wfn.org | UMCom puts major new emphasis on electronic media

[NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG]

Oct. 31, 2000 News media contact: Linda Green·(615)742-5470·Nashville, Tenn.
10-71B{494}

NOTE: For related coverage of the United Methodist Commission on
Communication, see UMNS stories #495 and #496.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (UMNS) - Recognizing the power of the electronic media, the
United Methodist Church's communications agency is moving in new directions
to connect people inside and outside the denomination.

The new strategies were a focal point for the Commission on Communication,
the governing body of United Methodist Communications (UMCom), during its
Oct. 27-29 organizational meeting in Nashville. The governing members,
preparing for their 2001-2004 period of work, learned how UMCom plans to use
the electronic culture and storytelling techniques to reach more people.

God is revealed through stories, and stories change lives, said the Rev.
Larry Hollon, UMCom's top staff executive.  

"Electronic culture is about visualization and storytelling. It's about
sound and motion, experience and spectacle. It's immediate, global and
transient," he said.

Being engaged in ministry today means participating in the electronic
culture by producing content that addresses people's spiritual and daily
concerns, he told the commissioners. "It means being in dialogue with people
in the church and the culture in a way that reveals the humanizing
perspective of Christian faith and God's grace."

Society has shifted from an emphasis on print to electronic media, he said.
The church, which has invested in print-oriented efforts, has failed to
recognize the new shift, he said. As a result, the church has not played a
role in the electronic culture and not learned the skills necessary for
doing so. "We have become marginal, if not irrelevant."

UMCom's challenges are to discover where God is working in the culture and
to express the faith electronically, Hollon said. "We know how to do this in
print. Today, we must learn how to do it through images on screens."

Those who work in the electronic culture help shape the future and society's
quality of life, he said. "If we choose not to produce in the electronic
culture, we choose not to be engaged and we have no voice."

He lamented the fact that when the United Methodist Church had the
opportunity to shape culture electronically, it chose not to or did so
hesitantly and with inadequate funding.

Hollon noted the United Methodist Book of Discipline's mandate for the
agency. "While its language is somewhat behind the curve, its intent is
clear," he said. The Commission on Communication and UMCom are responsible
for providing the church with technical expertise and support, as well as
offering communications leadership that includes the use of new technology
in ministry.

"We must become even more aggressive in electronic and digital production,"
Hollon said. "Our task as the communications agency is to help the church to
find its voice and sing this song."

UMCom is providing that leadership in two ways, through its Igniting
Ministry campaign and a new partnership with computer giant Microsoft.

Last May, UMCom received funding approval from the 2000 General Conference
for the Igniting Ministry campaign, the agency's $20 million effort to use
television and other media to evangelize the masses. The four-year campaign
was designed to help increase awareness of the United Methodist Church and
its ministries and to invite people into a relationship with Christ through
the local churches. The conference authorized UMCom to create national
television commercials about the United Methodist Church for cable
television, with the goal of communicating with people that the denomination
might not reach otherwise.

During the meeting, the commissioners learned that 30 regional training
events related to the Igniting Ministry campaign have been planned so far
for 2001. They also heard a sample of survey results from Barna Research
Group that will be used as UMCom develops the ads.

Through its new partnership with Microsoft, UMCom plans on wiring the
denomination with affordable computer products. The arrangement enables
UMCom to consolidate the entire purchasing volume of computer products for
the United Methodist Church. The agency will provide computer products at a
reduced price and in a variety of languages to local churches, annual
conferences, boards, agencies, schools, colleges, universities and other
ministries. The agreement allows the church to be connected at every level
and moves the agency and the entire church toward an electronic future,
Hollon said.

In other business, commission members elected officers for 2001-2004: Bishop
William Oden, Dallas, president; Margaret Novak, Chester, Mont., vice
president; Mertice Shane, East Stroud, Pa., chairman, personnel committee;
the Rev. Elijah Stansell Jr., Houston, chairman, finance committee; the Rev.
Jamie Potter-Miller, Johnstown, Pa., chairwoman, evaluation and legislative
committee.

Commission members also:
·	Renamed the agency's Racial Ethnic Minority Fellowship the Judith L.
Weidman Racial Ethnic Minority Communications Fellowship. The new name
honors former UMCom top executive Judith Weidman, whose concern about the
lack of minority communicators in the United Methodist Church guided the
establishment of a yearlong fellowship that places a racial ethnic
communicator in an annual conference.
·	Heard from Nicole Benson, the 2000-2001 Racial Ethic Minority
Fellow, who is working in the church's Southwest Texas Annual Conference.
·	Heard of the agency's plans to reinvigorate the United Methodist
Communications Foundation.

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