North American News & Stories

United Methodist Church and Community Workers gather in California for their biennial meeting to celebrate and reconnect with their colleagues for mutual support and professional networking.

Grants totaling $853,301 will help build the capacities of United Methodist mission partner organizations around the world next year in the areas of Leadership Development, Congregational Development, Ministry with the Poor and Global Health.

Directors of the Global Ministries and UMCOR, meeting Oct. 10-12, focus on mission and ministry, global migration, disaster response, new initiatives and ways to bind the United Methodists together despite fractures in the church and world.

Residents of Grand Bahama Island and Abaco are receiving relief in the form of shelter, meals and hygiene items. Some are also taking great joy in being a part of the volunteer effort, serving their neighbors in the midst of their own tragedies.

The gathering held on September 21 in Upper Sandusky, Ohio brought together more than 500 people in celebration of a shared past and promising, common future.

The month of September marks two years since Hurricane Maria brought widespread destruction to Puerto Rico. The recovery has progressed steadily, thanks largely to the Methodist Church of Puerto Rico, and with the help of UMCOR training and funding and more than 200 Volunteer in Mission teams.

Although it didn’t receive much national attention, the spring floods of the Arkansas River wiped out property and devastated some communities. UMCOR and the Arkansas Conference Disaster Response Team have just rolled out a new phase to help with recovery.

A growing amount of grassroots climate change work is being done by graduates of Global Ministries EarthKeepers training.

Throughout Hurricane Dorian’s movements, UMCOR coordinated with Conference Disaster Response Coordinators from United Methodist conferences along the Southeastern U.S. coast, monitoring their needs and likely responses.

Healthy Youth USA, an afterschool and summer camp program in the North Atlanta area, used a Global Health grant to ensure that more children could access the care they needed while their parents were at work.

They join 50 recently commissioned international Global Mission Fellows, starting two-year assignments in social justice ministries around the world.

Seeking to return sacred lands they have held in trust for 176 years, leaders of The United Methodist Church and the Wyandotte Nation will hold a ceremony this September during which lands held by the agency will be formally returned to the Wyandotte Nation of Oklahoma.