Conference News
Charles Mills is author of one of the books we read as part of the course "Deep Dive" for Sacred Conversations to End Racism. Time listed is Eastern Time; it will be 9–11 am Mountain Time.
Read MoreThe United Church of Christ offers scholarships for those preparing to serve the church. Applications close March 1.
Read MoreUpdated UCC website offers much more than just a new look.
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The Members in Discernment, along with Associate Conference Minister Rev. Dr. Barb Doerrer-Peacock, have collaborated to create a worship service for the first Sunday of Christmas, December 27, 2020. The video is available in its entirety, as well as the individual components, for churches to download and use in their virtual worship and websites. The worship service will stream live on the SWC Facebook page at 9 am on Sunday, December 27.
Read MoreThere are a new opportunities to be generous and reduce your tax liability through end-of-year giving: The Cares Act charitable giving benefit and tax-free gifts made directly to charitable organizations from IRA and other retirement accounts.
Read MoreAn offering United Church of Christ congregations traditionally collect in December has become a lifeline this year for scores of clergy struggling with financial insecurity because of COVID-19.
Read MoreJanuary 19, 2021, 12–1pm MST, presented by Maryle Malloy
Great church websites have one thing in common: they focus on the new visitor experience. We'll cover the key points every church website needs to engage new visitors and inspire them to learn more.
Read MoreWende Gonzales is curating a Spotify playlist of the Southwest Conference’s cherished Advent and Christmas songs by your favorite artists. Old and new, sacred and secular, joyful and melancholy.
To join this project, just email Wende with the song title, artist, and album (if known). Add a note (optional) telling us what you love about the song(s). If you’d rather not have your name attached to your thoughts about the song, please add the word “anonymous” to your note.
Read MoreA mournful loss: An iconic New York church, home to one of the city’s first religious congregations, is gutted by fire.
Read MoreUCC@ASU student Hailey Lyons is producing an incredible podcast that we are delighted to share with students at ASU and the Desert Palm church family as well as all the UCC congregations in the SWC. Nearly all our UCC@ASU students are participating in interviews with Andrew in our past and upcoming episodes. We are delighted to offer this as a way to share about our ministry but also to have an intergenerational connection.
Click on the link to listen:
S1E5 - Coming Out and Faith (pinecast.co)
S1E6 - What We're Offering (pinecast.co)
Eleven digital hymns, a movie and a pageant of lessons and carols, produced by the national setting of the United Church of Christ, will soon be available to local churches for Advent and Christmas.
Each piece will be downloadable as a video file.
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Meet the 2021 General Synod worship planners and worship director, and download General Synod Zoom backgrounds and logos.
Read MoreIf you weren’t able to join us on November 22, you can watch the recording of our online gathering.
Each one of us, through the small actions we can take, can contribute to stopping the spread of the virus, reducing the number of daily new cases, and saving lives. Please use your agency and courage to do everything possible to stop COVID19.
Read MoreOn November 12, 2020 the SWC Executive Board adopted three significant bylaws changes purposed to implement the SWC resolution “Decentering Whiteness in our Churches and Society.”
These additions will impact how the nominating committee identifies and recruits conference leaders. The nominating committee will invite local church’s and clergy to submit individuals’ names for consideration as SWC leaders with a particular emphasis on church members who identify as Black, Indigenous, and/or Persons of Color.
The Board also updated the SWC bylaws to include Lay Ministerial Standing.
Read MoreSouthwest Conference Minister Rev. Bill Lyons is recommending that ALL SWC churches adopt these guidelines through the end of November.
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and state health officials on Friday announced the state of New Mexico will temporarily re-enact a statewide order closing in-person services for all non-essential activities in order to blunt the unprecedented spike of COVID-19 illnesses and to attempt to relieve dramatically escalating strain on hospitals and health care providers across the state.
Read MoreThe United Church of Christ General Synod Planning Team is inviting people across the wider church to bookmark the recently released GS 33 website to learn more about the denomination’s first online biennial gathering.
This website will provide a hub for all the information related to General Synod 2021.
Read MoreWhat does it mean to “DECOLONIZE THANKSGIVING,” and WHY would we want to do it??
A Southwest Conference Faith Formation leaders will sponsor and facilitate intergenerational conversation and idea-sharing Zoom gathering for the whys and ways we might begin as families and church cultures to DECOLONIZE THANKSGIVING on Sunday, November 22 at 3 pm.
The exponential spread of COVID19 requires churches to re-evaluate their plans for returning to in-person gathering.
Read MoreThis Advent season will be unlike past years as a result of the pandemic, so this resource has been created with online and streaming worship in mind. The toolkit includes calendar, theme graphics, social media assets for Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and weekly video prayers. Best of all, it's FREE!
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