GEMN wishes you and your family and community
a blessed Christmastide and New Year as you celebrate God’s mission
incarnate among us in Jesus the Christ!
Next year’s Missio, the annual world mission conference for the Episcopal Church, will be held in San Pedro Sula, April 29-May 2, at the invitation of Bishop Lloyd Allen of Honduras. “Shared Mission with Jesus” is the theme. Evangelism, Empowerment and Climate Change will be the major topics addressed by speakers both from Honduras’s region and from elsewhere, with Migration also discussed.
The Mission Formation Program will be held on Tuesday, April 29, after its participants arrive on Monday the 28th.
Missio participants should plan to arrive in time for the Missio Welcome on Tuesday evening. Missio will continue through Thursday evening in plenaries, table discussions, field trips, a Honduras cultural event, and celebrations of mission agencies with 10th, 20th and 25th anniversaries in 2025. GEMN’s own 30th anniversary since its founding in 1995 will be observed.
Friday, May 2, is an optional day for more field trips and gatherings of special interest groups. Attendees may return home either Friday morning or Saturday morning. Interpretation between Spanish and English will be provided throughout.
Stay tuned for registration details in January!
Three from the GEMN Board made a site visit to San Pedro Sula in early December. With his expertise as a Clinical Pastoral Education supervisor, GEMN president Paul Rajan was the featured speaker at the diocesan clergy conference on education for spiritual pastoral care. Treasurer Bill Kunkle and executive director Titus Presler attended part of the clergy conference, visited Catedral del Buen Pastor, met with Bp. Allen and diocesan staff, and reviewed meeting spaces and accommodations in local hotels.
Ian Douglas tells how Haitians recalled him to missionary vocation
“Own your identity as a missionary, or go home!” is the title
of a video testimony in which Ian Douglas, retired bishop of Connecticut, testifies to how two Haitian Episcopalians taught him about mission during his time in Haiti as a young Volunteer in Mission. Ian says he was afflicted by what has been called the western guilt complex about mission until his Haitian companions, a layperson and the bishop at the time, challenged him to embrace his missionary identity.
Douglas’s testimony is one in a dozen of My Mission Story videos that GEMN has compiled from conversations with lay and clergy Episcopalians at General Convention. Watch Ian’s video here. The collection is accessible on GEMN’s YouTube channel and the GEMN website.
Mission Formation Program held annual session online in October
GEMN’s Mission Formation Program held its 2024 session online over three days in October. 21 people from around the church and three other countries engaged with biblical foundations, mission history and theology, missional spirituality, mission companionship vs. colonialism, asset-based community development, cultural dynamics, parish-diocese-province connections, group process, and mission team-building.
Ten of the participants were new to the program, while eleven were returning for a second set of modules. The group discussed several of the My Mission Story videos and received an overview of current Episcopal mission initiatives. Between the first and second set of modules, enrollees meet in mentor groups and undertake mission projects.
The next Mission Formation Program will be held in person on April 29 in tandem with Missio 2025 in San Pedro Sula in Honduras. Stay tuned for registration details in January.
Applications invited by Jan. 31 for Young Adult Service Corps
From the Episcopal Church’s Office of Global Partnerships: “Could serving with the Young Adult Service Corps (YASC) be your next faithful step? This ministry is for Episcopalians ages 21-35 who are interested in exploring their faith in new ways by living and serving in communities around the world. Applicants must have a high degree of maturity and possess a faith commitment, the willingness to be a humble guest, and the ability to be an authentic companion. Applications are due January 31.” Click here to apply.
The Office of Global Partnerships holds a monthly call on the second Wednesday of each month, and all are welcome to participate. To receive regular notices, write to Fred Spitz, global relations and networking officer, at globalpartnerships@dfms.org. The next several meetings are Jan. 8, Feb. 12 and March 12.
Good news from dioceses and mission agencies:
• Episcopal Relief and Development is working with the Diocese of Amazon in the Anglican Episcopal Church of Brazil to offer relief to people afflicted with food insecurity. The program is serving 5,426 people in about 1,300 households in 48 communities.
• Jerusalem Peacebuilders’ programs that bring together Muslim, Jewish and Christian young people and adults were completely full last summer, despite the continuing war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, and the programs impacted over 10,000 future leaders in 2024.
• Diocese of North Carolina and its Chartered Committee on Global Mission continue to offer the Global Bible Study, which is open to all around the church and the world. Five sessions were offered in 2024: March, May, July, September and December. Stay tuned for notices of sessions in 2025
• Global Refugee Mission of New England gathered donations of winter clothing for refugees resettled in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Focusing on refugees from Syria and Ukraine, the agency is based at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Beverly Farms, Mass.
• Light from Light, based in Atlanta, reported that despite 76% of hospitals being closed in Haiti, the Lespwa Timoun clinic it supports served 3,337 children and a total of 8,901 patients this year through October.
• Diocese of Newark has established its first Global Mission Commission and is pursuing a companion diocese relationship with a diocese in Burundi.
• Stand With Iraqi Christians has launched the Nineveh Restoration Initiative to broaden sustainable development through vocational and agricultural training, youth employment, and female-owned businesses.
• Health Tanzania reports that the Buguruni Anglican Health Center in Dar es Salaam is treating more women patients and that it has a program for children with HIV/AIDS. The Centre for Family Medicine Development and Research has been established to work with Muhimbili University of Medical and Allied Sciences in the development of Tanzanian family medicine.
• American Friends of the Episcopal Churches of the Sudans has formed an eight-member advisory council that will advised on matters affecting AFRECS’ relationships with the Episcopal Church of Sudan and the much larger Episcopal Church of South Sudan.