IRS Names J. Daniel Gary to ACT Advisory Panel

Nashville, TN – The Internal Revenue Service’s Advisory Committee on Tax Exempt and Government Entities (ACT) will introduce newly named members at a public meeting on June 10. J. Daniel Gary, Administrative Counsel to The General Council on Finance and Administration (GCFA), has been named one of the 10 new members of the panel. They will begin two-year terms and join 11 returning members.

Gary is Administrative Counsel for the General Council on Finance and Administration (GCFA) of The United Methodist Church, the third largest religious denomination in the United States. GCFA is responsible for protecting the legal interests of the denomination, and Gary provides guidance on a wide variety of issues related to tax-exempt organizations, including charitable giving, legislative and political campaign activities, and unrelated business income tax (UBIT). Gary received his Juris Doctorate from the Washington and Lee University School of Law and his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Illinois.

A. Moses Rathan Kumar, General Secretary and Treasurer of GCFA states "We are very pleased that Dan has been selected to serve on this IRS advisory committee. This honor is well deserved. Dan is known throughout our Church as someone with a great deal of expertise in tax issues affecting clergy and churches. We are grateful that through his service on this committee, Dan will have the opportunity to share with the IRS and others the unique perspective of the faith community on the tax issues faced by churches and other religious organizations."

ACT includes external stakeholders and representatives who deal with employee retirement plans, tax-exempt organizations, tax-exempt bonds and federal, state, local and Indian tribal governments. ACT members are appointed by the Secretary of the Treasury and advise the IRS on operational policies and procedures.

The General Council on Finance and Administration coordinates and administers finances and
safeguards the legal interests and rights of The United Methodist Church.
www.gcfa.org

Statement on the U.S. Immigration Situation
Council of Bishops
The United Methodist Church
May 2009


In Scripture we see evidence that God cares for sojourners. In the Old Testament we are reminded that we are to care for the sojourners among us as native born, loving them as we love ourselves, and never oppressing them (Leviticus 19:33). Most telling, God chose to be incarnated as a migrant in Jesus, who as a tender child became a refugee to Africa, and as an adult became an itinerant teacher of good news to all people. Jesus identifies himself with the sojourner in our midst and calls his followers to provide hospitality to the sojourner (Matthew 25:38-40). As we follow Jesus in serving the sojourner, we hear the good news of the gospel incarnated in their stories and in their lives. We believe that welcoming the sojourner is so vital to the expression of Christian faith that to engage in this form of hospitality is to participate in our own salvation.

Throughout the world we experience redemptive liberation through relationships with migrants in our communities. These relationships help us to see that regardless of legal status or nationality, we are all connected through Christ to one another. The Apostle Paul reminds us that when one member suffers, all members suffer as well (1 Corinthians 12:26). The solidarity we share through Christ eliminates the boundaries and barriers which exclude and isolate. The sojourners we are called to love are our brothers and sisters, our mothers and fathers, our sons and daughters; indeed, they are us.

As we serve in communities all across the United States, we are made aware of the daily suffering of immigrants who live and work among us. Our immigrant brothers and sisters suffer greatly due to abuse in the work place, indiscriminate federal raids, and indefinite detention and deportations which tear their families apart. These conditions are exacerbated by a broken immigration system that not only separates families for long and indefinite periods of time, but that ignores the fact that immigrants provide a much needed labor force in the United States and come to this country often encouraged by potential U.S. employers who actively seek their labor.

Consideration of U.S. immigration policy must take into consideration the fact that today many immigrants are forced to leave their homes due to economic and foreign policies of the United States. In addition, the growing militarism along the border with Mexico further aggravates the suffering of immigrants and border communities as it exposes immigrants and communities to greater violence and mistreatment. Because of all of these circumstances immigrants are forced to live in the shadows of society to avoid being exploited thus living lives of constant fear and insecurity.

Our calling as followers of Jesus the Christ is to stand in solidarity with our immigrant neighbors and to advocate for justice on their behalf. The United Methodist Church affirms the inherent dignity, value, and human rights of all immigrants regardless of their legal status. We acknowledge that all nations have the right to secure their borders, but the primary concern for Christians is the welfare of immigrants and communities.

The Council of Bishops of The United Methodist Church is committed to advocate for comprehensive immigration reform that is humane and effective and that upholds the human and civil rights of immigrants. We affirm President Obama for his leadership in moving the immigration agenda to the forefront of public discourse and decision making.

We call upon President Obama and all Congressional leaders to support comprehensive immigration reform that would:

.Provide a pathway to citizenship for immigrants;
.Reunify immigrant families that have been separated by immigration itself or due to work place raids and ensuing indefinite detentions and deportations;
.Increase the number of visas for short-term workers to come into the United States to work in a safe, legal, and orderly way.
.Extend legal protection to all workers who come to stay for a certain period of time as well as for those who stay permanently including the right to bargain for higher wages, to protest against poor working conditions, and to preserve their human rights as workers, be they documented or undocumented;
.Eliminate privately-operated detention centers, which are not regulated by the federal or state governments, and end all indiscriminate raids.


Just and humane immigration reform will put an end to much of the human suffering of our immigrant brothers and sisters, bringing them out of the shadows of society, and integrating them into society in ways that will bring their gifts and hard work to bear as together we strive to build communities of justice.

Abrahamic Faiths Unite for Peace at Lake Junaluska Peace Conference, September 20-22, 2009

LAKE JUNALUSKA, N.C. — Participants of this year’s Lake Junaluska Peace Conference will be exposed to a dialogue of better understanding of the faith communities of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. September 20–22 are the dates for this time of learning about one another’s faith traditions, examining what each brings to the search for peace, celebrating our common heritage and exploring ways we can be more effective “Peace Builders” in our local communities.

Jimmy L. Carr, Lake Junaluska’s Executive Director, said the Peace Conference is an event all persons should attend.

“Lake Junaluska is delighted to once again provide the site and staff support for the Lake Junaluska Peace Conference. We appreciate so much the Peace Committee’s work in offering such a timely conference. Their efforts allow Lake Junaluska to serve the church and the community by providing challenging speakers and information to assist persons in becoming the peace makers that Christ calls us to be,” Carr said.

Speakers from each faith will describe what their scriptures and practices have to bring to the Table of Peace. Workshops will teach skills in being Peace Builders. Through prayers, celebrations, and the arts, we will experience what each contributes to the search for peace.

“This year's Peace Conference centers on an issue that has universal implications. There is much agreement that we will not have world-wide peace until the major religions understand each other better and develop genuine respect for one other. As we focus this year on the three Abrahamic Faiths, we hope a significant number of persons from each faith group will be here. Come expecting to be challenged by the presenters. Come with an open mind and an eagerness to enter into creative dialogue with persons of other faiths,” Garland Young, Chair of the Peace Conference Planning Committee, said.

Leadership for the event includes:

Archbishop Elias Chacour:
Father Chacour, a native Palestinian, was ordained a priest in the Melkite Catholic Church in 1965. In 2006, he became the Archbishop Metropolitan of the Melkite Diocese of Akka, Haifa, Nazareth, and all of Galilee in Israel. He has long been a strong voice for peace and reconciliation in Palestine and Israel and has worked with all factions and faiths.

Rabbi Arthur O. Waskow:
Rabbi Waskow has been one of the creators and leaders of Jewish renewal and of several important interfaith projects addressing issues of peace, justice, and healing of the Earth. He founded the Shalom Center in 1983 and has been its director since then, shaping it into a prophetic voice.

Dr. Sayyid M. Syeed:
Dr. Syeed is the National Director of Interfaith and Community Alliances for the Islamic Society of North America. The ISNA is an umbrella organization with 300 affiliates across the US and Canada. He has been actively involved in fostering understanding among the world’s religions and has participated in interfaith dialogues at different levels.

Dr. Lisa Schirch:
Dr. Schirch is professor of peace-building at Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. She serves as executive director of the 3D Security Initiative, which promotes civil society perspectives on conflict prevention and peace-building in US security policy-making.

Cost: $89 ($79 before August 1, 2009); $65 – Students
Register online at www.lakejunaluska.com/peace.aspx, by Fax (828) 452-1956 or by phone (828) 454-6656. Lodging reservations can be made at www.lakejunaluska.com/peace.aspx or by calling 1-800-222-4930. Please let the reservations representative know that you are attending the Peace Conference.

Note: Clicking on the registration address above will take you to the Peace Conference homepage where there are links to on-line registration, plus full information about leadership, schedule, workshops, lodging, and event sponsorship.

For more information, please contact: Pam Naplen at (828) 454-6656, pnaplen@lakejunaluska.com

The Role of Jordanian Women in the Spiritual Formation of Their Children
By Jeanette Pinkston*

AMMAN, JORDAN—In 2008, I traveled to Amman, Jordan with a group of twenty U.S. journalists representing the Associated Church Press, Evangelical Press Association and the Catholic Press Association.

Having just covered an interfaith panel on faith formation during the joint Preaching from the Center and Christian Educators Fellowship conferences in Albuquerque last fall, I was led to explore the role of Jordanian women in the faith formation of their children while on the Jordan press tour.

The role of Jordanian women in the faith formation of their children is remarkably similar to that of women in other faith traditions. Across the board, women are typically more influential in shaping the religious practice of children; Jordanian women are no different.

Lorain Rezeq works in the business center of a local hotel in Amman, Jordan. “Women are very influential in shaping the religious life of their children,” says Rezeq. “Because they are so close to their moms, moms influence their children from ages one to ten. The children follow their mothers everywhere. They are so close to them. When you hear a mother saying her prayer, you say ‘I am going to repeat it,’” says Rezeq.

Muslim woman with children

Former Ambassador to the United Nations, Hasan Abu Nimah agrees. According to Mr. Abu Nimah, director of the Royal Institute for Inter-faith Studies, a child will probably be more influenced by his mother than by his father because of the physical proximity to the mother, normally.

“But I can not really talk about any rules that define the role of women or the role of parents [in] shaping the religion of their children,” he said. “A child from Christian parents will normally be Christian, from Moslem parents will be Moslem, from mixed parents that’s difficult to say. You don’t have a rule that applies to every situation,” said Mr. Abu Nimah.

While Muslims are asked to practice their beliefs by performing certain acts of worship, actually doing so is a matter of choice, as in other religions. Some people are very strict in adhering to the religious practices of their faith, while others are not.

“I think it is safe to say that regardless of one’s faith or background, perhaps the most influential person or one of the two most influential, in the minimum, is the mother,” says Ihab Wl-Kady, Ph.D., of the Islamic Center and University of New Mexico. “On her shoulders, reality says [rests] the core of faith formation for the offspring — at least in the very first few years or stages of that persons life.”

El-Kady told a gathering of over 600 Methodist educators, lay, and clergy, that women shape the faith of their young, and because they represent half of the universe, they actually have a bigger hand in faith formation than male members of that faith.

“How a mother embraces her duties and embraces her faith will really reflect on how I will embrace my faith and go through it,” he said.

Mr. Abu Nimah says, “if a child is born to a Moslem mother and a Moslem father, the child will be Moslem. If the child is born to a Christian mother and Moslem father, (we have a lot of cross marriages here), that depends on the family itself. Sometimes they agree what the children will be when they have children. Sometimes they leave it to chance.”

Throughout our travels around Jordan, we found that in Muslim and Christian communities, women have a strong influence in the family, workplace, religion and society in general. As El-Kady suggests, one can obviously spend hours and hours talking about the rights and roles and duties of women in Islam. He says it is especially imperative for those who are foreign to Islam, or who are not Muslim to separate what is cultural from what is Islamic when viewing people practicing faith from a culture perspective like in the Gulf region or in North Africa.

“One needs to ask himself — or ask those who know Islam — what of these practices is actually cultural and what of these practices is actually Islamic?” said El-Kady.

While young children are trained in the rituals of Islam, Islam is not just the ritual; it is the faithful belief itself.

“Although we teach our children and start training them how to pray at the age of seven and start teaching how to actually fast at the age of ten, we don’t go through the entire day. We go through segments of the day and a little longer as the child grows older. Then the length of the fasting actually extends until hopefully when they reach puberty they can actually fast the entire month of Ramadan.

“But the training for the ritual itself is only the surface. This is what you see the child or the member of the faith actually doing. What lies in his heart is completely different. Nobody can tell what lies in your heart but yourself.

“It is fundamentally important to understand that the prime role for faith formation in our system of belief lays on the family itself, then on peers, then on the leadership,” said El-Kady.

*Pinkston is the director of media relations for the United Methodist General Board of Discipleship (GBOD). She resides in Nashville, Tenn.

New Executive Coordinator Named for the United Methodist Appalachian Ministry Network

Hagerstown, Maryland: “Linking Hands Across Appalachia,” the theme of the 2009 Appalachian Assembly, was literally present during the spring meeting of the UM Appalachian Ministry Network with members attending from southern New York, northeastern Mississippi and many conferences in between.

The excitement of the meeting centered on the selection of a new Executive Coordinator. A Search Committee, working since the beginning of 2009 interviewed seven of the twenty-one applicants and recommended Rev. Robert “Bob” Wilkins to replace the retiring staff person.

Wilkins is an elder in the West Virginia Conference most recently serving in an appointment as the director of a conference mission project, Heart and Hand House in Philippi, WV. He has served as a member of the Network representing grassroots mission projects. Wilkins holds a Doctor in Ministry from United Theological Seminary and has certification in Non-Profit Management from West Virginia University.

As Wilkins described what he saw as challenges for the region and the Network, he said, “an encourager and an enabler are the hand and glove that are needed.” In Wilkins, the Network feels that it has found those qualities as well as experience in ecumenical settings, working with government agencies and cooperative efforts. Goals of the Network will move forward with the direction of the one who brings these gifts to the organization.

The Network’s office will be located in Buckhannon, WV. The Upshur Cooperative Parish, will provide space for the office. The official transition will occur sometime later in the fall.

Wilkins replaces N. Sharon Leatherman, who is retiring. She is completing her 15th years with UMAMN as the Executive Coordinator. Leatherman plans to continue to assist the Network as a consultant and trainer while enjoying more time to spend with her family and other volunteer roles.