My father wasn’t a religious man yet near the end of his life, he began to explore the possibilities of eternal life particularly the notion that, if heaven existed, would he go there since as he said one night in the stillness of his hospital room “I wouldn’t want your mother to get there to find I wasn’t there to take care of her.”   In this poignant moment, I understand more completely than ever the love that existed between my parents.  My mother was by no means a frail woman; in her youth she drove trucks and school buses—at age 67 she finally retired from her factory job as a forklift driver.  My father’s care for her did not include any silly notion that she wasn’t a capable woman who would be left helpless by his absence; rather it was a notion that they had forged a partnership throughout their lifetime which was based on mutuality—a covenant that was shaped by facing the joys and disappointments of life—together.

     Covenant is a word that gets used—a lot—in the UCC; we are a covenant people even as we are autonomous within that covenant.  As members of a local congregation, we covenant to worship together—to do ministry together---to be there for one another in our joys and in our sorrows.  Local congregations express their covenant with their associations by attending meetings, providing financial support and providing leadership for its committees.  Associations, for their part, offer leadership training and opportunities for fellowship and support as well as the important work of authorization for ministry, both of clergy and congregations.  Congregations and the Associations are bound in a covenant relationship with Conferences by providing leadership for the various Commissions and Councils and in their support of professional and support staff who provide leadership, guidance and staffing for the Conference and Association commissions, councils and committees.  Congregations, Associations and Conferences covenant with the National setting of the church—once again through financial support and the providing of volunteers for national boards while the National setting provides valuable resources designed to strengthen the local church and be the vehicle for global mission and ministry.  If this is beginning to look like a web of inter-relationships, then you are getting a good sense of what it means to be a part of the UCC!  It works when we understand mutuality; it works when we understand that it is our autonomy that gives us the right (and the responsibility) to choose to be in relationship one with another.

     As I have been traveling throughout the conference, I have been asking two questions: “what do you like/love about the New York Conference?” and “how could we be better covenantal partners with you?”   I would love to hear your answers; please feel free to e-mail me at ritaroot@uccny.org.   Your responses will be shared with the Executive Council as we move into a future guided by God’s Holy Spirit.