connections

February 2008 • Vol. 11 Issue 2

Alliance of Baptists • 1328 16th Street NW • Washington, DC 20036www.allianceofbaptists.org • 202.745.7609 • 866.745.7609

A clear voice for Christian freedom, distinctively Baptist and intentionally ecumenical in an interfaith world.

Alliance member Jann Aldredge-Clanton has teamed with Larry E. Schultz, minister of music at Alliance-affiliated Pullen

Memorial Baptist Church in Raleigh, NC, to put together a CD collection of inclusive hymns. The selections are from Inclu-

sive Hymns for Liberating Christians and are performed by members of Pullen.

“We created this CD to provide another worship re-source that supports the inclusive theology of Alliance

churches and others,” said Jann, an Alliance-endorsed chaplain at Baylor University Medical Center, Dallas,

TX. “So many people tell me how hard it is to find music with inclusive divine imagery, especially music

that balances biblical feminine and masculine divine names. We have created music for children, youth

and adults with this balanced imagery so that the gospel values of equality and liberation are realized.” “In 2001 I was at the Alliance convocation when Jann gave

the covenant address,” Larry said. “In her address and through the singing of her hymns, Jann encouraged the use of expanded and

inclusive images of God in worship. Although we didn’t personally meet at that event, her address and hymns inspired and remained with

me.”Larry later contacted Jann and then began their efforts at collaboration.

“When Choristers Guild asked me to compose a children’s musical for their catalog, I immediately thought of Jann’s Alliance convocation address and

asked her to create with me Imagine God! A Children’s Musical Exploring and Expressing Images of God,” Larry said. “Jann then asked me to join in the creation of the hymnal, Inclusive

Hymns for Liberating Christians. Amazingly, Jann has written more than 100 texts which are included in this collection. I provided several texts

and also some new tunes for Jann’s hymns.” Twenty selections from the Inclusive Hymns for Liberating Christians

were recorded in September 2007 by Pullen’s congregation, choirs and orchestra. The CD helps to teach the new tunes and demonstrate ways

in which the hymns may be voiced in worship. The hymnal and CD provide resources for worship which include a

wide variety of biblical divine names and images, inspire justice and peacemaking, and empower women, men and children of all races to

become all they are created to be in the divine image, Jann said.

The CD can be used with the hymnal or

separately for individual inspiration, in groups,

and in congregations. The CD includes hymns to

familiar tunes and hymns set to vibrant, new tunes by Larry.

Prayer and worship groups can use the CD as meditation music

and/or to sing along with the hymns.

A CD of hymnsResource supports inclusive theology of Alliance

CD: Selections from Inclusive Hymns for Liberating Christiansby Jann Aldredge-Clanton with composer Larry E. Schultz.Performed by the congregation, choirs and orchestra of Pullen Memorial Baptist Church, Raleigh, NC.

Jann Aldredge-Clanton of Dallas, TX, with composer Larry E.

Schultz of Raleigh, NC.

The hymnal is available for $21.95 from the Alliance Store accessed from our website. The CD will be available soon.

PICO brings people of faith together to strengthen families and revitalize communities. Since 1972 PICO has successfully worked to increase access to health care, improve public schools, make neighborhoods safer, build affordable housing, redevelop communities and revitalize democracy.

Alliance board member Michael-Ray Mathews has joined the staff of PICO National Network as director of outreach and recruitment. He had been pastor of Grace Baptist Church in San José, CA, for eight years.

At PICO, Michael-Ray will work full-time in the area of social justice. “Some of you have known of my work in the area of faith-based community organizing over the past 10 years. In west Oakland, and later in downtown San José, I participated as a clergy leader in the efforts of PICO affiliates to affect change in local communities,” he said. “In recent years, that leadership has included PICO’s

national campaign to address the crisis of uninsured children in our nation, and the local efforts of Grace Church and PICO’s San José affiliate to advocate for the dignity of those who live with a mental illness.”

In his new position, Michael-Ray will be responsible for establishing relation-ships with institutions and communities from which prospective community organizers will come. “This work will place a special emphasis on the recruitment of organizers of color,” he said. “My work will also include the development of clergy leaders engaged in community organizing, which is the primary focus of my doctoral dissertation project.”

Email Michael-Ray: mrmathews@pacbell.netLearn more about PICO: www.piconetwork.org

A new Alliance connection:

Board member joins PICO staff

Asheville nurse protests Guantánamo

Tim Nolan, a nurse practitioner and member of Alliance-affiliated Circle of Mercy Congregation in Asheville, NC, participated in a Jan. 11 protest of Guantánamo, the U.S. Navy prison on Cuba’s southeastern coast where some 275 suspected terrorists are housed. The protest, co-sponsored by more than 100 organizations, including Am-nesty International and the Religious Coalition Against Torture, came on the sixth anniversary of the first enemy combatants to be held at the Guan-tánamo facility.

For more information about Witness Against Torture, see its website: www.witnesstorture.org.

Year-end finances: A success and a challengeThanks to a terrific end-of-year response, gifts to the 2007 Bridges of Hope

Mission Offering totaled $127,009.58. The goal was $125,000. This means that all mission partners for 2007 can be fully funded. The $2,009.58 above the goal will go into the 2008 offering fund so we’re off to a good start in reaching the $131,000 goal for 2008.

In the operating budget, we ended the year with $361,323 (unaudited), signifi-cantly below our budget of $453,618. So, the challenge is before us to do more to

reach our operating budget of $511,686 in 2008.

Our partner — Baptist Youth Camp — gave its 2007 offering to Bridges of Hope. Before 2007, the BYC offering had traditionally been given for either mission/ministry efforts that were local to the meeting place, and/or with which BYC participants had some direct involvement or knowledge.

“In 2007 we made a decision that henceforth the offering would be made to Bridges of Hope, and that we would highlight (but not designate) one of the recipients at camp,” said the camp’s director, John Kent from Covenant Baptist Church, Cleveland, GA. “Last summer we chose the Alliance work with the Fraternidad de Iglesias Bautistas de Cuba to highlight, primarily because we had several of our BYC participants from Pullen Memorial who would be leaving the next week to work with their partner congregation in Cuba. Several BYC participants who had already been to Cuba shared during our worship time, along with several who were looking forward to the experience for the first time.”

The decision on which Alliance mission partner to focus on for the 2008 camp has not been made.

Gift from BAptist Youth CAmp helped Boh offerinG

One of the 130 participants at the 2007 Baptist youth Camp who gave $520 to support Alli-ance missions.

Call for artists We need artists to display their

work at the convocation in a visual arts show Friday night through Sunday afternoon. All media are welcome, including photography, painting, mixed-media, and sculpture. If you would like to offer your art for sale, the percentage will be 50% to the artist and 50% to Bridges of Hope Mission Of-fering. Submission deadline and space reservation is March 20. Contact Lara Meier Arp, art@citygallerydallas.org.

The AlliAnce of BApTisTs sTore is now open. If you are in search of books, music or other resources for your ministry or your spiritual growth, check out the new store at allianceofbaptists.org. A portion of everything purchased through the store supports the ongoing mission and ministry of the Alliance. And if there’s something you would like to see in the store, please contact Chris Copeland.

I feel called to speak the truth in love. I have not always been good at speaking truth nor do I always do

it well, but I’ve learned over the years that speaking truth in love is ultimately liberating for me and often freeing for those around me.

So, here’s one of my truths. i Am noT drAwn To church. AT All.

There was a time when everything in my life revolved around church – fel-lowship, community, service, spiritual growth, and even vocation. For seven years I served as associate pastor of an Alliance congregation and had a wonderful experience. That’s not to say that I didn’t struggle because I did. But in the course of my tenure at Oakhurst Baptist Church, I grew and learned and was changed in beautiful and profound ways for which I will always be grateful.

When I ended my ministry at Oakhurst in the spring of 2006, I decided to take a sab-batical from church consid-ering that the longest time I had ever been away from church in my entire life was about eight weeks. I trusted that when I was ready, I would be drawn back to the church to give and receive love and grow more deeply in my faith.

But that hasn’t happened.A few of my close friends have sug-

gested that my lack of draw to church probably has to do with the fact that I worked in a church system and that my desires would shift given time. That may be so, but there’s more to it than that. What I know is that I long to be a part of church that centers in relationships, embodies authentic experiences of God at its core, and is marked by the natural flow of justice and compassion. What I don’t long for is to spend any more time or energy maintaining another institu-tion.

As I have talked with Alliance people around the country, I have heard some resonance with my struggle. Some have named this disconnect from church in its current form as a generational issue. I suspect that is part of the story but not

a complete picture. I think many of us of all ages are tired, stressed out, and frustrated with “doing” church.

Reading Barbara Brown Taylor’s book, Leaving Church, gave me great comfort as I reflected upon the ways she was surprised to find God outside the church – not because she thought

God couldn’t be outside the church, but because she had never been outside the church long enough to experience God there. I recognize that the places that I have found my church over the last 18 months have not been in church build-ings. Communing with compassionate

and gifted people in coffee shops, yoga studios, a film festival, and cooking classes has been nothing less than the manifestation of the Spirit.

You may be curious, frus-trated, or even offended to dis-cover that as your Minister for Leadership & Congregational Life I am not drawn to church.

Truthfully, this has been a hard truth to claim for myself, and somewhat of a risk to name to you.

Here’s another of my truths. i love The church wiTh All of who i Am.

This became clear to me as I at-tended a conference in December at Harvard Divinity School titled “Finding

Our Way,” led by Marcus Borg, Brian McLaren, and Diana Butler Bass. Over the course of two days, I was inspired not only by their words and their wis-dom, but by their deep commitment to the gospel of Jesus Christ as expressed in the Church.

To be clear, they all say that the church in its current form is dying and must die. This is so that it may be reborn into a movement marked by tra-ditional and authentic spiritual practic-es; the freedom to be our full selves as God created us to be without judgment or shame; justice for all of creation,

particularly for those on the margins; a recognition and celebration of abun-dance, that we already have all that we need; and an unbounded expression of kindness and compassion.

The other way that I was moved by the conference was that I was among a gathering of 300 people who desperately love the church and long for it to be a place that is alive and vital. And I knew I was one of them.

In my many travels and meetings with folks from all kinds of denominational bodies, I have a clear sense that the Alliance is poised like few other groups of churches and individuals to encour-age, support, and nurture this emerging church about which Borg, McLaren, and Bass speak. To quote Kester Brewin in Signs of Emergence, we have the free-dom and gifts to help create a church that is “organic, networked, decentral-ized, bottom-up, communal, flexible, and always evolving.”

I have particularly witnessed these signs of emergence in one of our dy-namic Alliance congregations, City-Church in Dallas, Texas (citychurch-dallas.org), and in one of our new mission partner churches for 2008, the Dogwood Abbey in Winston-Salem, NC. (dogwoodabbey.squarespace.com/). This movement of re-visioning, re-imagining, and re-creating what it means to be church gives me great hope for the church and for this Alliance of Baptists.

I have one last truth to share. i hope The dAy will soon come when i Am drAwn BAck To church AgAin.

by chris copeland

on the churchp e r s p e c t i v e s

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February 2008

Chris Copeland Minister for Leadership & Congregational Lifechris@allianceofbaptists.org

Stan Hastey Minister for Mission & Ecumenism shastey@allianceofbaptists.org

Mary Pawlowski Office Administratormary@allianceofbaptists.org

Phone: 202.745.7609 • Toll-free: 866.745.7609Fax: 202.745.0023www.allianceofbaptists.org

Sue Poss Communications Consultanteditor@allianceofbaptists.org864.469.0779

Alliance of baptists1328 16th Street NWWashington, DC 20036

By Lynn Hyder, COnvOCATiOn CO-CHAirI am excited about our convocation being in

New Orleans for so many reasons. The Alliance gives such a different view of Baptist life. For me, it is an accurate view of Baptist life. Where else could we experience the theme for this year in a more tangible way than in New Orleans? The communion of art and faith is evident all over the city in everyday life, and our call to create is the active involvement the Alliance enbodies for me.

I am serving as co-chair to try to create those events that have been so meaningful for me at previous convocations for those of you who will

attend this year’s convocation. Making connections between our theme, our

anticipated experience, and local artists and per-sonalities is critical. Having that local connec-tion will help our task group tremendously.

I have throroughly enjoyed working with the board during this time. PLUS, working with co-chair D.H. Clark has been the joy of this experi-ence. He is so calm and always thinks things through.

Won’t you join D.H. and me, and other Al-liance members as we are “called to create” in New Olreans?

march 28-30St. Charles Avenue Baptist Church • New Orleansregister online at www.allianceofbaptists.org/convocation2008.htmlOr call the office and ask that a brochure be sent to you.

Co-chair D.H. Clark will be featured in the March issue of connections.

meet ConvoCAtion Co-ChAir lYnn hYder: Lynn is a staff chaplain with the new Orleans Police department and serves part-time as pastor of St. Paul’s United Church of Christ. She is endorsed by the Alliance and is a board certified chaplain through the Association of Professional Chaplains. Lynn became interested in the Alliance while studying at Baptist Theological Seminary at richmond and became a member in 2000. She has served on the staff of two Alliance churches — Williams-burg Baptist Church in Williamsburg, vA (1999-2000), and riverside Baptist Church in Jacksonville, FL (2001-2003). She attends the convocation every year.

The 2008 convocation