California-Pacific Annual Conference
June 22-26, 2005, Redlands, Calif.

Under the theme, “One in Spirit, All in Ministry: New Creation and the Church’s Mission,” more than 1,500 members and guests of the California-Pacific Annual Conference experienced powerful worship, Wesleyan conferencing, and fellowship and sharing. The conference held its 21st annual session at the University of Redlands.

During the opening worship celebration, Bishop Mary Ann Swenson proclaimed, “I invite us all to be honest—honest about our circumstances, honest about our weaknesses and our strengths, honest about our fears and dreams. Then together let us take the risky initiative to push through the crowd of our own prejudices, to press beyond the patterns of doing what we have always done.”

Swenson’s opening sermon set the table for two visioning plenary sessions led by the Rev. Mary Elizabeth Moore, clergy member of the California-Pacific Conference and director of the Program for Women in Theology and Ministry and professor of religion and education at Candler School of Theology in Atlanta. Conference members spent more than six hours visioning for the future of ministry in Southern California and the Pacific Rim. 

Spirit-filled worship was led by internationally acclaimed worship leader Marcia McFee, who has preached, led worship and taught workshops for churches and conferences across the United States, Europe and Asia. An emotional moment came during a worship moment when McFee and the Rev. Ron Griffen, pastor of San Luis Obispo United Methodist Church, sang a song written by the Rev. Al Rhodes-Wickett called “No Guns.”  Rhodes-Wickett, a clergyperson in the California-Pacific Conference who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease, is a pianist who has written and composed several musicals. 

On its first tour in the Western Jurisdiction, the Africa University Choir performed at various points throughout the session and during the closing worship celebration and sending forth service. 

The conference adopted a resolution that will transfer the campus ministry property at San Diego State University, valued at $1.8 million, to a newly formed public corporation (the directors to be chosen by the Wesley Foundation and San Diego State University). The new corporation will develop and build low-income student housing and facilities to support the expansion of the United Methodist campus ministry at the university. The new facility will include worship space, community space, and offices. The project will pay for itself and fund the campus minister and the programmatic outreach. The conference will be able to redirect apportionment dollars currently funding the ministry, and it will assume no debt or risk for the project. 

Bishop Swenson welcomed Byron S. Minor, the eighth recipient of the Judith L. Weidman Racial Ethnic Minority Communications Fellowship, provided by United Methodist Communications. Minor will be mentored by Larry R. Hygh Jr., conference director of communications, for one year. The California-Pacific Conference is the first annual conference in the Western Jurisdiction to host the fellowship, and Hygh, who was the first recipient of the fellowship, is the first ethnic minority communicator to serve as a mentor. Minor was introduced by Amelia Tucker-Shaw, resource consultant from the Communications Resourcing Team at UMCom. 

Swenson acknowledged the work and convictions of the Revs. Inman Moore and Ed McRae, who signed a statement 40 years ago denouncing segregation in Mississippi.  They received backlash and threats for taking this stand. The two recently returned from a reunion in Mississippi with some of the original signers. 

The Bethesda String Quartet performed for the memorial service. The quartet was founded in 1976 at the Sungsae Rehabilitation School in Daejon, South Korea. The members share the common handicap of being polio victims from the beginning of their lives and being confined to wheelchairs. The first experience of music motivated them to forget their physical challenges and to have fun together in music. 

Jim Winkler, top staff executive for the United Methodist Church’s Board of Church and Society, was the guest speaker for the laity dinner. Winkler talked from the theme of “Speaking Truth.”

“The United Methodist Church is the third largest denomination in the most powerful nation in the history of the world,” he said. “We cannot afford to turn inward and stop paying attention to the world. In many ways, we are at a crossroads as a denomination and as a global community.” 

For the third year in a row, all of the plenary sessions and worship services were broadcast via the World Wide Web on the conference Web site www.cal-pac.org.

Conference members adopted a $12.4 million budget, representing a 2.5 percent increase over the previous year.

Conference members also gave $19,552 in offerings that benefited the following ministries:

• Conference Mental Health Ministries, $3,918;
• Bethesda String Quartet, $2,169;
• Retiree pension and health care, $2,277;
• Conference Youth Ministries, $2,280;
• Joint Commission in Mexico, $3,971; and
• Philippines Mission, $4,937.

The third annual clergy basketball for charity was held, raising $1,550 for campus ministries in the California-Pacific Conference. 

The bishop ordained 10 elders—six women and four men. Ten people—eight women and two men—were commissioned for probationary membership for the Order of Elder. Two women were ordained deacon in full connection and one was commissioned into probationary membership in the Order of Deacon. 

Twelve clergy retired, including the first African-American woman elder in full connection to retire; the group represented 319 years of service. During the retirement celebration service, Bishop Swenson welcomed Bishop Carolyn Tyler Guidry. Tyler Guidry’s election in 2004 marked the second time a woman has been elected bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Tyler Guidry leads the Sixteenth Episcopal District of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, which includes Jamaica, the Dominican Republic, South America, Haiti, the Winward Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, London, Guyana and Surinam. 

Conference membership stands at 91,316, down 1,783, or 1.92 percent, from the previous year. Average worship attendance stands at 54,276, down 617, or 1.1 percent, but still high at 59.44 percent of membership.

--Larry R. Hygh Jr.