Comments on our impact from Bishop Jeremiah Park

Bishop Jeremiah Park

As episcopal leader of the New York Area, Bishop Jeremiah Park oversaw the General Commission on Religion and Race’s monitoring review of the New York Annual Conference in late 2007. The review involved three GCORR staff and dozens of lay and clergy leaders representing various ministry areas throughout the conference. They candidly discussed their ethnically diverse conference’s life and ministry, relationships, strengths and weaknesses, challenges and signs of hope, all in relation to their quest to build a beloved community of racial justice and inclusiveness. Bishop Park discussed this landmark experience and GCORR’s participation in an interview afterward.

The vision for our annual conference is to embody a beloved community of hope by building up a healthy Body of Christ. With so many people representing so much diversity, we doubt that all of our people have a clear understanding of what it means that we are called to be one community out of all the differences we represent. It is a primary calling that we have to somehow respond the best way we can to be the church. …

It has been good for us to share our thoughts, ideas, suggestions and our vision for the future of the conference as a multiethnic, multiracial community. We need to do it on a regular basis and be more supportive of each other and more resourceful to each other on this journey together.

In time, more people will realize the significance of this vision of the beloved community, and they will ask, ‘What does it mean in our particular place of ministry, in our lives as individuals and as a congregation?’ They will begin to open up to that possibility and then, of course, to lots of issues and unfinished agendas that we have to address as best we can, understanding the implications of how these issues impact our common journey.

It’s good to see people open up and have a serious conversation about (the vision); and racism is at the heart of that conversation—how to address it and overcome it as a church. That’s a critical piece of our challenge together. The gift of diversity is a wonderful gift, but it is also a challenging gift.

GCORR’s role here is what the strength of the connectional church is all about. We need all the help and support and resources we can get, because the agenda is so huge, no one has all the answers. We’re really grateful that GCORR can come to us, listen to our stories and help us to have a better understanding of where we are and where we need to go. They have been our partners in this journey.