Outreach and Mission     •    Racial/Ethnic Empowerment Committee

Fall 2005 grants awarded to racial/ethnic 
empowerment and racial reconciliation programs

September 2005

On the recommendation of its Racial/Ethnic Empowerment Committee (REEC), the Ohio Conference Board of Directors awarded four grants at its September meeting.   

1.  Cross Creek Community Church Intensive Weekend - $4,000

Cross Creek Community Church, Centerville, Ohio
Rev. Dr. Michael D. Castle, Pastor
http://crosscreekchurch.org 

Cross Creek's area of concern is the justice issue of race, power and privilege in our country, our community and in our churches. Dayton, like many other cities, is racially segregated geographically, culturally and economically. Cross Creek is a suburban, predominantly Euro-American congregation, but they are committed to addressing issues of race in a concrete way. A survey of the congregation's priorities identified racial reconciliation as a fourth choice out of nineteen. 

Cross Creek is entering a partnership with College Hill Presbyterian Church (www.collegehillchurch.com), a predominantly African-American church within the city of Dayton. The pastor of College Hill is Rev. Robert E. Jones, a UCC minister with full standing on loan to the Presbyterian Church. The churches hope to co-sponsor a speaking engagement by a prominent African-American theologian for their congregations and the greater Dayton community.

Twice a year, spring and fall, Cross Creek Church offers to their congregation and to the community Weekend Intensives where nationally known speakers make a presentation and speak at worship services.  Some past speakers have been John Dominic Crossan, Susan Thistletwaite, Yvonne Delk and Marcus Borg.

The grant from REEC will be used for expenses for the Intensive Weekend. The church is hoping to engage the Rev. Michael Eric Dyson, Professor of African American and Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, as the Intensive speaker. They hope to schedule the weekend in Spring or Fall, 2006.

Attendees at past Intensives have absorbed the expenses by paying significant ticket costs.  For this Intensive Weekend on issues of race co-sponsored with College Hill, the REEC grant will enable the congregations to minimize expenses for participants and hold the Intensive in a larger venue for greater community attendance.

2.  Mentoring Youth-at-Risk: A Training Program for Communities of Faith - $7,500 

Justice and Witness Ministries, United Church of Christ
Rev. Sala Nolan, Minister for Criminal Justice and Human Rights and Project Manager

In 2003, U.S. law enforcement agencies made an estimated 2.2 million arrests of persons under the age of 18.  According to the FBI, juveniles accounted for 16% of all arrests, and for 15% of all violent crime arrests, in 2003.  Many of the youth who are adjudicated face residential imprisonment.  Their numbers are approaching 150,000 in juvenile facilities; a fast-growing additional population consists of youths sentenced to incarceration with adults.  What is less well known is the extent to which the well-being of our youth is threatened by other aspects of crime and the justice system.  Children are the most likely of all U.S. residents to be the victims of violent crimes, generally by people they know and trust.  In addition, an enormous and growing number of children are victimized by the extended imprisonment of their parents who, when released from prison, will be hampered by policies that will keep them, and their children, in chaos and poverty. 

Minority youth and the poor are at particular risk of endangerment, because of the disproportionate imprisonment of African American and Hispanic parents, and because the burgeoning number of prisoners of the past decade are now being released, returning often to poor and minority communities without training, housing, or other means of support.  The racial and ethnic inequities so evident in adult prison populations are mirrored in the young.  

This project will develop a curriculum to be used by UCC churches to engage in mentoring projects with adjudicated youth who are leaving the criminal justice system, and with youth whose parents have been incarcerated.  Initially, churches from Ohio who commit to participating in mentoring activities will identify volunteers to attend a training conference in Cleveland.  This “train the trainer” meeting will use a curriculum designed by this project, and will engage project volunteers with established UCC leaders who are currently working with communities across the country to establish faith-based prisoner re-entry programs for adults.

Trainees will meet extensively with members of the Cuyahoga County Department of Justice Affairs, Cleveland Metropolitan Schools, Youth Opportunities Unlimited (a workforce services group providing training to adjudicated youth), and the Educational Development Center, Inc. (an international non-profit organization that develops career training programs for at-risk youth).  Members of these cooperating organizations will assist in identifying potential youth for the project start-up.

As trainees return to their church communities and begin the mentoring and community re-entry for youth programs, they will be asked to guide their faith communities in this process, creating a wider mentoring network and community support base for participating young people.  They will be supported in this effort by continual online information and connection with trainers from the UCC and Cleveland area justice and youth programs, and with each other.  Initial participants will be asked to return to Cleveland in the spring for a second conference to revise and improve the curriculum, and to train a new group of UCC volunteers for a next generation of mentoring through congregations.

3.  Director of Discipleship for Nu-Vizion Christian Fellowship, UCC - $10,000

Nu-Vizion Christian Fellowship UCC, Toledo
Mr. Will Stuart, Pastor

The Nu-Vizion Christian Fellowship of the United Church of Christ is a new church plant in a low-income, high-crime (and increasingly violent) multi-cultural urban center.  The ethic of the new church is to reach out to those traditionally underserved by the church and, more important, those lacking a relationship with Jesus Christ - targeting the unchurched, margially churched, disaffected churched and those among the fringes of society. 

Those participating in the services and programs currently being offered by Nu-Vizion reflect the diversity of its neighborhood and comprise the most diverse congregation in the Northwest Ohio Association. There are approximately 20-40 adults, 5 youth and 2 children of African, European and mixed descent.  Nearly all live at or below the poverty level. 

The peculiar and intense needs of such a population make their development into viable leaders within the church challenging.  It requires an interpersonal ministry that requires more time than the pastor is able to give.  With this grant funding, Nu-Vizion hopes to create a new ministry position to help meet the critical need to quickly and efficiently develop leaders within the congregation. 

After the initial year, no other funding is anticipated.  Within the year we hope the position will begin to "pay" for itself via the growth of the congregation.

4.  Yeshua-Do, The Way of the Shalom Priesthood - $10,000 

Trinity United Church of Christ, Columbus
Rev. Dr. Norman Moxley, pastor

In today’s world, the challenges before children are vast and in many cases insurmountable without help. According to 2001 figures, every day in America:

            (National Observance of Children’s Sabbaths 2001 p. 82)

Add this to the fact that the inner city black child has an absence of structure in his life (as middle class society defines structure). Thirty-seven percent of black children live with two parents, as compared with 77 percent of white children. In school, this lack of structure manifests itself in bad behavior and poor study habits. 

They do not understand the basic principle of our capitalist system and democratic society. Most of these children are reared by black women.  America, on the other hand, is run by white men. The white child is kept in check by his desire to share in his father’s wealth. As long as he adopts the values of his father, he receives the benefits a father can give. If he rebels against his father’s teachings, many of the material benefits that are given by his father are taken away until he conforms. 

The giving and taking away of things, which is based upon approval or disapproval, is the foundation of discipline in white America. White people tie their discipline to material rewards and require conformity that will maintain those rewards. 

Inner city blacks are conditioned differently. They generally don’t have much wealth. They do things for love, affection, and acceptance. Black women do not withhold their love, affection, and acceptance from their children regardless of what they do. Consequently, black children do not make the important connection between behavior and material rewards. (from Understanding and Educating African American Children – William L. Jenkins)

Add to this the challenges of racism and the tremendous economic disadvantage that comes from not living up to their education potential.  So, how do we address, intervene in, or transform this lifestyle from life taking to life giving?

Enter Yeshua-Do, The Way of the Shalom Priest. What is Yeshua-Do?

Yeshua – Hebrew pronunciation of the name Jesus

Yah – Yahweh (the Creator)
Hoshua – (the Savior)
Do – (way) or way of life.

The way of life of the Creator/Savior

Yeshua-Do is a marrying of Martial Arts, designed to develop the mind, body and spirit with Christian ways of living, that allow that developed mind, body and spirit to be filled with the Holy Spirit, so that these changed people might change people, and the world for Christ.

You also, like living stones, are being built up into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 1^st Peter 2:5. It believes that the world is changed, made better by its people becoming better.

These Shalom Priests are trained to be persons of righteousness and character, by altering their environmental external and internal influences to remove the lifestyle barriers so they like Jesus can grow ‘in wisdom and stature and favor with God and men.’ (St. Luke 2:51-51)

It is our intention to gather 12 to 14 of these inner city black youth, between the ages of 10 and 13, and involve/ immerse (as much as possible) them in Yeshua-Do, that they might become the core group and one day instructors and teachers of this way of life, changing their pieces of the world, much in some of the same ways that Jesus did in his earthly ministry.

This program meets the social need of shelter as it produces a hedge around its participants. It attempts to shelter them from the negative influences of their experienced reality until they are sufficiently grounded in Christ to live in the world -- but not be of the world. 

It incorporates elements of art, culture, and dance. This program also incorporates justice issues as it aids in creating people who can advocate for themselves and others; people who are able to increase the quality of their lives, and therefore have less need for healthcare; and people who are committed and enthusiastic about their education – all as a goal to moving toward their desired priesthood.

This program also serves as a tool of outreach as it reaches into the community and draws persons to Christ; calls its participants to discipleship; and helps Trinity UCC further develop into one that lives out its purpose statement, UNAVOIDABLY REVELATIONAL, and UNDENIABLY TRANSFORMATIONAL. 

This program is uniquely suited for Trinity’s ministry plan. Trinity’s Pastor, the program’s coordinator, has earned his Master of Divinity and Doctor of Ministry degrees. He also holds a 5^th degree Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do, and a 4^th degree Black Belt in Hapkido. He is a Master Instructor in both disciplines, and therefore suited to instruct participants in both the Christian and the Martial Art facets of the Yeshua-Do program. 

Applications for the next round of REEC grants are due February 15 for funding in March. All applications must be accompanied by a full budget, noting income from all sources, including in-kind contributions and any other contributions from the congregation applying for the grant. 

Funding for the grants comes from the portion of the Neighbors in Need offering retained by the Ohio Conference and designated for the Racial/Ethnic Empowerment Committee.  Please limit the initial grant request to $5,000 or less.

For information about the Racial/Ethnic Empowerment Committee and/or an application, contact committee chair Kim Martin Sadler, 3692 Rawnsdale Road, Shaker Heights, Ohio 44122, (office) 216-736-3756 or ksadler@thepilgrimpress.com.
  

Questions or information about the Racial/Ethnic Empowerment Committee,
 or for a grant application, contact Kim Martin Sadler, Chair
216-736-3756 or ksadler@thepilgrimpress.com

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