News

Sierra Service Project Finishes a Record Breaking Summer

Sierra Service Project (SSP) has just finished a very busy and successful summer of home repair and youth ministry.  Volunteer teams of over 2,000 junior and senior high youth, along with adult chaperons from their churches, worked on six reservations in California, Arizona, Nevada and Idaho, and in Urban Los Angeles.  This included 717 volunteers from 45 churches in the California-Pacific Conference.  These hardworking volunteers completed 145 projects...

Sierra Service Project Finishes a Record Breaking Summer

Sierra Service Project (SSP) has just finished a very busy and successful summer of home repair and youth ministry.  Volunteer teams of over 2,000 junior and senior high youth, along with adult chaperons from their churches, worked on six reservations in California, Arizona, Nevada and Idaho, and in Urban Los Angeles.  This included 717 volunteers from 45 churches in the California-Pacific Conference.  These hardworking volunteers completed 145 projects...

Navigating the Ministry of the Whole: September

For the Cal-Pac Annual Conference, September begins with an intensive week of collaborative leadership: The full and appointive cabinets will meet September 6-7-8, including an extended session with the Connectional Ministries staff, meeting at South Pasadena UMC. During this week, outgoing (in more ways than one) Director of Communications Dr. Larry Hygh will be celebrated with a farewell luncheon, and incoming Executive Director of New Ministries Kelvin Sauls will have his first series...

Mental Illness Awareness Week

Mental Illness Awareness Week is the first week in October; this is an opportunity to partner with community groups to raise awareness about mental illness, and incoludes the National Day of Prayer for Mental Illness Awareness Recovery and Understanding, set for Tuesday, October 5. This day of prayer was initiated by Angela Vickers, JD and Gunnar Christiansen, MD of California in 2004. It has widespread support by individual congregations and National Faith Community Mental Illness...

Board of Laity Convocation, "Dealing with Change in the Local Church"

A church, a congregation, is a living presence in a community. To continue, to live and grow it must find a way to be relevant.  To serve the spiritual needs of the community in which it finds itself.  If our local churches are to grow and to thrive!  To be a living  presence in the community. If we are to serve the people outside our congregation and outside the doors to our sacred space. We must begin to continually change! On October 16th, 2010 we are planning to...

Churches responding to flooding in Pakistan

All donations can be given to UMCOR International Disaster Response, Pakistan Flooding: #982450 at the following link:  http://secure.gbgm-umc.org/donations/umcor/donate.cfm?code=982450&id=3019041  (use drop-down box for designation to Pakistan).  UMCOR is working with the following (trusted and known) partners: Church World Service; Church of Pakistan (Diocese of Peshawar): with/through the ACT Alliance & Norwegian Church Aid ; GlobalMedic; Muslim...

Crossing Bridges Cross-Cultural Competency Training Retreat

  Demographic studies in the United States show that our population is increasingly becoming diverse.  Especially in Southern California and in the California-Pacific Annual Conference, we are experiencing cultural and racial diversity as the norm, not the exception to the rule.  In light of this highly cultural, racial and ethnic diversity there is great need to provide training in cross-cultural/cross-racial competency, so that we can better develop a sense of community across...

Loving Your Neighbor: Pakistani Church Leaders Model Interfaith Cooperation

Before flooding devastated one-fifth of Pakistan two weeks ago, two Pakistan leaders, moderator Rev. Samuel Robert Azariah of the Pakistan Church and principal Resha Qadir Bakhsh of the Dar-Ul-Mussarat School, shared the challenges and achievements of the Pakistan Church with Global Ministries staff, including Mr. Thomas Kemper, the new head of the General Board of Global Ministries, the United Methodist mission agency. The two are among many in Pakistan teaching tolerance. Rev. Azariah and...

The Center for the Study of Information and Religion

“The Center for the Study of Information and Religion (CSIR), Kent State University, is conducting research regarding how clergy members around the country addressed the Deepwater Horizon oil spill incident in the Gulf of Mexico in their sermons. Findings will be presented at the 4th Annual Conference of the International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature, and Culture in December 2010. The conference theme is “Living on the Edge”. CSIR invites and encourages...

Cokesbury Pasadena is offering a 15% discount

Cokesbury Pasadena is offering a 15% discount on all custom choir robes purchased from August 16 through November 12.  Save 10% on Speedship and ReadyRobes.  PLUS receive a FREE robe bag and hanger with every robe purchased.  Call the store at 877-432-8802 for more information or to request a catalog.  Stay connected with Cokesbury on Facebook.  http://www.facebook.com/cokesburypasadena...

Mainline or Methodist?

Wesleyan Leadership Conference, October 14 - 16, 2010, West End UMC, Nashville, TN Early Bird Registration ends Sept. 1, 2010. For more information visit www.gbod.org/wesleyanleadership   Dr. Scott Kisker, author of Mainline or Methodist? Rediscovering Our Evangelistic Mission,  will headline a marvelous group for this event. Bishop Timothy Whitaker writes "I hope my generation will be the last generation of United Methodists that has to endure this identity crisis of our...

UMVIM (United Methodist Volunteers in Mission) Training October 2nd

If are interested in serving as a United Methodist Volunteer in Mission (short-term mission volunteer) and/or leading an UMVIM team then this training is for you!  Receive materials about insurance, cultural sensitivity, what to bring, how to pack, etc. that will make your mission trip a rewarding one for your team and those you serve.  There will be a brief session during the training highlighting areas such as Haiti, Mexico, & Pakistan. The training will begin at 9:30,...

“A Time to Sow” - A Reading Week Retreat for Lectionary Pastors

LIFT Renewal Ministries and the Cal-Pac Board of Camping, Retreat, and Outdoor Ministries will  co-sponsor  “A Time to Sow – A Reading Week for Lectionary Pastors”, facilitated by Rev. William Johnson, at Aldersgate Retreat & Cultural Center in Pacific Palisades, September 28 to October 1, 2010.  The Reading Week for Lectionary Preachers is time set aside to sow seeds of excellence in next years’ preaching ministry.  The Reading Week is an...

“Taking a Break From the Lord’s Work”

 “Taking a Break From the Lord’s Work” is the title of a widely circulated article by Paul Vitello in the August 1, 2010 New York Times. The beginning of the article is excerpted here, including specific reference to the U.M.C.:  “The findings have surfaced with ominous regularity over the last few years, and with little notice: Members of the clergy now suffer from obesity, hypertension and depression at rates higher than most Americans. In the last...

10 Fold Global Ministry

  10 projects in 10 days: from October 10th through 19th you will be able to learn about Global Ministries’ projects around the world supported through The Advance, the designated giving arm of The United Methodist Church, during an online event unlike anything you have experienced before.  It’s called 10-Fold. Through live webcasts, streaming video, online chats and other media, you will see and hear about amazing projects that are changing people’s...

Aldersgate featured on “Treasure of the West”

Aldersgate and The Mountain Mermaid featured on this month's “Treasures of the West” show on KPFK.  You can hear the show at: http://archive.kpfk.org/parchive/mp3/kpfk_100804_140031poetscafe.MP3 ...

Cal-Pac Camps & The Center for Leadership Launches Cross Bridges Program

On August 19th, 2010, twenty five individuals will gather at Aldersgate Retreat & Cultural Center for the first ever Crossing Bridges Retreat, a three day training designed specifically to enhance cross-cultural, cross-racial competency. The Crossing Bridges Retreat is actually Phase 1 of a three phase strategy to equip our clergy and lay members in the California-Pacific Annual Conference to better communicate and relate across cultural and racial lines.   The retreat will be...

CST Alaskan Adventure

Claremont School of Theology is planning a travel experience called the Alaskan Adventure. This fellowship trip will give Alumni/ae and Friends of the school the opportunity to travel with President Jerry Campbell and Bishop Charles W. Jordan and see some gorgeous scenery. The trip is planned for July 1-15, 2011 and will also provide a $300 per person gift towards the La Veta Campbell Scholarship Fund at CST to help provide needed scholarships for our students. There is information available...

Applying for Provisional Membership

Dates to Apply: July 1 – August 31, 2010 Applying for provisional membership this year will be online. Starting on July 1 to August 31, 2010 those certified candidates wanting to apply for provisional membership this year will need to go to the Board of Ordained Ministry’s web site, www.calpacordainedministry.org and click on “Membership: Provisional and Full Connection” and then click on “Applying for Provisional Membership.” There you will find...

Applying for Full Connection

Dates to Apply: July 1 – August 31, 2010 Dear Provisional Members: Candidates for Ordination are required to have the equivalent of 2 years of full-time service in an approved appointment by the Annual Conference at which they wish to be Ordained and made a Member in Full Connection. All Provisional Members (including transfers) are required to participate in the Conference Residency Program (CRP, formerly RIM). Candidates will be required to have completed 8 CRP events by June 1st...