news article
Mission unites the Syracuse UM Churches
December 1, 2015 / By Kathleen Rubino / .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
When a letter from the former Crossroads District Superintendent the Rev. Darryl Barrow announced the Syracuse city churches – University, Saint Paul’s, James Street, Hope Korean, Gethsemane, Erwin First, Brown Memorial, and Bellevue Heights United Methodist churches – would combine to form the Syracuse UM Churches, members from these churches gathered.
“We all sat together and decided that it would be a good thing that if we were combining efforts that one person from each one of the congregations start talking about missions we were going to do … how we can help each other, and how if we were going to combine as the Syracuse churches, how we can work together in missions and help each other,” said Evelyn Disinger, chair of the Rethinking Missions Team.
The congregants developed a group to help the churches work together: the Rethinking Missions Team. Each congregation has a few representatives who serve on the Rethinking Missions Team, which meets to discuss upcoming missions and work the churches can do together.
In August 2014, the Syracuse UM Churches members had their first group mission. They harvested fresh vegetables at Matthew 25 Farm in Tully to be handed out following Sunday worship. In November 2014, members hosted a spaghetti dinner to benefit the Syracuse Westside Urban Mission (SWUM) located in the Brown Memorial UMC and raised $1,200. SWUM’s ministries include a summer program for children and youth, tutoring during the school year, life skills classes for adults and youth, a free legal clinic, the St. Paul’s Westside Food Pantry, and a Community Sunday School.
The Rethinking Missions Team wanted to work on a project that could incorporate all the churches, so it decided to fundraise for Africa 360 – the Upper New York Conference’s holistic plan for health and education initiatives in Africa.
“We felt that it [Africa 360] was something that all the churches could relate to, that it was the best thing we could put our efforts toward a mission, and we could all do it together,” Disinger said.
This past September, the Syracuse UM Churches set up a booth at the Westcott Street Cultural Fair, where members sold pipe cleaner mosquitos they had made (see photo at right), hosted a craft for children, and handed out Africa 360 literature. Pastor Alicia Wood, serving at the Syracuse UM Churches, said the group aimed to raise not only funds but also awareness for Africa 360 at the fair.
“I think that it’s [Africa 360] united us in that we were able to have a focus,” said Pastor Wood. “It wasn’t necessarily about our individual neighborhood. It was a focus that was greater than Syracuse, so it was easy for us to get behind it and work together as a group.”
While the Syracuse UM Churches have worked together in mission for Africa 360, they’ve also hosted individual events. Rev. Davis Matovu – a preacher from Uganda and President at Nexus Seminary in Uganda – discussed his experience with malaria at a meeting at Erwin First UMC. James Street UMC, inspired by the Annual Conference session, held a mosquito net fashion show. Four women dressed up in themed-mosquito net costumes (see photo below) – from a cowgirl to a fly fisher – and for a $1 per vote, congregants could choose their favorite contestant. Children circulated the church with the Imagine No Malaria red boxes, which served as the receptacles for the votes; the fashion show raised more than $200.
And one Syracuse UM church received recognition for its Africa 360 fundraising efforts.
Laurel O’Connor, field coordinator for Africa 360, presented the first golden flyswatter to University UMC this fall (see photo at top). The golden flyswatter is awarded to churches that raise more than $2,000 for Africa 360, and University UMC was the top fundraiser at the 2015 session of Annual Conference.
“One woman said at a meeting, ‘The reason why we are all still together was because of The United Methodist Church and that we all have a passion for missions,’” Disinger said. “And that’s what keeps this group together. We all get along very well with each other, we all interact well with each other and are always willing to help each other out, but the main focus is missions.”