Radiate. Initiate. Co-create!
- Image does not exists
My second United Methodist annual conference of the year was with the good folks of the California-Nevada conference and we had a wonderful time of radiating joy, initiating relationships outside our comfortable boundaries and reclaiming our belief in our inherent creativity so needed in building right relationships and a just society. This theme was a provocative one and rich fodder for creating worship for this conference.
This conference, which covers Northern California and Northern Nevada, is the most diverse conference in the United Methodist connection. One of my favorite moments of worship was the Great Thanksgiving with eight languages resonating throughout as we gathered around a round table in the midst of the body. It was truly the incarnation of “one body, many members” and was called “an ecstatic experience of inclusion and diversity” by the Commission on Religion and Race at the monitoring report the next day. Throughout the conference, the sounds of Taize met with sounds of Latin American folk music, woven with strong Fijian singing, accented with trumpet ringing out 19th century hymnody, and spiced with “Fill My Cup, Lord” in a jazzy swing feel.
Most importantly, these things weren’t just a “show and tell” parade of nations. It wasn’t what I call “smorgasbord” worship where we include a diversity of things simply to fulfill our duty to be “inclusive.” As a global church, worship planners have a dizzying array of repertoire to work with. And that’s a good thing. Rather than ask myself, “who do we need to include?” I ask, “what spirit, or energy, does this moment in our spiritual journey called worship require?” How blessed we are to be able to answer that question from a deep well of worship expression from around the globe.
As promised to the attendees of this conference, I am including the scripts of the worship for download here. You will find references to all the liturgy and music we used. Remember, you must have your own licenses and permissions to utilize the music found here in your place of worship. I pray many blessings on your continued work of “radiate! initiate! co-create!”