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On April 27 the Rev. Francisco Cañas, coordinator of the National Plan for Hispanic/Latino ministries, gave me an appointment to visit with him in his New York office at the General Board of Global Ministries.  I began working as a lay missioner in the Prairie Rivers District about a year and a half ago and I was amazed that the Rev. Cañas took more than an hour out of his extremely busy schedule to visit with me.  However, his servant heart was readily apparent.

We discussed some of the challenges that this ministry faces, including immigration reform and other social issues, grants and funding matters, his work with annual conferences, leadership formation, equipping lay missioner and pastor-mentor teams, seeking more facilitators and consultants for the strengthening of Hispanic/Latino ministries, plus much more.  He challenged me to think about how to invest time and resources in reaching new immigrants versus second and third generations of Hispanic/Latino people. 

Arrangements were made for me to visit an interesting church which has a service in Spanish but is a Hispanic/Latino/African-American congregation.  It was a small group but very friendly.  The pastor is Luisa Martínez who had a wonderful sermon!
 
The Rev. Cañas is so knowledgeable about what is happening in the conferences across the United States and I was fascinated to hear how the United Methodist Church is seeking to embrace and celebrate multiculturalism but so much more remains to be done!                     

Racism, ageism, classism and sexism still divide humans from one another.  We need to listen to our neighbors with open hearts and minds to hear and feel their struggles, needs, loneliness, rejection, dreams, styles of worship and music and their culture.  We need to see each person as someone in need of God’s love and remember that we are commanded to love our neighbors as ourselves.  We are to receive others, include others and care for others as we would care for ourselves. 

I pray that we can bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to our multicultural and multiethnic world. The world has come to us and we must respond!