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"UNITED METHODIST DAILY NEWS" by SUSAN PEEK on Aug. 11, 1991 at 13:58 Eastern,
about FULL TEXT RELEASES FROM UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE (2920 notes).

Note 2919 by SUSAN PEEK on April 25, 1996 at 22:42 Eastern (5124 characters).

057 {2921}                                          April 25, 1996

                         THURSDAY ROUNDUP

     DENVER (UMNS) -- United Methodism's chief missions arm will
continue to be headquartered in New York City, the church's top
legislative assembly said April 25 here.

     The decision by a margin of 584 to 354 ended for at least the
next four years a debate that has continued for the past eight
years.  The headquarters is located in the Interchurch Center at
475 Riverside Drive in New York.

     In 1992 General Conference approved by a narrow margin a
study committee's report that the missions agency should move its
headquarters to a site to be chosen during 1993-96.  A task force
named to conduct that search eventually chose Reston, Va., as the
best site to re-locate the board, which has more than 400
employees.

     The proposed relocation to Reston would carry a total price
tag of about $72 million, according to the committee.  Because of
the cost, and other factors, the task force recommendation was
rejected unanimously in the legislative committee.

     Instead, delegates called on a standing committee of the
General Council on Ministries and General Council on Finance and
Administration to continue its assigned duties of reviewing the
suitability of all locations of the denomination's boards and
agencies.

     Although standing pat on Global Ministries' headquarters
site, the conference ended another debate that has spanned 30
years by voting to reorder the church's ministry.

     The new plan calls for two separate offices of ordained
ministry: deacon, one who pledges to serve God and the church
through "word and service" to the community; and elder, who serves
through "service, word, sacrament and orders."  At present there
are both ordained deacons and elders, but the ordination as deacon
is usually a first step toward ordination as elder.  There also
are people consecrated as diaconal ministers.

     The two-step ordination for clergy would have been retained
by the Council of Bishops that submitted the proposals debated
here, but a legislative committee opted for the one-step process
for elders and a separate process for deacons.  Also rejected was
a proposal by the bishops for a new category of "lay ministry
steward" -- individuals who feel called to special service.

     Also approved April 25 was continuation of a special program
on substance abuse and related violence.  Launched in 1992, the
program coordinates various drug and alcohol education and
prevention initiatives across the denomination.

     By a vote of 778 to 26, the delegates mandated a national
comprehensive plan for town and country to be developed under the
oversight of the National Division of the Board of Global
Ministries for the 2000 General Conference. The plan would be
comparable to the "Holy Boldness" plan for urban ministry
developed this quadrennium.

     The Conference approved a plan for the National Committee on
Deaf Ministries by a vote of 704 to 39.  Also approved by a large
margin was continuation of the Interagency Task Force on AIDS,
pending budgetary approval.

     The Judicial Council, the church's "supreme court" re-elected
Tom Matheny, Hammond, La., attorney, to an unprecedented sixth
term as president.  Matheny, first elected to the court in 1972,
has been president since 1976.

     The Rev. John Corry, Nashville, Tenn., was elected vice
president succeeding Sally AsKew, Elberton, Ga., who took the
secretary's post vacated by the retiring Wayne Coffin, Oklahoma
City.

     Lay alternate members of the court elected April 25 included
Daniel K. Church, Akron, Ohio; Sally Brown Geis, Denver; Jon R.
Gray, Kansas City, Mo.; Ed Hill, Amarillo, Texas; Jack W. Plowman,
Pittsburgh; and T. Terrell Sessons, Tampa, Fla.  Clergy alternates
are the Revs. Charles Brockwell Jr., Louisville, Ky.; Richard W.
Cain, Upland, Calif.; John Collins, New Rochelle, N.Y.; Larry
Duane Pickens, Chicago; Robert K. Sweet Jr., Reading,  Mass.; and
the Rev. Jane Tews, Gilbert, Ariz.

     After being warmly welcomed to the conference April 24,
Bishop Arthur Kulah of Liberia told a news conference April 25
that his life has been in danger in his homeland so often that he
thanks God each day for safely arriving home from his office a few
miles away.

     The bishop, who said he would return to Liberia "to be with
my people," warned that the bitter fighting that has plagued
Liberia since the end of 1989 could spread to other West African
countries unless the United Nations and United States government
"take a very decisive role in bringing peace to Liberia."

     In another of a series of dramatic events at the 1996 General
Conference, a telephone call linked the delegates by trans-
Atlantic telephone with Bishop J. Alfred Ndoricimpa who was denied
an entrance visa to attend the conference here.  "Our churches are
growing," Ndoricimpa said from Nairobi, Kenya.  "God has been
taking care of our people."

                               # # #

                                                     --Robert Lear
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