wfn.org | California fires force evacuations of homes, church offices

["NewsDesk" <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

Oct. 28, 2003  News media contact: Tim Tanton7(615)742-54707Nashville, Tenn. 
ALL-RM{514}

NOTE: Head-and-shoulders photographs of the Rev. John Yohan Yoon and Bishop
Mary Ann Swenson are available.

A UMNS Report
By Larry R. Hygh Jr.*

As fires continue to burn across Southern California, one pastor and his
family are counting their blessings.

The Rev. John Yohan Yoon, pastor of Del Rosa United Methodist Church in San
Bernardino, evacuated the church parsonage with his family on the afternoon
of Oct. 25. 

"We didn't get any warning," he said. Fire trucks and police cars did not
come down the street telling people to evacuate; instead, the family saw the
flames coming. Yoon, his wife and two young sons escaped with little more
than the clothes they were wearing. 

When Yoon arrived back in San Bernardino at 6 the next morning, he found the
Del Rosa church still standing. The church is about a half-mile from the
parsonage. "I was crossing my fingers that the parsonage was somehow
salvaged," he said. 

He returned to find the parsonage burned to the ground. 

Fires, raging since the weekend, had killed at least 17 people in California
and Mexico and destroyed more than 1,500 homes as of Oct. 28. The United
Methodist Church's California-Pacific Annual (regional) Conference, led by
Bishop Mary Ann Swenson, has requested help from the United Methodist
Committee on Relief.

Several United Methodist families had to evacuate their homes, and one
congregation evacuated during Sunday services Oct. 26. The San Diego and
Santa Barbara district offices were closed, and Santa Barbara's records were
moved to a church.

At the Del Rosa church, Yoon said about 35 members gathered that Sunday
morning to share with each other. 

"There are seven families in the congregation who have also lost their
homes," Yoon said. "We came together to draw strength from each other. We're
trying to make it the best we can with God's help."

Yoon did not deliver his prepared Sunday morning sermon, but instead spoke
using the first chapter of 2 Thessalonians. "God comforts us in our trouble
so that we may comfort those who are in trouble," he told parishioners.
"Don't lose hope in the midst of tragedies like this.

"It's amazing how there's so many people trying to reach out in trouble," he
said. "...There are people caring for each other, both strangers and friends.
We are drawing strength from one another."

Yoon took his sons, ages 12 and 10, to the site where the parsonage once
stood. "The little one thinks he'll be able to go back and find some of the
toys he had left," he said. The toys were not there, but Yoon told his son
that being together as a family is irreplaceable. 

The family is staying temporarily with Yoon's parents, who recently moved to
Southern California. 

Bishop Swenson is calling on churches across the conference to take a special
offering beyond their normal giving during the next two weeks. The conference
stretches from Southern California across the Pacific Ocean to Hawaii, Guam
and Saipan.

Geographically, six of the eight districts in the California-Pacific
Conference have been affected by the fires that continue to burn in Southern
California.

"There are no words for the sense of loss that comes from all this," Swenson
said in a statement, "but there are words that give hope: Jesus says at the
close of the Gospel of Matthew, 'I am with you always,' and I am convinced
that is not an unspecific, generalized long-range plan, but a very intimate
and specific promise to be present with us in each moment in our lives. 

"That promise is sure and true, and I am holding on to it today," she said.

"It is also true that we are a part of that promise becoming real in the face
of this disaster: our wonderful connection is already at work, bringing
assistance to those in need-and not just our United Methodist family."

# # #

*Hygh is director of communications for the California-Pacific Annual
Conference.

 
 

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United Methodist News Service
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