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United Methodists hold church's first global deaf conference

Jul. 20, 2005

NOTE: Photographs are available at http://umns.umc.org.

By Erik Alsgaard*

BALTIMORE (UMNS) - An international gathering of deaf, hard-of-hearing
and late-deafened people drew more than 200 participants for the first
ever Global United Methodist Conference of the Deaf.

The July 14-17 event, hosted near Baltimore by the Northeastern
Jurisdiction of the United Methodist Congress of the Deaf, was the
culmination of years of hopes, dreams and plans. Mainly, it was about
missions.

"Our dream is to see the mission outreaches that we've all been in
contact with under one roof," said the Rev. Peggy Johnson, pastor of
Christ United Methodist Church of the Deaf in Baltimore, one of only
three deaf congregations in the denomination. "This is a conference
where people will tell what's happening in mission in their country" in
the deaf community, she said.

The Methodist family has a long history of sending missionaries outside
the United States to provide education and resources for deaf people. As
far back as the 1850s, Methodist missionaries were running schools for
the deaf in Korea.

One result of that work today is the Rev. Joo Hai Kang, an ordained
Presbyterian pastor serving four deaf communities and a deaf United
Methodist church in the Illinois Great Rivers Annual (regional)
Conference.

"I became deaf at the age of 2," he said, speaking through an
interpreter, "and I went to a deaf school in Korea." That school has its
roots in the 1850s Methodist missionaries.

Joo established a deaf church in 2001 and has formed two or three other
Bible study groups in southern Illinois. He said he serves four
different areas as a circuit-rider.

The conference, which used no less than six simultaneous sign-language
interpreters during sessions plus computer-assisted real time
translations, offered participants a chance to learn what deaf
communities in other countries are doing in mission and ministry.

"The Koreans, for example, are doing some really landmark kinds of
ministries with enormous numbers of ordained deaf pastors," Johnson
said. "So we hope to sit at their feet and learn how they do
evangelism."

In Zimbabwe, society is anti-deaf, said David Ennis, president of the
Northeastern Jurisdiction deaf organization, a co-leader of the
conference and member of Middletown United Methodist Church in
Frederick, Md.

"They don't have much of a ministry in Zimbabwe," Ennis said through an
interpreter, "but it's starting to get a Methodist ministry there and
helping them to be able to be established on their own."

Ennis traveled to Zimbabwe and Kenya in 2001, helping set up a deaf
ministry in Kenya and empowering the people there to support themselves.

Conference leaders highlighted a need for increased ministry and
leadership in the church's deaf community.

Joo said he prayed more deaf people would go into ministry. "Deaf people
feel more comfortable when they are around other deaf people; it creates
a culture."

Although the conference itself was not designed for local churches
wanting to learn how to do deaf ministry, the United Methodist Congress
of the Deaf is eager to serve as a resource.

"One of the goals of this body, from a national level on down, is to be
a resource for local churches that want to expand or enter into deaf or
hard-of-hearing ministry," said Michelle Menefee, a member of First
United Methodist Church in Houston and of the Congress of the Deaf's
national board. She served as one of many American Sign Language
interpreters during the conference.

"Deaf ministry is not just somebody signing the worship service on
Sunday morning," she said. "It needs to be every bit as comprehensive as
you would have children's or youth or any other type ministry."

Menefee told excitedly how her home church began a signing ministry
eight years ago for two or three people, only to have the ministry
expand to include hard-of-hearing adults and several autistic children.

"We ended up serving a much broader group of people without ever
realizing that was going to happen," she said. "What we didn't know
about was that God had a whole lot of other people there that we didn't
know about."

The rate of hearing loss in the United States is expanding at an
alarming rate, said Candis Shannon, member of First United Methodist
Church in Fairbanks, Alaska, and president of the Congress of the Deaf.
This is a growing group of people, she said, and a growing ministry for
the church.

"So many people go to church that are hard of hearing and they can't
understand," Shannon said. She noted that many, inexpensive
communication tools are available for local churches to help, from
assisted-listening devices to computer-assisted note taking and
projection.

Resources available to churches include:

"	"Signs of Solidarity: Ministries with People Who Are Deaf,
Late-Deafened, Hard of Hearing, and Deaf-Blind," published by the
National Committee on Ministries with Deaf, Late-Deafened, Hard of
Hearing and Deaf-Blind People, and the Health and Welfare Ministries
Unit of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries. Available for
$7 per copy from Service Center, 7820 Reading Road, Caller No. 1800,
Cincinnati, OH 45222-1800.
"	The Congress of the Deaf's Web site, www.umcd.org.
"	American Sign Language translations of The Faith We Sing and The
United Methodist Hymnal from the United Methodist Publishing House, at
(800) 672-1789 or www.cokesbury.com.

"Once you get past the communications technology, then you get to the
real issues, and that's communication between people," Shannon said.
"The real gifts that people have to give come to the fore."

For this group, that is what it's all about.

"We've been praying for Pentecost," said Menefee, talking about the
challenges of putting on a conference using many different sign
languages. "This conference has had all the makings of a Tower of Babel,
but we've been praying for Pentecost. It feels like maybe that's what
we're going to see."

*Alsgaard is managing editor of the UMConnection newspaper and
co-director of communications for the Baltimore-Washington Conference.

News media contact: Tim Tanton, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5470 or
newsdesk@umcom.org.

********************

United Methodist News Service
Photos and stories also available at:
http://umns.umc.org

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