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Photo by Lisa Elliott Diehl
LEAWOOD - Ten were ordained and six commissioned for ministry at the 2010 Kansas East Annual Conference Service of Ordination and Commissioning June 11.
Rev. Diana Chapel was ordained a deacon and elected to full membership in the conference. As a deacon with full membership, Chapel will serve as a bridge between the church and the world, preparing people within the church to live out their faith in the world.
Revs. Stephen Cady, Barbara Clinger, DeFisher, Kara Eidson, Josh Gooding, Caren Loper, Dennise Paschke, Morgan Whitaker Smith, and Delores Williamston were ordained elders and elected to full membership in the conference. With ordination, elders are authorized to conduct worship, preach the word, perform the marriage ceremony, bury the dead and administer the sacraments of Holy Communion.
Loren Drummond, Richard Fitzgerald, Emily Reeves Grammer, Tony Hazen, Seong Lee, and Andrew Whitaker Smith were commissioned for the ministry of elder. Through commissioning as a provisional member of the Annual Conference, the church recognizes a candidate’s talents, gifts and training and sends the individual into leadership and service in the name of Jesus Christ. Commissioning begins a time of probation as the candidates prepare to move through the process to be ordained.
Rev. H. Sharon Howell, a member of the Kansas East Conference and director of the United Methodist related Scarritt-Bennett Center in Nashville, was the speaker for the Ordination and Commissioning Service.
Howell shared a story about her visit to the Civil Rights room at the public library in downtown Nashville. A replica of the historic Woolworth lunch counter sits in the center of the room, surrounded by the many displays documenting the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.
“It’s a humbling experience to be reminded of the exclusion, racism, hatred and misguided moments of faith communities that led to the need for the Civil Rights Movement,” Howell said. “I sat at every stool. Each stool gave me a different perspective on the exhibits in the room.”
Over the door to the exhibit room hangs a quote from John Lewis. “If not us, then who? If not now, then when?”
Protestors were told to show no fear, Howell said.
“Today, we live in a time when fear could be what defines us or paralyzes us or isolates or compels us to the real work of justice, love and hope,” Howell said. “I believe that on the paths of justice, we will hear lots of voices -- voices that engage, and voices that enrage. We’ll hear noise that overwhelms and noise that becomes background music. The ministries of justice, love and hope in the future days must be shared -- clergy and laity together.”
The first path to justice is radical hospitality, or just hospitality, she said. Not “just” hospitality as in only hospitality, but “just” hospitality. She referenced Lettie Russell’s final text entitled “Just Hospitality.” In the text, Russell writes about mending creation in partnership with our rock-steady God.
“Lettie Russell tells us that just hospitality is the practice of God’s welcome by reaching out across differences to participate in God’s actions, bringing justice and healing in our world of crisis and fear of the ones we call ‘other.’”
The second path of justice is peacemaking. The week of conference, Howell’s administrative assistant’s son headed to Afghanistan. The young man has already completed a tour in Iraq.
“How in the world do we bring about the end of escalating violence in our communities, in our nation and in our world?” Howell asked. “How do we reduce our fear of those who believe differently, who live differently? Do we not stand on a winding path of justice full of land mines? How do we disarm them? How do we move toward them with peacemaking with our heartbeat?”
Howell said now is the time to reclaim Dr. Georgia Harkness’ writings and embrace her life-consuming passion for peace. Harkness believed that peace was possible because faith in the possibility means faith in the living God.
“I believe it takes prayer and lots of sweat equity by allowing it to become our highest and best option in everything we do,” Howell said.
Second, Harkness believed the world needed to develop a provision for peaceful change. Harkness used the term “self-criticism,” but Howell said she would choose the term “self-reflection” instead. Harkness meant the world needed to be able to repent for its sins because humility is the first step in change.
Third, Harkness suggested that countries should surrender absolute national sovereignty, creating instead an organism for international cooperation.
“It’s harder to give something up, to give something up to make a new way for the good of God’s world and God’s people,” Howell said.
The fourth key to peace, according to Harkness, is economic security for all.
“Unless the hungry peoples of the world are fed and see adequate security for the future, unrest will break forth in civil and international strife,” Howell said.
Harkness’ fifth key to peace is understanding and practicing the democratic way of life.
“It is incumbent upon the church to constantly protest against infringements of race and class discrimination,” Howell said. “Laity and clergy together become God’s voice in the noise and chaos of discrimination and exclusion.”
Finally, Harkness suggested that there is an international ethos or spiritual undergirding of a new international order. A peaceful future depends on local and global and national fellowship. As she saw it, the ingredients for this new world order were prayer, missions, evangelism, Christian home, and ministries of local congregations.
“She never stopped believing that the church and its leadership have a responsibility to bring about a just and lasting peace for God’s world,” Howell said.
“The final path to justice for this occasion is leadership and relationship,” she continued.
In 2009, Howell said she used Cornell West’s “Hope on a Tight Rope” for her devotions. Two sentences she found contained within have stayed with her, “You can’t lead the people if you don’t love the people. You can’t save the people if you don’t serve the people.”
Howell said the church has relied too heavily on secular leadership styles.
“We’ve forgotten the importance of relationships,” Howell said. “We can change the world if we start listening to each other again. Simple, truthful conversations where we each have an opportunity to speak and we each have the opportunity to listen well.”
Howell said she believes that one of the most important paths of justice is to receive and honor each person we encounter, to listen to their stories with our whole beings.
“Leadership and relationships are about people, people are gifts from God,” she said.
