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Date: May 10, 2005
Contact: Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford
V: 847/742-5100 F:  847/742-6103
E-MAIL: CoBNews@AOL.Com

CHURCH OF THE BRETHREN	NEWSLINE
May 10, 2005

CONSULTATION HIGHLIGHTS WAYS CHURCH OF THE  BRETHREN IS WOVEN TOGETHER

May 10, 2005 (Elgin, IL) -- The 2005  Cross-Cultural Consultation and 
Celebration of the Church of the Brethren on  April 21-24 drew as many as 250

African-American, Mexican, Dominican, Haitian,	Indian, Puerto Rican, and
Anglo 
Brethren participants over four days of events.  Also in attendance were
Church of 
the Brethren Annual Conference moderator Jim  Hardenbrook and moderator-elect

Ron Beachley, and church agency staff including  general secretary of the 
General Board Stan Noffsinger, On Earth Peace  co-executive Bob Gross, and
Bethany 
Theological Seminary president Eugene Roop  and academic dean Stephen Breck 
Reid.

The gathering was by far the  largest since annual cross-cultural 
consultations began in 1999. A 1996 Urban  Ministries Conference at Pleasant
Dale Church 
of the Brethren in Decatur, Ind.,  preceded the 1999 consultation in Kansas 
City.  

Worship services,  listening sessions, and times of fellowship were hosted by

the seminary,  Richmond (Ind.) Church of the Brethren, and Eaton (Ohio) 
Church of the Brethren.  The seminary and area congregations provided food, 
transportation, and  hospitality.

The consultation theme from Colossians 3:12-17--"Woven	Together with 
Love"--was just "a sophisticated way of saying, we are having a  dress
rehearsal for 
heaven," said Dennis Webb, pastor of Naperville (Ill.)	Church of the 
Brethren, as he led participants in one of the many worship  experiences.

Lively multicultural worship two or three times a day was a  highlight of the

meeting. "What I have enjoyed is seeing brothers and sisters  coming from 
many states to worship together with very different races, and how  many are
open 
to more diversity so that all can praise God in different  languages," said 
Alex Sable, of the Maranatha Multicultural Fellowship in  Lancaster, Pa. 
Sermons were given by invited speakers, but worship leaders also  facilitated
open 
times of sharing in which participants were encouraged to bring  "offerings"
of 
music or testimonies. Prayers were said in Haitian Creole,  Spanish, French, 
and English. Spanish-English translation was  available.

A Saturday evening worship service at Eaton featured the  Inspirational Choir

of First Church of the Brethren and the Brethren in Christ  in Harrisburg, 
Pa., directed by Barton Smith. First Harrisburg's pastor, Belita  D.
Mitchell, 
preached. Many of the 300-plus worshipers, including visitors from 
neighboring 
congregations, received anointing for cross-cultural ministry in the  name of

Jesus Christ. Sunday morning worship was at Richmond, where pastor Kelly  
Burk invited consultation participants and the Inspirational Choir to help
lead  
the service.

Preachers focused on being woven together as Christ's  multicultural body. 
"Woven together is knowing that I love my brother from	Puerto Rico, Mexico, 
Covina!" said Gilbert Romero, pastor of Bella Vista Church  of the Brethren
in 
Los Angeles. "I want to be woven to you. You're the only  church I have."

Bethany dean Stephen Breck Reid examined how the ancient  Israelites were 
woven together in worship at the temple, and compared that to  the
multicultural 
experience. He urged participants to take the message of the  weekend home 
with them. "It's important that we go home...to reach folks we	haven't
talked to 
yet," he said.

Mitchell spoke about being "well dressed  in Christ." Love adds "marvelous 
beauty" to woven cloth, she said. "When we put	on love as our outer garment
and 
our shield, we put on Christ. With the love of	God through Christ Jesus, we 
can become a multicultural church."

A  keynote address on the peace of Christ in an American cultural setting of 

differences between people, values, and even scriptural interpretation, was  
given by Fumitaka Matsuoka, a former dean of Bethany who is teaching at 
Pacific  School of Religion in Berkeley, Calif. He called on Brethren to
learn a 
"second  language" of caring and compassion taught by scripture. "The Church
of 
the  Brethren started as a community that took seriously this second
language" 
of  nonconformity, he said. "Being in the world but not of the world--that's
a 
 second language." Matsuoka added a plea for Brethren to allow themselves to 

become vulnerable and exposed to other cultures. "In order to speak the 
second	language, we have to live in more than one world," he said. "That's
what 
the  cross-cultural experience is all about."

The consultation also offered  time for participants to share about painful 
experiences of racism and prejudice  in the church, as well as suggestions 
about how to make the denomination  multicultural. Several leaders called for

honesty about the "hard issues" facing	those who gathered. Seminary faculty
and 
members of two Annual Conference study	committees--the Intercultural Study 
Committee and the Study Committee on Doing  Church Business--held listening 
sessions during the consultation (see feature  below).

Consultation participants seemed to have no doubt of God's will  for the 
Church of the Brethren--that it is to become multicultural. Some said  the
very 
survival of the denomination depends on it becoming multicultural.  "This
great 
denomination that has drawn this soul (referring to himself), will  draw many

more," said Joseph Craddock, lay minister at Germantown (Pa.) Church  of the 
Brethren.

"It's wonderful, this event--getting better every year,"  said pastor Verel 
Montauban, of Haitian First Church of the Brethren in  Brooklyn, N.Y. "When
we 
are here, there is no color, thank God we all are the  same."

The event was planned by the Cross-Cultural Steering Committee,  aided by the

General Board's Congregational Life Ministries. Committee members  are 
Barbara Date, Ruben Deoleo, Sonja Griffith, Robert Jackson, Belita Mitchell, 
and 
Gilbert Romero. For more information contact staff members Duane Grady at  
dgrady_gb@brethren.org or 800-505-1596, or Carol Yeazell at  
cyeazell_gb@brethren.org or 828-687-1155.

The Church of the Brethren is a  Christian denomination committed to 
continuing the work of Jesus peacefully and  simply, and to living out its
faith in 
community. The denomination is based in  the Anabaptist and Pietist faith 
traditions and is one of the three Historic  Peace Churches. It celebrates
its 300th 
anniversary in 2008. It counts about  130,000 members across the United 
States and Puerto Rico, and has missions and  sister churches in Brazil, the 
Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Nigeria.

#  # #

For more information contact:

Cheryl	Brumbaugh-Cayford
Director of News Services
Church of the Brethren General	Board
1451 Dundee Ave.
Elgin, IL 60120
847-742-5100 ext.  260
cbrumbaugh-cayford_gb@brethren.org

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The  Church of the Brethren Newsline is produced by Cheryl Brumbaugh-Cayford,

 director of news services for the Church of the Brethren General Board. 
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