Tag Archives: Widening the Welcome

Widening the Welcome Conference Recordings

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Widening The Welcome


Listen to and view the events of Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for All, September 24-26, 2015, Hartford, CT, hosted by the United Church of Christ Mental Health Network and Disabilities Ministries. We’ve posted videos and audios from the 5th national United Church of Christ Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for All Conference 2015.

The opening worship and the keynote speakers are posted as video files; while the workshops are posted as audio files.

These are posted on the Widening the Welcome 2015 playlist within the WtW channel on YouTube.

UCCDM June 2014 Update

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Grace and Peace to those who may be interested to know about the work of the UCC Disability Ministries Board–Friends, UCC Members, UCC Clergy, UCC persons with disability and our ecumenical partners,

This is to provide you with an update of the work of the UCC Disability Ministry (UCCDM) Board of Directors since our last update published in February 2014.

At the UCCDM Annual Meeting last October, the Board identified three main goals for this year: strengthening relationships, strengthening the A2A (Accessible to All) program, and continuing our ecumenical work.

  • Relationships-The UCCDM Board of Directors continues to work to strengthen our relationships within the UCC. The national setting of the church developed a social media meme for “Inclusivity and Accessibility” as part of the March Fourth for justice campaign. UCCDM engaged March Forth via the UCCDM Facebook page and supporting Special Olympics’ “Spread the Word to End the Word” campaign.
  • Relationships-The UCCDM Board of Directors has also been in dialogue with the national setting to encourage disability awareness and perspectives in the many communication of the national setting including columns such as ‘Dear Theo’ and ‘Sermon Seeds’.
  • Relationships-The UCCDM Board has been discussing how we may further engage in the denominational focus on literacy, perhaps highlighting issues specific to learning disabilities.
  • A2A (Accessible to ALL)-The A2A Subcommittee of the Board has received permission to update and revise the A2A resource entitled “Anybody, Everybody, Christ’s Body” and is developing criteria that will guide the redevelopment of this resource.
  • Ecumenical–UCCDM Vice Chair, Rev. Jeanne Tyler represented UCCDM/UCC at the National Council of Churches’ Christian Unity Gathering meeting in Washington D.C. the focus of the meeting was mass incarceration and the school to prison pipeline. Rev. Tyler was the only self-identified person with a disability at the meeting and reported that she was able to lift up the issues of mental health and learning disabilities as factors inseparable from the school to prison pipeline.

The UCCDM Board would also like to report that we have completed and/or continue to work on the following projects:

  • UCCDM Lenten Devotional was presented on uccdm.org. UCCDM sought original theological reflections for the Lenten season that would highlight theological issues via the disability/mental health lens.
  • UCCDM transferred the uccdm.org website to a new server to allow for increased security and features. The website has been somewhat reorganized, and content continues to be reevaluated for relevance. A resource section has been added to the website and will continued to be expanded.
  • UCCDM Board has started to make plans for UCCDM presence and involvement at Synod 2015.
  • The Kreyer Scholarship Committee is seeking leadership donations to grow the endowment funds as we seek to raise $34,000 by 2015 so that scholarships may be offered to persons with disability/mental health concerns preparing for authorized ministry.
  • Conversations about the next Widening the Welcome event have begun.
  • The Nominating Sub-Committee is developing the nomination process for the next class of UCCDM Board Members.
  • Board members and members of Conference Inclusion Teams saw that UCCDM and the A2A program had a presence at the Annual Gatherings of the Northern California/Nevada Conference, Rocky Mountain Conference, and the Southern California/Nevada Conference. (If you tabled with UCCDM information at another Conference please let us know.)

The UCCDM continues to partner with the UCC Mental Health Network. The UCCDM Board continues to serve as a resource to individuals, pastors, and congregations seeking information to improve their accessibility and inclusion. Individual UCCDM Board Members as well as individual UCC members continue to encourage local settings and conferences to increase their accessibility to and inclusion of persons with disabilities. We would love to hear about your efforts to include people with disabilities in the life of the church as well as to know what types of support you may need from the national setting.

May Christ’s Peace Abide with You,

Rev. Kelli Parrish Lucas, UCCDM Secretary

 

UCCDM February 2014 Update

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To those whom may be interested to know about the current work of the UCC Disability Ministries Board–Friends, UCC Members, UCC Clergy, UCC persons with disability and our ecumenical partners,

This is to provide you with an update of the work of the UCC Disability Ministry (UCCDM) Board of Directors since our last update published in October 2013.

After much discernment, in late November 2013 the UCCDM Board voted that effective January 1, 2014, the Mental Health Network would be its own entity rather than a sub-committee of  UCCDM. We look forward to both the continued flourishing of the UCC Mental Health Network (UCCMHN) and the on-going collaboration between the UCCDM and UCCMHN. For full details please see the Press Release UCCDM and UCCMHN. UCCDM will be returning MHN designated funds to UCCMHN as well as providing additional funds to support this newly independent ministry.

The Widening the Welcome conferences have been a successful collaboration of the UCCDM and UCCMHN. The UCCDM has received some requests from local churches to use the Widening the Welcome name and logo. After discussion, it has been decided that use of the Widening the Welcome name and logo will not be granted to other entities or individual congregations, and that the Widening the Welcome name and logo will continue to be the designation used only to indicate the collaboration between UCCDM and UCCMHN. The next Widening the Welcome Conference has not been scheduled at this time.

In our October update we noted three main foci for 2013-2014, here is an update:

  • Relationships-UCCDM has strengthened relationship with UCCMHN as the UCCDM Chair is now participating in monthly meetings of the UCCMHN.

  • Relationships-UCCDM has started to explore ways to strengthen relationships with members of the UCC interested in Disability Ministry. Board Meetings as always are open to UCC Members. If you have ideas of how UCCDM may further interact with UCC members please contact the UCCDM Board.

  • Accessible to All (A2A)-UCCDM has discussed with the national setting how to include A2A ideals in general UCC curriculum. This continues to be a challenge and the UCCDM is discussing creating its own curriculum content. If you would like to volunteer and have skills in creating curriculum content please contact the UCCDM Board.

In October we also noted on-going foci for 2013-2014, here is an update:

  • Scholarship Funds–UCCDM subcommittee for the Virginia Kreyer Scholarship has reached out to others identified as interested in fundraising to explore a major fundraiser for the Virginia Kreyer Scholarship. $34,000 needs to be raised in 2014. If you would like to assist with fundraising please, contact the UCCDM Board.

  • Website–The UCCDM website has been updated and this continues to be a work-in-progress. A2A congregations and Conferences are now listed on the website. A2A resources are now easier to find. A frequently asked questions page has been added. Blog contributions have been requested. If you you believe you have original blog content related to disability ministry to contribute please contact the UCCDM Board.

  • Ecumenical Work–UCCDM Board Member, Rev. Kelli Parrish Lucas, served as a representative at the Ecumenical Disability Advocacy Network (EDAN) Pre-Assembly of the World Council of Church General Assembly. Rev. Parrish Lucas also served as one of four UCC delegates to the World Council of Churches General Assembly in Busan, South Korea. UCCDM continues to recognize its leadership in disability ministry within the ecumenical movement, as such UCCDM continues see a need for sending people with disabilities as leaders and delegates to ecumenical gatherings and working groups.

  • By-laws–UCCDM subcommittee on by-laws has begun the work of updating the UCCDM by-laws in preparation for the future of the UCCDM within the new Unified Board structure of the denomination. It is hoped that revised by-laws will lend themselves to the potentiality of 501(c)3 status. The subcommittee hopes to complete a proposed revision of the by-laws by the end of summer 2014.

In addition to the work of the DM Board, individual Board Members continue to teach and advocate for the inclusion of people with disabilities and mental health concerns at the local congregation, Association, and Conference levels of the UCC. We would love to hear about the work that you, the members of the UCC and friends of UCCDM, are doing in disability ministry in your context. This is story of the UCCDM Board, would you send us your story?

Sincerely,

Rev. Kelli Parrish Lucas

UCCDM Secretary 2012-2014

“Widening the Welcome” Conference Presenters Make Important Trip to the White House

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Rev. Alan Johnson and Rev. Craig Rennebohm of the UCC Mental Health Network and UCC Disability Ministries Board of Directors traveled to the White House to meet with President Obama and others during the White House Conference on Mental Health. As a UCC representative to the White House Conference on Mental Health, Rev. Johnson was encouraged to join with the newly formed UCC Mental Health Network to help reduce stigma around mental illness. Rev. Johnson has long been involved with the leadership of the Widening the Welcome Conferences. Both Rev. Johnson and Rev. Rennebohm will be continuing their work to reduce the stigma of mental illness within our churches and wider culture by presenting workshops at the upcoming fourth “Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for ALL” Conference.

There’s still time to register for the one day Widening the Welcome Conference, June 27th in Long Beach, CA. Click here for Widening the Welcome Brochure and Registration

The Rev. Susan Gregg-Schroder, Founder Mental Health Ministries, will be one of two keynote speakers at Widening the Welcome. We’d love to have your congregation join the UCC movement of inclusion of people of varying disabilities, apparent and unapparent, including those with mental health challenges.  Please, if at all possible, have a member of your congregation attend the Widening the Welcome Conference so together we can continue to extend God’s extravagant welcome to all people.

Watch Alan’s trip to the White House for this momentous occasion: http://youtu.be/i0zbJI9rQEU

Submitted by Rev. Alan Johnson; edited by Rev. Kelli Parrish Lucas

UCC Goes to the White House

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Submitted by Rev. Alan Johnson, UCCDM Board Member, UCC Mental Illness Network Chair, and UCC Mental Health Network Member

Sometime in late May there will be a White House Mental Health Summit and three UCC members have been invited to the White House for this Summit.  Our UCC representatives are Rev. Mike Schuenemeyer, Rev. Craig Rennebohm and Rev. Alan Johnson.  This is the message from the White House.  “We are working on launching a national dialogue on mental health to address the social barriers preventing people from seeking mental health services – particularly the shame, fear, and misperceptions that surround mental illness and mental health services.”  The first decision our UCC team has made is to work on a plan for at least a one-day event, Sunday, Oct 13, 2013 (part of Mental Illness Awareness Week), that will serve as a catalyst to strengthen and build congregational engagement in mental health response.  Please stay tuned about how we, the UCC, can engage our denomination in this national dialogue.

Since May is also Mental Health Month, it is a good time for you to raise awareness about mental health challenges in your congregation.  1 out of 4 American families has a relative who has a mental illness.   This staggering figure comes from the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) which is the largest grassroots organization of people who are affected by mental illness/brain disorders. This figure mostly likely is also true for your church.

We want to point you to one resource which has an already prepared bulletin insert for highlighting Mental Health Month.  MentalHealthMinistries.net.  The director of Mental Health Ministries is the Rev. Susan Gregg Schroeder who is a keynote speaker at our fourth national UCC Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for All, June 27, in Long Beach, CA.  Check out the Conference at wideningthewelcome.com . For more information or to register for the upcoming Conference, click here: Widening the Welcome 2013 Registration Brochure

We have come to believe, “There is no health without mental health.”  Please give some of your attention to the mental health challenges that are being faced your own church members.  If you have any thoughts, ideas, stories, or questions, please email Alan Johnson at revalan2004@comcast.net.  Grace and peace.

 

Why Widen the Welcome

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Have you heard? There is a banquet planned before Synod, and I have been asked to bid you come.

I hope that sounds familiar to most of you. Most of all, I really hope that you will accept the invitation. Yes, I know Synod is coming and there is lots for us to do to prepare! But, then there is that biblical mandate that we all live with to be welcoming and to enter into the community of God, while ever widening the welcome to include all whom God has invited to the banquet.

This is a goal of most congregations. Yet despite the advertisements of a radical welcome, there are some people who wonder if that welcome really includes them. I have from time to time found myself wondering if I really were invited. You see as a child, I had a pronounced speech impediment and I learned early that even when I was invited to be somewhere that I had to do some extra work to find out if I were really welcome or if I was there to entertain others as I spoke. And yes I learned to wonder this even at church. Last year, at Widening the Welcome 3 in Columbus Rev. Lynda Bigler asked in her sermon “Have you ever been faced with revealing your disability or keeping silent to keep the status quo?” and waves of remembering being told I was either not qualified or could not be qualified to serve as a chaplain because I am a woman with disability flooded over me. This time, however, those waves did not knock me down. This time I had learned I was indeed welcome not only at the table but welcomed into the community of God.

I have been questioned by people within the disability community about why I would want to be involved in the church. Its not as shocking as it seems. Many persons using wheelchairs find it difficult to get into church buildings and they feel excluded. Many persons with mental health issues find that people in the church are no more compassionate than people outside the church even as the gospel is preached each Sunday. And, yet, this is not the church I have always known or the understanding of the gospel I have learned from church. As Jason Hayes said in his speech at the last Widening the Welcome, “‘Failure to conform to social norms’ sounds like Jesus the Christ to me.”

Why am I telling you all of this? Because, I want you, my brothers and sisters in the church, to understand why I am bidding you to come to Widening the Welcome. God calls all people to God’s community. God sometimes calls people to us we do not yet understand or people whom we are not sure how or if to welcome. God, it seems does not share in all our human stigmas. So I bid you come to the banquet where we can met one another and learn what disability and mental illness are, and what they are not. Come so we can equip the leaders and laity of our congregations to extend with confidence that radical welcome to persons whose body may not be like other bodies and persons whose brains may not be like other brains. Come let us talk to one another about how to move beyond stigma and welcome all people into the full participation of the life of our churches.

Come to the Widening the Welcome, Pre-Synod Event on Thursday, June 27, 2013 at the Renaissance Long Beach Hotel. Keynote speakers will include The Rev. Susan Gregg-Schroder, Founder, Mental Health Ministries, and The Rev. Kathy Reeves, Coordinator of Ecumenical Disability Advocacy Network-North America, a program of the World Council of Churches. Workshops will provide information about becoming an “Accessible to ALL” (A2A) church, starting mental health ministries, caring for adolescents and the aged, as well as creating inclusion and transformation. Registration is now open and the registration brochure is available here Widening the Welcome 2013 Brochure. Please follow registration instructions in the brochure. Limited scholarships funds are available. For more information about Widening the Welcome or for a scholarship form please email Rev. Kelli Parrish Lucas at kelli@womenwhospeakinchurch.com

Widening the Welcome 2013 Registration Begins

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Widening the Welcome logo

Widening the Welcome:Inclusion for ALL

UCC Disabilities Ministries and UCC Mental Illness Network
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (March 10, 2013)
Coordinator: Rev. Kelli Parrish Lucas, UCCDM Secretary
email: kelli@womenwhospeakinchurch.com

Widening the Welcome Pre-Synod Event Location and Details Announced: Developing Congregations to Include People with Disabilities and Mental Illnesses/Brain Disorders to be held in Long Beach, CA June 27.


The United Church of Christ Disabilities Ministries (UCCDM) and the United Church of Christ Mental Illness Network (UCCMIN) is happy to announce that the Fourth Annual Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for All Conference will be held at the Renaissance Long Beach Hotel, CA. Widening the Welcome 2013 will commence at 7:30 am and conclude at 7:30 pm on Thursday, June 27th, 2013. Registration information, including link to on-line registration is available now , and here: Widening the Welcome 2013 Registration Brochure!

Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for All will celebrate the theme “God’s Vision: The Great Dinner is Open to All” (Luke 14:15 ff) with speakers and workshops designed to assist congregations in welcoming and ministering with people with disabilities and/or mental illness/brain disorders. Keynote speakers include The Rev. Susan Gregg-Schroder, Founder, Mental Health Ministries, and The Rev. Kathy Reeves, Coordinator of Ecumenical Disability Advocacy Network-North America, a program of the World Council of Churches.

Workshops will include “Becoming A2A (Accessible to All): From Theory to Practice”, “Mental Illness and Families of Faith: How Congregations Can Respond”, “Mental Illness in Prison: Understanding the Facts”, “Spiritual Care for People with Disabilities & Brain Disorders of Aging”, “Centers of Hope and Transformation: People with Disabilities Creating a Consciousness of Inclusion”, “Cherish the Parents, Care for the Child: Supporting the Emotional Well Being of Families from Birth to Young Adulthood,” and “Developing and Sustaining a Spiritual Support Group for Mental Health and Wellness”.

“Widening the Welcome: Inclusion for All” was termed “a movement within the movement” of the UCC by General Minister Geoffrey Black. UCCDM and UCCMIN welcome all UCC churches and conferences as well as our ecumenical partners seeking to do ministry with persons with disabilities including mental illnesses to send representatives to join us on June 27, 2013 for this fourth historic gathering. This Widening the Welcome Conference is offered prior to General Synod so as to make this educative, informative and engaging Conference available to Synod delegates. This is also the first of the three prior national conferences that will be held in the west so as to make it available to people in this region of our country.  ###