news article
Nominations and Leadership Development team seeking nominations
March 15, 2024 / By Ian Carlos Urriola, Nominations and Leadership Development Chair / .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
For three days, United Methodists of Upper New York gather for a time of prayer, worship, and holy conferencing to conduct the business of our Annual Conference. And yet, the work of our connectional ministry to live the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to be God’s love with our neighbors in all places is a 365—or, when it’s a leap year like 2024, 366—day affair. This work is done by a dedicated group of servant leaders who have answered the call Jesus has placed on their hearts to use their gifts and graces for ministry in service of our connectional Church. It is the task of your Nominations and Leadership Development team to prayerfully discern and identify these servant leaders among our ranks to carry on and execute the ministry of our Annual Conference well after the time our adjourning motion is adopted, and our bishop bangs his gavel for the last time.
In the past, our team’s report for the Pre-Conference Workbook has needed to be perfected until right before we give our report to you during the Conference session for a variety of reasons. This year, it is our goal to have that complete report to you by the time pre-conference briefings are held. The completed nominations report will be put on the Annual Conference here as an update to the 2024 Pre-Conference Workbook. In order to make this goal a reality, we need your help. The truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that we need each other. Neither any single person on our team, nor our whole team in its entirety, is as wise as all United Methodists of Upper New York put together. So, rather than trying to hold off on sharing our work with you until it’s perfected, our team invites you into our work.
Click here for the list of all of the Annual Conference committees, teams, boards, and agencies for which the Nominations and Leadership Development team is responsible, a brief description of their work, and their needs. If, after reviewing this, you feel called to serve United Methodists of Upper New York in a servant leadership capacity on one of these teams, please fill out this form here.
If there is a member of your congregation or one of your colleagues in ministry whose leadership you think would be an asset to our Annual Conference, you can also fill out this form. Our team is grateful for every nomination form that we receive, and we will surround each submission in prayer as we nominate people into servant leadership roles. Please note that submitting this does not guarantee that we will nominate the person for the role.
2023-2024 Nominations and Leadership Development Members: Ian Urriola, Chair; Janice McKinney, Vice Chair; Casey Bradley, Secretary; Abigail McCarthy, Member; Sharon Rankins-Burd, Member; Angela Stewart, Member; Natalie Bowerman, Commission on Religion and Race Liaison; Cesar Galarza-Arzola, Hispanic Ministries Team Liaison; Aaron Bouwens, Director of Missional Excellence and Cabinet Rep; Grace Lynn Besse, Adirondack District Lay Leader; Ellen Mall-John, Albany District Lay Leader; Richard Preston, Cornerstone District Lay Leader; Robert Mueller, Crossroads District co-Lay Leader; Darlene Dennis, Crossroads District co-Lay Leader; Shafeegh Habeeb, Finger Lakes District Lay Leader; Peter Lagueras, Genesee Valley District Lay Leader; Mark Adsit, Mohawk District Lay Leader; Ann Welch Wood, Mountain View District Lay Leader; Hap Skellen, Niagara Frontier District co-Lay Leader; Brenda Shelmidine, Niagara Frontier District co-Lay Leader; Rick Fisher, Oneonta District Lay Leader