Author Archives: ECRD DistrictUWF

Committee on Nominations

NOMINATIONS ASPIRATIONS

Betty Spencer Dickey, Chair, Committee on Nominations

Summer and Fall are busy times for the Nomination committee. We are looking to engage others into sharing our excitement about United Methodist Women. There is so much change going on during this time. School is about to start, church we hope, is about to start in person again and there is new hope for good things in the new year.

We want to encourage you to share your ideas and hopes for UMW too as we have our Presidents zoom meetings in August to get a sense of what you have been doing during the Pandemic. We also want to encourage you to go outside your comfort zone and consider working with us on the District team. We learn new things everyday working with each other and from the Conference and National UMW. The opportunities are great for expanding your knowledge, experience, connections and spirituality. Is God sending you our way?

Many of us cannot physically go on mission trips because of our circumstances, but UMW is a mission. We can still participate in helping our local and District UMW to carry out the goal of being in mission to women, children and youth. We can do that from our own homes. We may be inviting you soon and hope you realize that serving on El Camino Real District UMW team may be the change and the chance you are looking for.

Prayers and Blessings,
Betty Spencer Dickey, Nominations Chair

Prayer Shawl Ministry at Campbell UMC

by Katherine Kim

I joined this knitting group from Campbell United Methodist Church just before the COVID pandemic started. Unfortunately, we were not able to meet in person for over a year. Now we meet at the church once a month, on the 4th Monday of the month. It is a blessing to be able to be part of this group!

One of the members, Laura Smith, told me about this wonderful ministry:

The Prayer Shawl Ministry at Campbell UMC was started by Cheryl Olsen as something fun to do during the summer, back at least 12-13 years ago.  She offered to teach non-knitters how to knit so I was on board.

We had a specific pattern so all Prayer Shawls were about the same shape and size. The yarn was washable Lions Brand because that made the shawls easy to care for and the yarn was readily available.

We had a small but enthusiastic group of knitters and beginners.  We met twice a month and were supposed to wrap things up the end of August that year.  That did not happen.  We overwhelmingly wanted to continue.

Our Prayer Shawls still today are blessed by the group, and are given to those in our congregation and beyond who need to feel God’s warmth surrounding them as they grieve, recover or just struggle with some of life’s hard times.  The recipients enjoyed getting them and we loved making them.

As a group, we have shared a lot and welcomed new members.  And like all close groups, we have mourned our losses as well.  We are back to monthly gatherings now that Covid restrictions have eased and I’m hopeful we’ll continue making Prayer Shawls for a long time.

Code Red for Humanity

Oil Refinery
International panel of climate scientists says temperatures will rise for decades, even in a best-case scenario

by Betty Spencer Dickey

There was a time when it was convenient to think about global warming and the destructive consequences it poses for life on Earth as a possible, but not necessarily probable, event happening in a distant future—a theoretical crisis that individuals could solve with simple measures, such as the change of a lightbulb. Those days are over according to Jonathan Hahn, the managing editor of Sierra Magazine*.

He says that “Governments’ stalled efforts to draw down greenhouse gas emissions—either because of a kind of muted trafficking in toothless pledges or due to right-wing political movements forcing delay, led by strident climate deniers like our former President and Jair Bolsonaro—now mean that an intensifying climate crisis is locked in for at least the next 30 years. That is the frightening takeaway from a major new United Nations report released on Monday Aug. 9, 2021.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report, the most authoritative summary of climate science in the world, shows that for the next generation, increasing heat waves and wildfires, hurricanes and floods, drought and sea level rise are now inevitable. And the consequences could be dire—potentially leading to millions of people displaced, thousands of lives lost, and billions in economic damage.

While the IPCC does not prescribe specific policies, the report makes clear that whatever measures governments decide to take, they must involve the rapid and immediate cessation of the burning of fossil fuels for energy. “This report must sound a death knell for coal and fossil fuels before they destroy our planet,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement released with the report, calling it a “code red for humanity. “There must be no new coal plants built after 2021. OECD countries must phase out existing coal by 2030, with all others following suit by 2040. Countries should also end all new fossil fuel exploration and production and shift fossil fuel subsidies into renewable energy. By 2030, solar and wind capacity should quadruple and renewable energy investments should triple to maintain a net zero trajectory by mid-century.”

For all of us that means that we need to write and call our congress people over and over and insist that they do the work that we need on the Infrastructure Bill and the other bills that will begin to ease the Climate Crisis. We have no choice. This earth depends on it.

*See article from Sierra Club here.

Treasurer’s Report, Q2 2021

Debbie Ow, Treasurer

Thanks to all the units who steadfastly support United Methodist Women through their pledges. This last quarter, we forwarded $7,916.50 in pledge money to our Conference UMW.

Our administrative account current has about $4,800, to be used for expenses for upcoming events such as Safe Havens 2.0 and Annual Celebration. These funds are planned in our annual budget, and are provided by Conference UMW when needed.

Watch for information about our 2022 administrative budget, which will be made available at least 6 weeks in advance of the Annual Celebration.

We also give thanks to Carolyn Bircher, who completed the audit of our treasury records for 2020. Two small corrections were required, to be incorporated in Q3.