Missions Board Special Report

Mission Education is our primary goal for many reasons.

1-Informal feedback comes to us that some of our church members believe that our mission budget is overly generous to overseas mission projects.
2- This feedback includes the sentiment of some that we should not be sending any Bath mission support outside of the USA when there is so much need right here at home.
3-Then there are some who would prefer to support only mission programs that seek to overtly proselytize “evangelize” persons of other faiths even if those mission efforts are non-UCC related.

The answers are as follows:
1- With the exception of our own Bath Mission team leaving for Haiti, only a tiny trickle of the Bath Mission finances go to support the UCC overseas mission programs.

Ninety percent of Our Churches Wider Mission (UCWM) giving mainly stays in North East Ohio for needs in Ohio. These include building stronger churches, youth programs and in-service continuing education for our own church leadership.

A small portion (around ten percent) of those OCWM funds are then channeled through denominational agencies serving national efforts to strengthen churches and their leaders, including projects serving young people. Eventually, some (less than ten percent) of the OCWM funds find their way to help our missionaries and mission partners in other countries AND mission projects in the USA.

Special offerings for Church World Service CWS (One Great Hour of Sharing) for emergency disaster relief are not included in these estimates. CWS is an ecumenical agency that responds to urgent need world-wide, including the USA. It does not respond in terms of percentages for local versus international aid.

2- The vast majority of our Bath church mission giving (Ninety percent) goes to literally dozens of local agencies serving local need according to carefully and prayerfully prepared guidelines. These guidelines are available to anyone requesting them.

3- Mission strategies globally are continuously studied and evaluated for their relevancy and effectiveness. The world today is continuously changing. It is a dynamic mixture of cultural, political and religious challenges. Among our top military leaders there are none who believe that all of the problems facing our nation can be solved by military means alone.
The educational, medical and social projects supported by UCC Global missions, however small they may be compared to the defense budget, serve an essential effort to bring peace through our sharing God’s love world-wide and is coordinated through indigenous Christian church partners.

This is not an arbitrary choice on our part to support Global missions. It is a mandate from the head of the church, Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.

The above message was prepared by the chair of the Bath Church Board of Social Concerns and Missions who welcomes your comments. He has served as a missionary on assignments in over 80 countries during the course of over four decades.

Faithfully,
Chuck Ausherman