 Greetings, friends. Welcome to CTUCC Conference Cast for September 26, 2014, the regular podcast of the Connecticut Conference of the United Church of Christ. Whoever you are, and wherever you may be on life's journey at this very moment, you are welcome here. We begin this week's conference cast with this meditation from the Reverend Dr. Michael Siba, Southwest Regional Minister. In the 17th chapter of Exodus, the people of Israel now free from slavery in Egypt face the considerable dangers of thirst in the desert. They quarrel with their leader, Moses, to the point where he believes they actually threaten his life. At God's direction, he strikes a rock with his staff, and water pours out to slake the thirst of the people and their flocks. When it came time to name the place where the Israelites found water in the midst of the desert, Moses had lots of choices. He could have called it Providence, since God provides the people with life-giving water in a barren land. He could have called it Water Rock or Wet Pebble. He could have called it Wacker Rock. He could have even called it Quit Your You Know What, but he doesn't. Instead, Moses names the place Massa and Meribah, two words which mean something like Test and Quarrel, because the Israelites quarreled and tested the Lord. Moses memorializes the sorry process rather than the joyful outcome. If we are honest, many of our churches could also be named Quarrel. To paraphrase Shakespeare, some churches are born in conflict, some become conflicted, others have conflict thrust upon them. Regardless of how it got there, conflict is present in too many churches too often, and too many churches don't deal with it well. Churches can be in denial about current and past conflicts. Some churches avoid apparent conflict at all costs, only to discover that, after a time of apparent peace, long-buried issues erupt like a volcano. A few churches seem to relish conflict. More often, churches stumble through conflict, emerging to stay together through compromise and accommodation, while moving slowly forward and losing some folks along the way. Conflict is inevitable in all human relationships. The question is, what do we do with it? Lay and clergy leaders can learn to more effectively guide the church in times of conflict. Behavioral covenants can help churches discuss controversial issues while avoiding behaviors that harm relationships. A healthy conflict can strengthen a church if it is resolved in love. An unhealthy conflict can make reconciliation difficult if not impossible. The question underlying our response to conflict is the same one the Israelites asked. Is the Lord among us or not? It is not God who is being tested. It is us. Of course God is among us, but sometimes we fail to recognize God's presence. God is present in the beloved community, the body of Christ. Our responsibility is to live and act in ways that build up Christ's body and keep it together. May Moses never ask about us, what shall I do with his people. Here is a prayer for this week. Patient God, we often quarrel with you and with one another. Forgive us for the ways we have used your name and your word to argue for our opinions at the expense of others. Help us to hear your voice in the voices of those with whom we disagree. Show us your truth that is beyond any one person's perspective. Heal your body and help us to be agents of healing in Jesus' name. Amen. In the news this week we start with a program announcement. CTUCC conference cast has officially moved to a Friday release schedule beginning with this episode. The reason is simple. I've had increasing demands on my time on Thursdays and it's put a real strain on production, particularly of the video edition. So look for us in your playlist on Facebook or in your Twitter feed on Fridays from this day forward. Last Sunday, huge crowds of people, estimated between three and four hundred thousand marched the streets of Manhattan and there were more in other cities across the world to proclaim the need for urgent action to mitigate and to reverse human generated climate change. In the New York City crowd were UCC members and friends from across the United States, including Pam Arithion, our own sustainability director at the Northeast Center for Environmental Justice at Silver Lake Conference Center. With her were several members of our environmental ministry team, the conference ministers from New York and Massachusetts and the UCC's Minister for Environmental Justice Megan Pritchard. In a story on our website, Pam Arithion writes, together we sent an indisputable message to the world that we can no longer ignore this issue, that climate change affects us all, our marginalized communities the most, and that it takes all of us to turn the tides and create a climate positive future. With the Connecticut Conference annual meeting coming up on October 17th and 18th, leaders have held a series of hearings on the issues which will come before the body at Cheshire High School. The finance and business matters will be debated and decided on Friday night, including the conference's budgets and two proposed resolutions. One calls for ending mass incarceration for nonviolent offenses, and the other regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict calls for divestment in companies active in Israel. On Saturday the conference will concentrate on a new vision for our life and work together, a vision of connectedness, a vision where we proclaim our interdependence in Christ. The Connecticut Conference and Silver Lake websites took an unscheduled break earlier this week when a hardware failure brought them both down. We've installed new equipment and rescued the data, but we found a number of incompatibilities between our code base and the new server environment. We're working to get those identified and resolved, but when you see one, please write to us at webmasteratctucc.org and we'll get to work on it. And thank you so much for your patience. For more on these stories and others, visit us at ctucc.org slash news. To Tulia 2014, I'm Hispanic, I'm UCC. We'll be held in Providence, Rhode Island, this Saturday. CT women of the UCC also gather this Saturday for a day retreat in Portland. This year's General Association, a three-day event for clergy, educators, and church musicians, welcomes Darkwood Brew Innovator, the Reverend Eric Ellis to Silver Lake Conference Center September 28th through 30th. The women's spirit retreat will be held at the lake October 3rd through 5th. The Connecticut Conference Choir performs in concert on October 11th in Norwalk. The inter-religious eco-justice network will host a climate stewardship summit in West Hartford October 12th and 13th. Celebrate the 20th anniversary of our partnership with the Kyungi Presbyteria of the Presbyterian Church in South Korea on October 15th in Glastonbury. The annual meeting of the Connecticut Conference will be held in Cheshire October 17th and 18th and Silver Lake Action Weekend where volunteers help us prepare the camp for the winter months is the following weekend October 24th through 26th. You can sign up now to congratulate Silver Lake's outgoing co-director Anne Hughes and support our conference's outdoor ministry program at a new annual fundraiser. The fancy camp Gala will be held November 1st in Farmington and authorized ministers you can register for boundary training now it will be held on November 6th in Milford. To learn more about any of these events or to register please visit us at ctucc.org slash events. Our spirited Wednesday thought this week comes from the Reverend Shepard Parsons acting pastor of the First Church of Christ UCC in Woodbridge. He writes, turning our lives around thinking differently about God and ourselves doing the faithful thing. It sounds good. It's hard to do. And that brings this conference cast to a close. Thanks to Michael Seba for his reflection and to GarageBand for our music. Primary funding for conference cast comes from your congregation's gifts to our church's wider mission basic support changing lives to the United Church of Christ. This is Eric Anderson the minister of communications and technology for the Connecticut Conference of the United Church of Christ praying that your days this week may be filled with the presence the guidance and the grace of God.