Mitch Rhodes writing.
UMN General Assembly
Last week, Wednesday and Thursday, United Mission to Nepal hosted their biennial* General Assembly (*it happens every two years.) Besides UMN staff, it involves the UMN board, which has people from 5 countries. Also in attendance are representatives from the supporting partners of UMN, as well as those mission and church related groups who send expats to work with UMN. In the first photo below, you can see Lora and me in front of the photo wall backdrop of all UMN partners and sending agencies. We are each pointing to our own main sending organization (Mennonite Mission Network for me, and the Presbyterian Church in Canada for Lora).
There were also 14 flags flying above the UMN main office entrance during the general assembly. People were here from Nepal (of course), Hong Kong, Ireland, Norway, the Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, the UK, the US, Canada, India, Australia, and Germany. The last flag was the UMN flag. The third picture below is of Lora leading communion at the closing session. She was honored to have been asked by Dhana Lama, our Nepali UMN executive director, to do this, because many other (mostly male) pastors in attendance could have been asked to do the job instead. There was a small, good-natured debate about whether she was the first female to lead communion at UMN’s general assembly. We still aren’t sure.
During the two days of the General Assembly, Lora and I were able to meet with many of the people from various international sending organisations with whom we are in regular email contact regarding the expats in UMN. I have to say it was a little exciting in a nerdy kind of way, maybe like meeting a pen pal for the first time. We also enjoyed having delicious catered lunches and also an evening of fun, including some musical entertainment provided by a mix of Nepali and foreign musicians playing jazz for us.
Although one focus of the general assembly is to inform the visitors about current UMN work, I also benefited from finding out about various projects and the work of other UMN staff not based in Kathmandu. To that end, we saw an informative and recently made video featuring the Tansen UMN hospital, produced by one of our fellow UMN expats there. I think the video’s authenticity owes to the fact that Pernilla, the filmmaker, is well-known and loved by the staff and patients there.
