November 29 - December 1, 2012"Creating a Culture of Multicultural Celebration and Expectancy." The 2012 Multicultural Conference will explore the changing racial, ethnic and cultural demographics of our country that are moving towards a population that is majority racial-ethnic. In light of this fast-approaching demographic change, this conference will provide cultural competency training for clergy and laity, enhancing their ability to serve as leaders within their communities.
Participants will experience this training through a mixture of plenary sessions, workshops, worship services and motivating speakers, all aimed at empowering the participants to embrace the principles learned at the conferences and then put them into action in their local churches communities.
This event will also help prepare clergy, congregational leaders and congregations for cross-racial/cross-cultural appointments and foster understanding of persons from a variety of cultural and ethnic backgrounds. Through this experience, participants will come to an understanding that multicultural experiences are the norm to be expected and celebrated rather than the exception for The United Methodist Church. Participants will come from a broad diversity of racial-ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds, bringing all actors to the table to become advocates of change in their churches, districts and annual conferences.
1. To provide a safe, non-judgmental space that will bring together persons from all racial groups representative of the Southeastern Jurisdiction to be trained in cultural competency. This will include both laity and clergy.
2. To help pastors, leaders and members of congregations develop an awareness that racial diversity in our world is actually the norm rather than the exception and identify their need for training in cultural competency.
3. To help participants embrace this awareness and commit themselves to working toward helping others achieve cultural competency in their local churches and communities.
4. To provide cultural competency training for clergy and laity and inspire them to put these principle into action in their local churches and communities in order to make disciples for Christ from among all people.
5. To inspire participants to create cultures of acceptance and celebration of persons from diverse racial and cultural backgrounds in their churches in order to be faithful to Christ’s mandate to make disciples from among all nations regardless of racial or cultural background..
6. To introduce methodologies, instruments, and approaches that can be used in local congregations, annual conferences and communities to train persons in cultural competency.
7. To equip pastors, bishops, district superintendents and others involved in making cross-racial and cross-cultural appointments create appointments that result in desirable outcomes.
8. To foster an understanding of persons from a variety of cultural and ethnic backgrounds so that multicultural experiences become the norm and expectation to be celebrated and embraced rather than the exception for The United Methodist Church.