Conference Minister's Corner 6.3.26
- Matt Alighieri
- 4 hours ago
- 5 min read
Conference Ministers’ Corner
By: Associate Conference Minister, Rev. Linda Hirst
6.3.26
I got to spend Pentecost in Charleston, SC, at the Circular Congregational Church. I arrived early and spent time looking at all the Pentecost decorations in the sanctuary. I am in awe of people who can decorate and make the sanctuary space inviting, sacred, thematic, and just plain special.Over the choir loft in the front of the church, the decorating folks had created a “Holy Spirit” out of ribbon and machinery. It danced like flames high in the air and captured our attention immediately.
Then, about five minutes before the service began, the Holy Spirit started to make a racket. Things were breaking off one by one and clanking to the ground.
Finally, with one last BANG, the dancing Holy Spirit went silent.
Those watching in the congregation went silent as well.After a few moments, things were back to normal: the choir continued to practice, the deacons moved about getting things ready, and the Holy Spirit, which had been dancing, was no longer. Or was it?I had a funny feeling that perhaps after the “loud rushing wind” of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit had made its way through the pews, around the decorations, under our feet, and into our bodies…calling us to do and be what God calls us to… well…do and be.
I got goosebumps, and I know I wasn’t the only one.
The pastor, the Rev. Dr. Jill Small, who has served churches of all sizes in NH, Maine, and beyond, commented that though the Holy Spirit ribbon of fire had stopped, there were other surprises (thanks to the Holy Spirit?), and there were. The music gave us chills and made us sway (sometimes in unison!), rose petals came down through a vent in the ceiling, mimicking the shower of rose petals that are dropped through the dome of the Pantheon on Pentecost, and people wept (including me) at the much-needed reminder that the Holy Spirit is alive and well and moving—with or without decorations.
I am grateful for the way the Holy Spirit moves in and around the churches, lay leaders, and pastors in the NH Conference (and at the Circular Congregational Church!) and pray it will continue moving through us and our country (and our world), giving us what we need to be the much-needed Church.
Come, Holy Spirit, come!
See you in Church,
-Rev. Linda Hirst
Melt the ICE HATS
The NHCUCC’s unique Immigrant Bond & Support Fund, managed by our Immigrant & Refugee Support Group (IRSG), is under tremendous strain. As we’ve all read in the news, ICE detentions have become more and more sweeping and indiscriminate.
As a result, the Strafford County Jail in Dover (which has an ICE detention contract with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security) is packed with individuals in ICE detention. One of our conference's most compelling ministries is our commitment to making very modest monetary deposits ($35 per deposit) to our ICE-detained siblings’ jail commissary accounts so they can purchase food to assuage their hunger, a warm sweatshirt, personal hygiene items—and, especially, desperately needed phone calls to the outside world. The IRSG is now spending $3,000 or more monthly for this essential “lifeline” -- as we endeavor to bring a little hope and UCC love of neighbor to 80 or more individuals in ICE detention in Dover each month.
To help shore up the IRSG's rapidly dwindling funds, generous and creative knitters from South Church UCC in Concord stepped in by knitting and selling miniature “Melt the ICE hats” as pins!
These “hat pins” helped South Church raise over $2100 to benefit the jail commissary ministry of the IRSG, resulting in support for over 60 individuals in ICE detention. South Church Knitters crafted 200 of these small "Melt the ICE" hat pins and made them available within their congregation and at the No Kings Rally for a donation to the Immigrant Bond & Support Fund. The hats are appealing, and the stories and needs of those in ICE detention are compelling. Donors were generous! The hats can be pinned onto clothing, representing year-round resistance to ICE activities plus support for immigrants in our state and nationwide.
The rub is, fellow citizens, that the more threatening the country becomes, the stronger the opposition. The United States' economic and military posture has made enemies who have responded by initiating terrorist attacks. Israel has used U.S. military aid and sales to facilitate its war in Gaza and Lebanon. Israel’s actions against Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza have raised generations of angry enemies, resulting in the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel. Also, “The U.S. Department of State has made a determination approving a possible Foreign Military Sale to the Government of Israel for its purchase of Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS) and related equipment. The estimated total cost is $992.4 million.”4. These are not defensive weapons.
The dire consequences of having a Department of War and its “precision kill” weapons may help us to see more clearly the results of being a sword-rattling nation. Maoz Inon, an Israeli citizen, has observed in the book, The Future is Peace, “baseless hatred is a fundamental human failing seen in the racism, Islamophobia, and anti-Semitism that blind us to the humanity of our neighbors…”2. Facing this uncomfortable reality may become the motivation to seek alternative ways to conduct diplomacy.
By bringing into the open hatred and human failing, marks of a warring society, perhaps we may learn that the best defense for our country is to approach others as good neighbors, even though there will be significant resistance. Aziz Abu Sarah, a Palestinian, observes, there are many warring forces that seek to pull down advocates for peace with justice for all. He wrote in The Future is Peace, “To work for peace means facing the worst of humanity; it means enduring suffering, facing scorn, carrying humiliation, and struggling not to sink into the darkness of trauma that threatens to pull you down.”3. We are living in a turbulent time. A warrior society exacerbates the troubles. Facing this reality may give clarity and courage to advocate for an end to the warring posture of the nation.
For example, after the experience of WWII, the United States had lost its taste for war. It initiated the Marshall Plan, a U.S. plan for economic assistance to help rebuild western Europe. “The Marshall Plan has been recognized as a great humanitarian effort. Secretary of State George C. Marshall became the only general ever to receive a Nobel Prize for peace.The United States responded, like a good neighbor, not with tanks but with aid to sixteen countries. “The pioneering plan became a model for how development can help advance foreign policy goals and U.S. interests.”5. A model for development and aid to neighboring countries in need may still happen today. We can become a nation that concentrates on the tools of defense rather than the instruments of offensive war:Tools of the harvest. Tools of medical care and healing. Tools for acquiring an understanding of others' motivations, beliefs, and customs. Tools of trustworthiness that generate good neighbors. Then, perhaps the Department of War will atrophy and become a needless, useless appendage to good government and good relationships with other nations.
2. The Future is Peace, Maoz Inon, p. 108, Crown Publishing Group, 2026
3. Ibid., p. 97.