GCORR & COSROW chart future
The new, streamlined board of the United Methodist Commission on Religion and Race announced Monday, Oct. 29, that it is embracing a mission that goes beyond monitoring the denomination’s handling of racial matters.
The agency “is in the business of building bridges of hope by equipping the Church at all levels to reach more people, more young people and more diverse people,” the board said in a statement to the denomination.
Among other actions, the board has empowered its top executive, Erin Hawkins (r), and president, Bishop Minerva Carcaño, to begin conversations with leaders of the United Methodist Commission on the Status and Role of Women.
The two agencies will be in dialog about aligning their work in preparation for General Conference, the denomination’s top lawmaking assembly, in 2016.
This conversation follows the vote at the 2012 General Conference for a restructuring plan that would have combined the churchwide commissions into a Untied Methodist Committee of Inclusiveness. On the last day of General Conference, the Judicial Council — the denomination’s to court — struck down the restructuring plan as unconstitutional. The lawmaking assembly scrambled to pass legislation submitted by agencies, including the Commission on Religion and Race, to reduce the size of their boards.
As conversations begin between the commissions, the Commission on Religion and Race will be looking at ways to help equip annual (regional) conferences, seminaries and local churches to become more diverse and more vital.
“The actions taken at this board meeting are small but significant steps to ensure that the ministry of (the commission) effectively supports the church in becoming a relevant and credible witness to the power of Christ in a diverse world,” Hawkins said in a statement.
~Reported by Heather Hahn, United Methodist News Service.