The Synod Mission and Ministry Commission met on January 27-28, 2017, at Stony Point Conference Center. As is often the case, we had lively discussions as a full commission and when we broke out into the Mission Working Group, Networks Working Group and Administrative Working Group. This is a summary of updates and actions taken.
This Network was birthed at the 2016 Synod Assembly during the discussion of the commissioner's resolution to divest from fossil fuels. The discussion took us beyond divestment to how to be the church in the face of climate change and environmental degradation. The discussion led to an overwhelming vote for divestment. The Holy Spirit was alive...
In mid-January, the Synod’s highly energized Committee on Representation met to review fourteen Robert Washington Scholar applications and to select the first Scholars. This was an extremely competitive process. Getting to three Scholars was not easy. The Scholars program will cultivate executive leadership training by providing resources for robust discernment regarding the Scholar’s vocation, call and...
We also investigated the important role that our own complicity in systems of oppression present, and the need for majority-white communities in mainline congregations to engage in significant pre-discernment and power analysis before beginning Sanctuary in all its forms. Communities who are directly affected by policing, anti-immigrant, religious and racial bias need to be given primary...
It might not sound like such a revelation to offer a movie night, but Ogdensburg has no movie theater. The small city used to be a thriving port, but the economy tanked nearly a decade ago. Now there is poverty, isolation, and a constant flow of drugs over the Canadian border putting the town at risk...
PIM, one of the 1,001 Worshiping Communities and partially funded by the Synod’s Innovation Fund is a ministry of many love stories like this one. The stories of people who come and go, caught up in a system that ignores their humanity. PIM calls them into community with Christ, so that even as they move from detention...
My wife and I minister to a growing community with many immigrants who are coming to Long Island. One young woman we met told us that she was paying $400 for a trip to the Human Resources Office in Manhattan to seek political asylum. Multiple trips at $400 for refugees fleeing persecution! These are not wealthy people. So,...
Turns out, God is doing a new thing. Of course, Isaiah, one of our favorite Advent voices, told us to look and see the new thing God is doing, but I never dreamed I would find myself in the middle of one of those new things. Would you join me in doing the new thing that...
As we move into a changed political environment the community of the Synod of the Northeast shares in the deep grief and fear that many within our community and throughout our nation are now experiencing. This concern is not one that is partisan nor focused upon a particular elected person. It is a concern based in what...
This was the first assembly to be held under the Synod’s New Way Forward, which was adopted at our 2014 Assembly. Using the foundational values of blue skies and unencumbered spaces, the Assembly flowed back and forth between sharing stories and information from across the Synod and governance work. The sharing included Minutes for Mission from...