February 24 - March 8, 2008
Cover Story

DEDICATING THE NEW SIMKINS HALL IN THE SHELBY CENTER

Photos by Allan Walker.

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GRANT HAGIYA CELEBRATION
Saturday, February 23 @ 4 pm
The Los Angeles District Superintendency Committee invites you to join the LA District churches, ministries and friends as we celebrate the eight years of leadership and vision of Rev. Dr. Grant Hagiya. We also celebrate the achievements and salute the success of the great Los Angeles District. Come and enjoy an afternoon of entertainment, hors d’oeuvres, fun and fellowship from 4 - 7 pm in Simkins Hall.

CONVERSATION WITH TOM ALBIN
Sunday, February 24 @ 11:30 am
Join Rev. Farris for a conversation with Rev. Dr. Thomas Albin, Dean of The Upper Room Chapel. All are invited to this potluck lunch in the Fireside Room. Upper Room materials will be available.

GOSPEL BLUEGRASS & ROOTS
Sunday, February 24 @ 7 pm
The Gospel Bluegrass and Roots Music Group will meet Sunday, February 24, in the Fireside Room at 7 pm. All are welcome to
bring their favorite songs, their voices, acoustic instruments, or just come to listen.

REV FARRIS BOOK STUDY & POTLUCK - MARCH
Sunday, March 2 @ 12 noon
The Rev. Farris Book Study originally planned for February 24 has been rescheduled for Sunday, March 2, at 12 noon in the Fireside Room with a potluck lunch. The book The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s final Days in Jerusalem by Marcus J. Borg and John Dominic Crossan is available for sale in the church library.

HABITAT BENEFIT CONCERT
Sunday, March 2 @ 4 pm
A benefit concert for the Santa Monica Habitat for Humanity Build will be held at First Presbyterian Church on Sunday, March 2, at 4 pm. On the program will be Gabrielle Faure’s Requiem and Erich Zeisl’s Hebrew Requiem performed by the Santa Monica Interfaith Habitat Choir. The suggested donation per person is $25.

SENDING OUR OWN ON VIETNAM MEDICAL MISSION
The Good Samaritan Medical-Dental Ministries started out as a project of the Vietnamese United Methodist Youth and Young Adult Fellowship in 1999. Today it is the biggest medical mission in Vietnam with 2 annual trips with over 120 medical-dental volunteers. Our Health Ministry Nurse Mary Jo and Dr. John Dalton participated in one of these trips a few years ago.

The Good Samaritan Medical Center is a project currently in the development phases, planned for Nha Trang, Vietnam, and sponsored by the Good Samaritan Medical Ministry. The building will be approximately 2500 square meters and will include a Primary Care Center and Family Medical Office, a Specialty Care Unit, a Surgery Center and a Dental Center. A pharmacy will also be provided on site to fill patient prescriptions. Because the facility will be associated with a nearby medical school, a lecture room for up to twenty students will be provided, connected to the Surgery Center. Housing for visiting physicians and nurses, patients and their families will be adjacent to the facility, complete with community room, kitchen and laundry facilities. The Center will be located on grounds that are gracious and lushly planted with gardens, allowing public spaces for patients and their families to wait comfortably before entering the clinic.

Our members Todd and Sherry Erlandson are the architects and designers for the Center. Todd will be going to Vietnam with the next Good Samaritan Medical Mission on February 25 - March 9 as a team member as well as architectural consultant with Dr. Vien Doan who has been helping to realize the vision for this new medical facility for nearly 5 years. Todd’s trip is being sponsored by the FUMC Missions Council and Health Ministry Council. We will commission Todd during worship on Sunday, February 24 at the 9 am service.

ONE GREAT HOUR OF SHARING - MARCH 2
Gifts to this offering underwrite UMCOR's "costs of doing business." This helps UMCOR keep their promise that 100 percent of every other gift you make to a specific UMCOR project can be spent on that project - not on home office costs.

UMCOR is a good steward of God's gifts. Offering gifts over and above those used to cover administrative costs are channeled where they're most needed. UMCOR's specialized ministries - responding in disaster, fighting hunger, alleviating poverty, providing relief supplies around the world, and offering hospitality to immigrants and refugees - all assist the most vulnerable people whose need is greatest.

EARLY MEMORY LOSS: A TOWN HALL MEETING
On Saturday, March 15, the Alzheimer’s Association will be offering a Town Hall Meeting on The Emerging Voice of Early Memory Loss in Simkins Hall. Make your voice heard. Connect with others who are coping with early memory loss; discuss the issues that matter most to you; and help the Alzheimer’s Association learn how to best serve the growing numbers of people living with early memory loss. Those who might be interested are:

• People with early memory loss, mild cognitive impairment (MCI), early stage Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias.

• Care partners and family members.

• Those interested in learning more about early memory loss.

A panel will address your issues, featuring a clinician, a physician and a person with early memory loss. Check-in will begin at 8:30 am including Continental Breakfast and the program will conclude at 12 noon. Seating is limited and there will be no on-site registration. Register by March 7! A nominal fee of $10 is charged for persons with early memory loss, their family members or friends, or $25 for professionals. Registration forms are available in the church office. For more information give the office a call.

2008 LAY SPEAKERS SCHOOL (Please note the bolded date correction.)
Are you interested in Lay Speaking? A Lay Speakers School will be held at Culver-Palms United Methodist Church on the following Mondays - April 7, 14, 21, 28, and May 5, 2008. Devotions will be held at 6:30 pm and class will be held from 7:10 - 9:10 pm each evening. The Basic Class is being offered for adults in English, Spanish, Japanese (possible different location) and a Basic Class for Youth is being offered as well. Advanced Classes will include: Lay Speakers Tell Stories (youth class), Lay Speakers Are Accountable Disciples, Lay Speakers Cultivate Christian Community, Lay Speakers Grow Spiritually Through Daily Discipline, and A Ministry of Caring. If you are interested or would like more information, contact Culver-Palms UMC at (310) 390-7717 or info@hope4la.org.

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“To live in today's world as a faithful
person is enough of a discipline. There is no need to take on more.”
—former Episcopal Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold on the observance of Lent

Upon first reading, this quote gave me a chuckle. It felt like a sneaky way out of various practices I’d taken on for Lent that aren’t much fun. Oh good, I thought. Even a bishop says “enough is enough!”

I suppose I’ve never been much of an ascetic-type Christian. Fasting just gives me a royal headache rather than any true spiritual insight. Set times for prayer cause me to rebel. Any list of “thou shalts” and “thou shalt nots” sets me to devising ways around them. I suppose I could blame all that on my red hair and Scotch-Irish stubborn genes. Or more likely, as Wesley would note, I am too lazy in my faith.

What to make of this, then? “To live in today's world as a
faithful person is enough of a discipline. There is no need to take on more.” I thought about how valuable it has been to work my way through our marvelous Lenten Devotional for 2008 in which so many of you have written. I thought about the
invitation of the “Carbon Fast” proposed by the Anglican bishops of London and Liverpool as a way of reducing our gluttonous over-
consumption of the earth’s resources in the hope of becoming more
faithful stewards. Isn’t there value in all that? Isn’t there ancient
wisdom in the church’s practice of inviting the faithful into this Lenten time of the renewal of our faith?

Of course. It finally hit me that Bishop Griswold is pointing not towards an easier forty-day path, but towards a much harder life-long commitment. To the extent to which we strive to be as faithful as we can, day in and day out, there is no need to take on more. The point is not to do something extraordinary for forty days, until it’s finally Easter and over, but to totally
transform the totality of our lives as evermore faithful disciples of the
crucified and risen Lord.

Wesley spoke of all this in terms of “adventuring ourselves with Christ.” He said: “Christ offers. If you will venture with him, he will bring you home, and he will bring you to God.”

And so may this Lenten time, holy and blessed, be not an end in-and-of itself, but a new chapter in our life-long adventure with Christ. Christ offers. And there is no end to the potential and the possibilities of the journey.

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CONDOLENCES
We extend our deepest sympathies to the families and friends of these dearly departed:
-Joe Williams who died on February 11.
-Phoebe Jensen who died on February 3.
-Marlys Fisk (mother of Diana Coulter).

THANK YOU
The family of Winifred Lewis gives thanks for the outpouring of loving concern expressed by so many friends at the time of her recent death. The inspirational service in celebration of Winifred’s life led by the Reverend Dorothy Worley will forever be cherished. Special thanks to the ministers, the staff and the United Methodist Women.

BAPTISMS
We congratulate Kim and Matt Crawford, siblings Emma and Megan, grandparents Dorothy and Gale Williams and Mary and Dick Crawford on the baptism of Ethan Matthew Crawford on February 10.

ROTARY RECOGNITION
At the recent meeting of the Santa Monica Rotary Club, past club presidents were honored. Five who were present are FUMC members: Paul Leoni, Lionel Ruhman, Dee Menzies, Herb Roney and Kent Colberg. We are so proud of the leadership our congregation provides to our community!

MEMBER UPDATE
Christina (Wedberg) Zittle has moved to Corvallis, Oregon with her husband, Michael and daughter, Vivian, age 2. They are now members of the Corvallis First United Methodist Church where Vivian was baptized. Christina is the granddaughter of former Head Usher Fred Wedberg and Vivian Wedberg who ran the Nursery. Her father, John Wedberg, served on the church Finance Committee for many years and now lives in Bishop, California, where he and wife Trish are members of Bishop UMC.

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