Connecting Voices

We are a faith community gathered in over 130 congregations. Visit and join us for inclusive Christianity built upon the foundations of our historic Protestant denomination. We welcome a rainbow of people. Our faith guides us to work for justice and peace at home and around the world! For more information about the Southern California Nevada Conference, click here.

CHURCH LIFE

Meet Ken Wyant, new Interim Director of Adult Programs

Irvine United Congregational Church has named the Rev. Ken Wyant as their new Interim Director of Adult Programs.

First Congregational, Riverside Then and Now: Two Great Stories from The Press-Enterprise

The First Congregational Church of Riverside was featured in two stories in the Inland Empire’s The Press-Enterprise newspaper.

A Potpourri of Pilgrim Pines Memories

From open air worship to rambling racoons, bears to starlit nights, UCCers share their special memories of Pilgrim Pines.

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CHURCH VITALITY

The New Adventure

The people of First Congregational Church of Santa Barbara, UCC are on a journey to discover what God is calling them to do. Rev. Sherrod shares their vision.

Mission & Money, Church Vitality 2012 Workshop, United Church of Christ of La Mesa

Preschools, financial stewardship, investment management, legacy gifts and fraud prevention: UCC and DOC speakers tackle the monetary challenges facing today’s church.

The Memory Foam Church

Picture a church flexible and supportive enough to embrace the needs of all who enter – or can be enticed to enter; one caring enough to give tradition an honorable retirement and open its heart its doors and its arms to the searcher, the spiritually hungry, the unchurched, the outsider.

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SPIRITUAL SOJOURNING

Article – Spiritual Sojourning

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PERSPECTIVES

Safe Families, Safer Communities

Dr. Romo discusses child sexual abuse and introduces “Safe Families, Safe Communities,” an awareness and prevention workshop for parents and teachers.

Safe families ….Safer Communities

Dr. Romo and Svava Brooks will share key concepts and practices to help parents prevent and detect child sexual abuse in any setting.

Who Made Your TV? Reflections on Tijuana

Following a trip to Tijuana with Centro Romero Director Carlos Correa, Adam McLane reflects on his recent purchase of a flat screen TV and asks, “where is the America of Ellis Island?”

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Ecumenical and Interfaith News – April

(Submitted by the Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations Committee of the Pacific Southwest Region, DOC, and the Southern California/Nevada Conference, UCC) UCC Awaits Guests, Adopts Disciples Pattern The Southern California/Nevada Conference of the UCC holds its 2012 Annual Gathering at Chapman University in Orange on June 8 and 9, under the theme, “Showers of Blessing”. Taking a leaf from its sister denomination the Disciples, the UCC will welcome an ecumenical and an interfaith guest into its midst. The ecumenical guest will be Father Steven Tischlis. He is the Senior Priest at St. Paul’s Greek Orthodox Church in Irvine. Prior to this appointment, Father Tischlis served the Greek Orthodox Church of the Assumption in Seattle. With a doctoral degree from Fordham University, Father Steve also served on the faculty of the Northwest Theological Union, an interdenominational, interfaith, and interracial seminary. He taught courses in theology, spiritual formation, and New Testament. The interfaith guest will be Mei-Yu Lin. She is an ordained bhikkuni, or nun, in the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Many who were present at the 2011 gathering of the Pacific Southwest Region at University Christian Church in San Diego met Mei, who as our interfaith guest on that occasion made a great hit ...

Morrow McCombs Lecture

25th Annual Morrow-McCombs Memorial Lecture An Annual Lectureship established at California State University San Bernardino to promote Jewish-Christian-Islamic relations "Religious Education for the 21st Century" a lecture by Najeeba Syeed-Miller Assistant Professor of Interreligious Education - Claremont School of Theology and followed by responses by a panel of distinguished local religious and educational leaders Wednesday May 16, 2012, 7:30 p.m. First Congregational United Church of Christ 3041 North Sierra Way - San Bernardino Free Admission - Free Parking - Reception following Co-sponsored by Center for Islamic & Middle Eastern Studies - California State University San Bernardino San Bernardino City Human Relations Commission

Music for a Sunday Afternoon in May – Schubert!

The next concert in the series Music for a Sunday Afternoon at First Congregational UCC, San Bernardino will be on Sunday, May 20 at 4PM. Jennifer Bern-Vogel (Cantor, Congregation Emanu El, Redlands), Michelle Anctil (clarinet and oboe), and Jerry Ripley (piano) will present a program of vocal and instrumental music by Franz Schubert. The program will include Schubert’s beautiful lied for soprano, clarinet, and piano, “Der Hirt auf dem Felsen” (“The Shepherd on the Rock”). An Artists Reception, sponsored by the congregation’s Fellowship Ministry, will follow the performance. First Congregational UCC is located at 3041 North Sierra Way, San Bernardino. More information may be obtained by calling the church office at 909-886-4911 or by visiting the church website, www.sbucc.org. Admission is free. However, freewill donations will be graciously and gratefully received!

On My Own at Pilgrim Pines

by Jim Woods, Long Beach, CA It was the summer of 1969 and I was in 4th grade. I had spent several weekends up at the Pines with friends from church when the couples club my parents belonged to at First Congregational Church of Long Beach had gone up for family camps, so I was familiar with the camp. But this summer was to be my first time spending an entire week at Pilgrim Pines without any of my friends. It ended up being a great week, though it didn’t start off that way. I was assigned to Beecher cabin in Junior Camp; the counselor was Joe Booth, the grandson of the former minister of First Congo, the Rev. Dr. Henry Kendall Booth, so I thought this was a good thing. Well, two things happened: one, I got home sick, and two, Joe told ghost stories during afternoon rest period and right before bed. Not a good start for a sensitive kid. I spent so much time with the nurse that I missed the swim tests on Monday and Tuesday and was only allowed in the shallow end of the pool. Instead of being teased about being homesick, the other ...

2012 Summer Session at Pacific School of Religion

Come to Berkeley this summer! Pacific School of Religion is a progressive Christian graduate institution with strong ties to the United Church of Christ. This summer we are offering more than twenty courses from July 2 to August 10 online or at our campus in Berkeley, California. Study faith and politics, preaching, church leadership, and more. The program is designed with the needs of laypeople, practicing clergy and seminarians in mind. Courses may be audited, taken for clergy continuing education units (CEUs) or academic credit. We hope to see you in summer 2012! Visit our website at http://www.psr.edu/summer

Meet Cynthia Diggs, New Pilgrim Pines Camp Manager

by Mary Domb Mikkelson, Senior Editor of Connecting Voices The setting was DiGiorgio Farms, the DiGiorgio, California ranch John Steinbeck immortalized in Grapes of Wrath, a place of look-alike grey houses and depression era simplicity and practicalities. It was, as Cynthia Diggs, who was born there, recalls, “a wonderful wrinkle in time in which to grow up – simple, protected, safe, happy. I didn’t think about why all our houses were grey; I never lived in town where things were different.” It also explains, she adds, “why I’m such a practical person.” Family events – including her parents’ divorce when she was sixteen – expanded her education in no-nonsense living. “I lived with my dad, doing all the cooking, cleaning and shopping.” Work and church, the Church of Christ, became – and remains – the cornerstones of her life. After high school in Arvin, California, Cynthia attended Bakersfield Junior College and Fresno State. “That, too, was a good time,” she says, spent mostly with other Church of Christ young people. After graduating with a BA in Social Work, Cynthia decided to take a teaching job. Not “really goal oriented” at the time, she thanks God for “the good things that ...

Put Yourself in the Picture: Synod 2013: Story IV: God at Work

Put Yourself in the Picture: Synod 2013 Why do UCCers gather together every two years, traveling long distances to plunge headlong into the intensity and immensity of a General Synod? Why should YOU attend? What’s in it for YOU? Gregg Brekke, Editor of the United Church News, summed his “why” up succinctly when writing of his very first Synod in 2009. “We seek an experience of God’s peace – through worship, renewed connections, new relationships and an immersion into our identity as people of the UCC.” The editors of Connecting Voices recently asked a number of past attendees (delegates and visitors, clergy and laypeople alike) about their “whys” and their Synod experiences – what “coming together” meant to them. Their responses will be presented in a series of mini-articles over the next few months. We hope that, stirred to “go and do likewise,” YOU will join us at Synod 29 in Long Beach, CA. God at Work: Synod Story IV by Rachel Chapman, Christian Fellowship Congregational Church, UCC, San Diego, CA Q. Where did you see God at work? A. I was a nervous wreck…excited but nervous to be attending Synod for the first time. Although I was attending as a visitor, I had a ...

Meet Jeanne Halverson, Summer Camp Director, Pilgrim Pines 2012

by Reverend Heather Miner In February, Jeanne Halverson agreed to serve as Summer Camp Director for Pilgrim Pines 2012. “It’s a different world up there. Kindness is cooler than macho-ness, and benevolence gets you more friends than trickery. I found out that I must have more than a little good in me, because I was a very popular guy. It is easy to be kind at camp. Honesty is common practice, trust is as easily accepted as given, and even KP is taken with a smile.” Jeff Gaskill Jeanne Halverson’s reason for volunteering to be this year’s Summer Camp Director is that young people like Jeff see themselves in a mirror unlike any other: a mirror which reflects back what is good and holy about them. Jeanne takes it as her “personal conceit” that heaven is found here and now. She writes, “I am walking on Holy Ground and everyone I meet is a kindred Citizen of the Realm.” She continues by saying, “There are rules. In heaven, I am required to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly knowing that God loves each of us equally and uniquely.” Jeanne has been a mainstay of camp since 1985 when her daughter, now ...

Who Made Your TV? Reflections on Tijuana

By Adam McLane San Diego friends Adam McLane and Dave Palmer recently joined Centro Romero Director Carlos Correa and Pastor Alfredo Gomez for a short trek into Tijuana to get an overview of the work and ministry of Centro Romero and Mexican groups which partner with the Center. Adam’s reflections about the trip follow. “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”1 Seeing these words painted in protest on the newly built, hugely fortified border fence in Playas de Tijuana, was eye-opening. What happened to us? How did we get to this place? And where is the America of Ellis Island? Here’s what we know. The American society we all enjoy is built on the backs of cheap labor. While we complain about expensive gas we enjoy cheap foods picked by nameless, faceless, undocumented people throughout our country. And that’s just the people who likely went in debt $5,000 to cross our monster border. We so easily forget about the hundreds of thousands of hands that manufacture goods in Tijuana. Two weeks ago, I spent $230 on a new ...

What in the World are You Doing?

Dear Friends, Please share with the Global Ministries Committee you’re global outreach to the world by filling in the Questionnaire “What in the World are You Doing And Where?!” This information will be shared with the Conference/Region to encourage all congregations as they live out the gospel. Thanks for your help!! Faithfully, Mike and Larry Global Ministries Committee

Come, Let Us Reason Together

Thursday, May 10, 2012 4:00 PM - Four Simultaneuous Teach-Ins on Four Topics 5:00 PM - Meet and Greet Time with Light Refreshments 6:00 PM - Main Presentation with Prof. Alexander Come, Let Us Reason Together: Faith Communities Confronting California’s Criminal In-Justice System featuring New Jim Crow author/activist Michelle Alexander at the New Philadelphia AME Church 19100 South Susana Road Rancho Dominguez, CA 90221 presented by This event is free and open to the public but you must register. Register online at www.cafaithaction.org/alexander Or register by email at admin@cafaithaction.org Or by telephone at (213) 625-0149

Interfaith Youth Leadership Initiative

Interfaith Youth Leadership Initiative Preparing Youth for the 21st Century Save the Date! University of Southern California June 18-20 A three-day summer program in leadership development training and interfaith engagement for High School students of all faith backgrounds. For more information, contact New Vision Partners

UCC History, Theology & Polity Class (non-degree)

The Southern California Nevada Conference will offering a UCC History, Theology & Polity course online. This will be a 16 week course (with breaks). The first and last sessions will be held at the Conference office; the other sessions will be online. The course will be taught by Rev. Dave Pomeroy, Rev. David Alicea and Mr. Keith Clark. The total cost for this course will be $450.00, plus the cost of books. Register here http://www.signmeup.com/83137 or call the Conference Office at (626) 798-8082 for more information. Registration is limited, so register early! Registration Deadline: May 21, 2012 Register Online here: http://www.signmeup.com/83137

ACTIVITIES & EVENTS

“…A Lot of Singin’ to Do” – Pacific Men’s Chorale in Concert

Pacific Men’s Chorale in concert at the United Church of Christ of La Mesa (UCCLM) Friday, May 18.

“Rising Above Bullying…” An Interactive Forum Hosted by the Youth of UCCLM

What is bullying? Why does it happen? Has it happened to you? On Sunday, May 27, 2012 the Youth of UCCLM will host “Rising Above Bullying…,” an interactive forum featuring open dialogue, role-playing and video clips.

UCC Musicians National Network Conference

The United Church of Christ Musicians National Network (UCCMNN) will be holding their 2012 biennial conference “Renew, Refresh, Re-imagine” from June 22-25, 2012

Share 2012 Revolution; Living Into New Versions of Church

Share 2012 will be five days of fellowship, networking, service, learning, and worship, looking for spirit-filled and progressive change in the face of all the forces standing in the way of faithfulness to God and authentic Christian community.

Clergy Engagement in Suicide Intervention and Aftercare

One of the most challenging clergy care situations is suicide. Please consider participating in a study on Clergy Engagement with Suicide Intervention and Aftercare, and, in appreciation, get a gift card. You don’t need to have engaged the issue of suicide to participate.

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ECUMENICAL & INTERRELIGIOUS

commUNITY WALKaTHON

Join the commUNITY Walk-A-Thon to aid the homeless and poor in Orange County on Sunday, September 30, 2012

Ecumenical and Interfaith News – April

The latest Ecumentical and Interfaith news brought to you by the joint Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations Committee of the Pacific Southwest Region, Disciples of Christ, and the Southern California Nevada Conference, United Church of Christ.

Morrow McCombs Lecture

First Congregational Church, San Bernardino hosts the 25th Annual Morrow-McCombs Memorial Lecture, an annual lectureship established at California State University to promote Jewish-Islamic relations.

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OUTDOOR MINISTRIES