• Submitted by: manso
• Society
• 01 / 04 / 2011

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John Michael De Marco, Jan 3, 201. By John Michael De Marco. Special Contributor. LAKELAND, Fla.—Key leaders in the partnership between United Methodists in Florida and the Methodist Church in Cuba say plans are under way to strengthen the connection, including sending mission caravans to the island and a visit from Cuban Bishop Ricardo Pereira.

“I visited with Bishop Pereira a few months ago,” said Cuban-born Icel Rodriguez, director of the Florida Conference’s global mission ministries. “We spoke about possibilities for the future [and] new mission opportunities for youth and young people. We are looking into sending at least three teams next summer to Cuba. It will be a widening of the covenant relationship in new and exciting ways.”

Ms. Rodriguez said Dave Sippel, director of the conference’s ministries with young people, will lead a youth team and Kelsey Linduff will lead a young adult team. Ms. Linduff is assistant director of ACCESS218, a United Methodist ministry serving college students in Northeast Florida. The ministry has a student club at the University of North Florida and a campus ministry at Jacksonville University.

A third team will likely include conference youth directors. All of the teams will be based at Camp Canaan, a Methodist camp in Cuba.

“This has never been done in the Cuban-Florida relationship,” said Ms. Rodriguez, who suggested the missions could lead to a larger partnership between Florida’s camping and retreat ministries and Cuba’s ministries for young people. “Visits from our youth and young adult ministries to our partners in Cuba will bring hope, enthusiasm and joy to both parts—the joy of realizing we are in the same journey together.”

The partnership falls under the umbrella of Methodists United in Prayer, formerly known as the Cuba-Florida Covenant. The covenant was signed in 1997 by the late Florida Conference Bishop Cornelius Henderson and the Rev. Rinaldo Hernández Torres on behalf of Cuban Bishop Gustavo Cruz. There are currently about 300 Methodist churches in Cuba, and membership has doubled since 1996 to more than 50,000 active disciples.

Dozens of caravans of Florida-based United Methodists have visited the island since the partnership was launched, but they have faced new hurdles in recent years due to new visa restrictions. These have complicated the process, but done nothing to lessen the resolve of those with a heart for serving with—and learning from—Methodists in Cuba.

“We’re still in sort of a waiting mode. The [difficulty in getting] religious visas from Cuba has definitely decreased our efforts,” said Renee Masvidal Kincaid, secretary of the Methodists United in Prayer task force. In the past caravans often included more than 200 people, she noted, but this year the task force has only been able to send caravans of about 50.

However, the team has other ideas to foster connections, including encouraging Cuban pastors to visit the United States.

Florida Bishop Timothy Whitaker has invited Bishop Pereira to deliver the sermon during a communion service at the 2011 annual conference session in Tampa. “The task force will have a few days afterwards with him to become more acquainted,” said Ms. Kincaid. “That’s a real encouragement. We are also expecting the visit of a new superintendent of the Sierra Maestra district in April. We’re just looking forward to what God is doing. He just tells us bit by bit, day by day. He’s in control.”

Ms. Kincaid also looks forward to a trip next year to the Cuban church’s district conferences, a first for a Florida delegation. “We’re very positive,” she said. “After 50 years of struggling, there’s a lot of love, a lot of e-mails going back and forth. It takes a lot of persistence and communicating and maintaining that flow of information and photos and news and love.”

Terry Denham, a member of John Wesley UMC in Tallahassee, Fla., is the new chairman of Methodists United in Prayer and a veteran caravan visitor to Cuba. He said the hospitality and welcome from members of the Cuban churches has never changed.

“They greet us with open arms,” Mr. Denham said. “We take letters back and forth for sister churches who are not allowed to travel. We’ll take other small gifts and bring back pictures and letters. One person can wind up being a conduit for a number of other relationships that are going on.”

Mr. Denham said more Florida United Methodists want to travel to Cuba than are able to go—a key insight into the conference’s heart for the island’s faithful.

“The people on this task force are in the business of praying that we get to the point that we’re not necessary,” he said. “That all the planning and mentoring and coaching and programming we do is not needed because all these rules and regulations go away. It’s much easier to do missionary work in just about every other place I know compared to Cuba.”

Reprinted from the Florida Conference e-Review.

Source: www.umportal.org/main/article.asp?id=7474