said downsizing some boards and agencies at the global level may be necessary to operate more efficiently as the church attempts to follow through with its mission.

Ang Hart
Age: 26 Church: Scott Memorial United Methodist Church
# of times elected: General Conference – 2; Jurisdictional Conference - 3
The Detroit Conference Director of Youth and Young Adults said she feels she has a pulse on what is happening with the up-and-coming generation of churchgoers in the UMC and she hopes to bring to light their unique viewpoints and inspirations. She said she is less concerned with the specific petitions that will come before her at conference and more interested in the gathering brining people to a deeper understanding of their purpose in the church and their walk with Christ.

Paul Thomas
Age: 35 Church: Bay City First United Methodist Church
# of times elected: General Conference – 1; Jurisdictional Conference - 1
The Detroit Conference Director of Communications believes his shrewd knowledge of the Book of Discipline and organizational makeup of the general church will help him make an impact at conference. Thomas said the potential restructuring of the UMC in response to the Call to Action Report set forth in 2010 is the greatest issue to be dealt with in Tampa in his opinion.

Wayne Bank
Age: 66 Church: Lexington United Methodist Church
# of times elected: General Conference – 2; Jurisdictional Conference - 2
Bank’s wide-ranging experience includes serving in five different local churches in three districts and involvement with the General Board of Global Ministries and General Board of Church and Society. He said the recurring debates about crucial social issues and the structure of the global church need to be dealt with in a Christ-like manner that addresses all opinions and voices.




Also:
A glance at the West Michigan Conference delegates elected for the 2012 General Conference

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Detroit Annual Conference offers youth, young adults a place to explore and connect

• By Ang Hart, Detroit Conference Director of Youth and Young Adults •

“Don’t forget about us!”

Such a declaration might be the cry from youth and young adults in the United Methodist Church as the procedures, schedules and legislative jargon of annual conference start filling bulletins and meetings at local churches.

If a church is still finalizing whom to send as their “at-large laity member” for Detroit Annual Conference, they should consider sending a youth/ young adult. It will encourage them in their ministry to the world and connect them with other passionate young people in the United Methodist Church.
Annual Conference is one of the most exciting events of the year for United Methodists. We all get geared up to see each other, worship together, learn together and discuss important world issues as a body.

This is no different for young people. There are many different activities the young people can participate in that make Annual Conference special for them as well.

Youth who come to Annual Conference are instantly welcomed into the world of the Conference Council on Youth Ministries, or CCYM.

They are asked to come and sit with the other youth, and begin to make new friends.

For young adults it is a bit more scattered at the beginning, but there is a special schedule that they are invited to in order to get to know others, learn a bit more about the system, and be inspired.

For those who know a young adult going to conference, feel free to share this with them so they don’t feel so lost.

The youth stay on the same schedule as everyone else most of the time, but travel as a pack to be close to the adults in charge.

They get to do their own work after the day is done, which includes writing their own report, putting together their table for the ministry fair, and getting together whatever fundraiser they are doing for Youth Service Fund (YSF) or Saving People’s Lives and Spreading Hope (SPLASH).

(For more information on either of these topics, please contact Ang Hart, email below.)

The youth enjoy ice-cream socials and strawberry shortcakes just like everyone else, but with their own added twist of youth and energy.

Conference always ends with the youth getting to have a little fun with the Bishop and two District Superintendents — in front of everybody. It is a must-see part of conference, and the youth love to plan this out.

The young adults have a set schedule for the evenings so that they can be intentional about spending time together.

Wednesday night is the CCYAC’s meeting. The council gets most of its business done there so that the rest of conference is open to spend time with all of the young adults. If a young adult is interested in joining the commission, they are welcome to join them at this meeting.

Thursday the Commission invites all the young adults to dinner at the nearby Applebee’s. This is a time for the youth and young adults to kick back and make memories.

Friday is the Poetry Slam, where anyone is welcome to come bring his or her own work to read, and the Rev Jeff Nelson is the main attraction.

It is a spirit-filled event that is becoming quite a tradition. The location changes every year, but the young adults will pass out flyers to let people know where it will be held.

Saturday, the last night of conference, is just general hangout time, with board games and no shortage of fun.

Youth and young adults stay in the same dorm — as long as their registration form is properly marked.

If you want more information on all of the activities of the young people at Annual Conference, please contact Ang Hart at ahart@detroitconference.org.

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$1,000 prize being offered in United Methodist Women video competition

• By Ang Hart, Detroit Conference Director of Youth and Young Adults •

United Methodist Women (UMW) has been impacting lives worldwide for more than 140 years, and this fall the Rev. Faith Fowler wants to bring attention to the organization by impacting a young adult’s pocketbook.

The pastor of Cass Community UMC is offering $1,000 to anyone under the age of 30 who produces the best video on the history of UMW and how it continues to change lives today.

At last October’s Detroit Conference UMW Annual Celebration and Meeting Fowler enacted the challenge as part of a passionate speech that invited people to consider how they looked at women’s rights and UMW in the 21st century.

Fowler referenced a poem that included names of women who throughout history helped pave the way for women everywhere today.

She said that most women under the age of 30 might not know a lot of the names, but if they didn’t, they should look them up and learn about them.

Fowler then showed a video that informed the audience about often-overlooked truths, like the fact that still today women only make 77 cents for every dollar that a man makes.

After the video, she talked about how women in the younger generations forget to be passionate about such issues.

She said something like a video competition utilizing some of the brightest young minds in the conference would be a great way to bring attention to the legacy of the organization and show how people can be involved in women’s rights issues today.
Fowler said the video could include UMW history, an invitation to join the organization and/or a look at the mission of UMW.

The video should be a maximum of four minutes long and cannot be posted on the Internet prior to Nov. 11, 2011.

The deadline for entry is Sept. 1 and submissions should be sent to: Cass Community Social Services, 11850 Woodrow Wilson, Detroit, MI 48206.
An initial screening will be held on Sept. 11 and videos that make the final cut will be viewed and voted on by attendees of the Detroit Conference UMW Annual Celebration and Meeting on Oct. 29.

Finalists must be in attendance.

The competition represents another partnership between the UMW and the conference’s youth and young adults.

For almost two years now, the Detroit Conference United Methodist Women has been working hard to focus on being in ministry with youth and young adults.
Detroit Conference UMW vice president Mary Fox asked me to help plan the annual UMW Celebration and Meeting after I gave a presentation to the organization.

She wanted to include more of a focus on young people and wanted to get more people under the age of 30 excited about what UMW is doing in the conference.
Over time the board solidified a more formal partnership with the Conference Council on Youth Ministries and what was formerly the Young Adult Task Force, by attending events and meetings, supporting fundraising efforts for new initiatives and building relationships.

For the 2010 Celebration and Meeting we invited the CCYM to do the installation of officers, and asked the young adults to be involved in various ways throughout the day.

This encouraged some new faces to appear at the meeting.

Fowler’s video competition was just the icing on the cake and a new way for young people to look at how they can be involved in a missional community that has over 800,000 members around the globe.

Those interested in more details on the competition can e-mail Ang Hart at ahart@detroitconference.org or Rev. Fowler at ccumcac@aol.com.

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Building new young adult communities one church at a time

By Ang Hart, Detroit Conference Director of Youth and Young Adults

Anyone who is part of Annual Conference each year knows the presence of young adults has been growing at the conference level for many years. But anyone who is not part of that body might not know much about it.

Either way, most people who have set foot inside a United Methodist Church in the last five years realize young adult ministries is one of the primary growing concerns and focuses in our denomination.

But what is a mystery to some is the direction the new Conference Commission on Young Adult Communities is hoping to take local churches in the next five years.

It is one of the best-kept secrets of our conference — one that more and more people will start being let in on.

In August, the Commission had its first retreat. There they decided on a vision, mission, structure and future actions.

They decided they would have two focuses: The first being ministry with local churches and the second being partnerships with other agencies in the conference.

Their plan to work with local congregations is three-fold.

The commission will first find a representative for each district.

Second, that person will be given the knowledge and resources to train others to start a local Young Adult Ministry and to organize and run a ReThink Church Event.

Third, the district representative will go out and train churches in their district and help them form or maintain a Young Adult Ministry that fits the life of that church.

Any church can work with a representative, and each church will have a different outcome. Some of the district representatives have been chosen already; Dan Philips in the Ann Arbor District, Alyssa Grant in the Detroit West District, Kayla Roosa in the Saginaw Bay District and Kaitlin Norton in the Flint District.

Norton is already piloting the program in Flint, while he rest of the representatives are getting ready to be trained.

The commission is still looking for people to do ministry for the Detroit East, Marquette and Port Huron districts.

The second main idea is to start partnerships with other agencies in the conference.

For example, the commission wants to work closely with agencies who deal with vulnerable persons.

In 2012 they hope to help raise awareness about vulnerable persons and young adults that are classified vulnerable persons.

The commission also has existing on-going partnerships with other groups, such as Keep Making Peace and United Methodist Women.

If you or someone you know are passionate about these ministries, and are under 30 and interested in working with Young Adults or working as part of this team, the commission is always looking for new people.

For those interested in having a district representative come to their church or for agencies of the conference who would like to partner with the commission, please contact Ang Hart at ahart@detroitconference.org.

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Fall Rally showcases leadership skills of Detroit Conference youth

By Ang Hart, Detroit Conference Director of Youth and Young Adults

Imagine you have taken on the leadership role of an event.

For this event you must find a band, a speaker, and food to feed the entire crowd, put together games for everyone, do it all on a tiny budget, and entice people to come.

Oh yeah — and you have four months to do it in.

This year at Conference Youth Assembly (CYA) — a camp for the youth leaders of our conference, the Conference Council on Youth Ministries (CCYM — the group who puts on conference wide Youth events, with Youth being the ones in charge) had a dilemma. Due to unforeseen circumstances, both the chair and the assistant chair of the Fall Rally had to step down.

This is the first time this has ever happened in the more than 10 years that the event has been running.

Usually, the assistant chair helps for their first year and is in charge their second year, so they have had time to watch this huge event take place.

Then, of course, the chair is the big person on campus, running the whole show.

But this year, the CCYM had no idea what was going to happen until camp came around. We were all praying that a strong leader would step forward, and one did — Taylor Pryde.

She is a junior at Hartland High School and on her Facebook page her Religious Views read “Jesus Freak and proud of it!” She is highly involved in her church, her community and now, on the CCYM.

She had four months to pull off a huge event and she did it brilliantly.

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Young leaders flourishing in DAC’s Mission Intern Program

Carl Gladstone, a former mission intern.

By RJ Walters, Editor

A quick look at some of the top young leaders in the Michigan Area reveals many of them share a common thread.

It’s not just the crazy hours they are willing to work or the ingenious ministry ideas they come up with — for a lot of them there is a mutual agreement of where they learned to serve.

For the past 12 years the Mission Intern Program of the Detroit Annual Conference has utilized enthusiastic college-age adults to reach the poor and develop leadership qualities that apply to all facets of life. The only trouble, according to Conference Director of Discipleship Rev. Terry Gladstone — who helped construct the program — is that not enough people understand the vitality and importance of it.

As of 2009 four full-time conference missionaries were Mission Intern alumni, two were deacons and plenty more were leading lives focused on serving.

Detroit Conference Director of Youth and Young Adults Ang Hart said the program changed her life, social justice advocate and Newburg UMC Deacon Paul Perez was once an intern, and Gladstone’s son Carl was an intern for three summers before becoming the head of the Young Leaders Initiative, the Motown Mission Project and countless other causes.

The only problem was Carl had to relocate to Dallas, Tex. during the summers to be a mission intern of the General Board of Global Ministries.

That’s when mom stepped in.

“When he got back from (Project Transformation) and was telling me all about it things just clicked,” Terry Gladstone said. “At that point we had a program called the Vocational Intern Program, VIP, but nobody was using it anymore. It was largely because the places that wanted an intern couldn’t afford to pay for half of it, which you had to.”

She saw some money sitting in a fund allocated for VIP and had ideas from her son’s Project Transformation experience — thus the Detroit Conference program was born.

The first year a handful of interns participated in the eight-week long summer internship, earning a stipend for using their summer to engage in ministry with those in need.

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Ang Hart featured by Young People's Ministries

Young People's Ministries has been on the prowl in the Detroit Conference, gaining some insights from some of the top young leaders.

Recently, the Conference Director of Youth and Young Adult Ministries Ang Hart was interviewed by the leader of the Young Leaders Initiative and Motown Mission Project Carl Gladstone and it was posted at www.globalyyoungpeople.org.

Hart and Gladstone are both alumni of the Mission Intern Program which will be featured in the January edition of the Michigan Area Reporter and Hart also provides a look at the Council Conference on Youth Ministry's Fall Rally in the issue.

So get to know this dynamic duo a bit by listening to the interview here:
NCJ Rundown #3 with Ang Hart

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Detroit Conference announces program staffing changes

Rev. Terry Gladstone

By Paul Thomas, Detroit Conference Director of Communications

The Rev. Dr. Jerome (Jerry) DeVine has announced several changes to the program staff of the Detroit Conference, effective immediately. All changes are within existing positions and budget.

The Rev. Dr. James Parkhurst, who has been on staff since April 1 as interim conference director of outdoor and retreat ministries, has been promoted to conference director of outdoor and retreat ministries, while the Rev. Terry Gladstone, conference director of discipleship, has accepted a position as the program development specialist for the Lake Louise Christian Community, Camp, and Retreat Center.

In addition, Ang Hart, conference director of youth and young adult ministries, and Paul Thomas, conference director of communications, will have their positions increased from 1/2-time to 3/4-time effective January 1, 2011.

“Aligning resources to fulfill the conference vision of creating and nurturing dynamic and fruitful congregations includes focusing the time and portfolios of those whom God has called and gifted for various strategic ministries,” said DeVine, who is in his second year as the conference’s director of connectional ministries. “These recent staff changes are focused heavily on equipping and connecting leadership for discipleship in a changing environment.”

Rev. James Parkhurst

Before moving to the Detroit Conference, Parkhurst spent the past 12 years as the Director of Discipleship Ministries in the Desert Southwest Conference. During those 12 years, Parkhurst oversaw the conference’s camping and retreat ministries that encompassed several sites and staff spread across two states. Parkhurst, with over 18 years of experience in outdoor and retreat ministries, is currently a member of the National Camp and Retreat Committee, an affiliated organization with the General Board of Discipleship.

An ordained deacon and member of the Desert Southwest Conference, Parkhurst earned a Bachelor’s degree in Recreation and Religion Studies from Morehead State University and received a Master’s degree in Christian Education from Scarritt College in Nashville, Tenn. Parkhurst also completed his diaconal studies at Claremont School of Theology and received his Doctor of Ministry degree from Wisdom University in Oakland, Calif.

“Jim brings a depth of faith and knowledge along with breadth of experience in spiritual formation through outdoor and retreat ministries,” DeVine said. “Originally from Kentucky, he has served as site director for several camp ministries, including one in the North Central Jurisdiction. He brings thoroughness, strategic planning skills, leadership development and organizational experience, and a keen understanding of networking communities to make disciples of Jesus Christ leading to the transformation of the world. We welcome him as part of our ministry.”

Gladstone, who has been on the staff of the Detroit Conference since 1994, will remain employed by the conference with a significantly reduced consultative staff role and a revised portfolio. Details of her new conference responsibilities are being worked out with the personnel committee, but her duties will focus particularly on aspects of effective leadership development, clergy and lay, for equipping and strengthening vital local congregations.

As the program development specialist for Lake Louise, Gladstone will be responsible for increasing ministry outreach and to help the community, camp and retreat center effectively utilize their facilities and natural environment to fulfill their purpose and mission. Her position will involve organizing and evaluating multiple educational functions and activities, focusing on continual improvement and growth.

She will also have responsibilities for recruiting and maintaining a resource pool of leaders, along with training and supervising of some staff.

“I have known Terry for over ten years,” commented DeVine. “While my own roles have changed over that time, she and I have been part of the Michigan Area Ministry Team during that decade. She has vast experience, and has already gifted this Detroit Conference with numerous ministries that now have their own strength and direction.

"Her decision to pursue a new ministry position with the Lake Louise Christian Community and Camp builds on her own family history and life-long love for that community. I am grateful that she will remain in a consultative staff role with us because of the extensive experience and skills that she offers. We will obviously be focusing her available time very intentionally, particularly around some new avenues for congregational health and vitality that we are developing.”

For a directory of Detroit Conference staff, please visit www.detroitconference.org/staff.

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