Join in at: www.unitedfuture.ca/live
Time: Thursday December 5, 2013 at 12:30pm – 1pm (Eastern Time)
Panelists
CHRIS DREW
Chris Drew (@chrisjamesdrew) is a community organizer and urban planning consultant living in Ontario. With over 3,400 Twitter followers and 27,000 tweets, Chris understands the power of digital tools to connect and mobilize people. Chris is active in his community through his volunteer work with the Church Wellesley Neighbourhood Association, the Toronto 2015 Pan Am and Para Pan Am Games, and Cycle Toronto. Chris is a member of St. Paul’s United Church in Brampton, Ontario, and has continued his faith journey through volunteering with Wesley Mimico United Church and by attending faith gatherings in his Toronto community. Chris graduated with a degree in Urban and Regional Planning from Ryerson University and while at Ryerson was part of a team that successfully pedestrianized Gould Street.
LAUREN HODGSON
Lauren is one of the church’s “under-30” ministers. She serves St. Matthew’s United Church in Toronto and is a member of the Comprehensive Review Task Group. Lauren has held leadership positions at several national United Church events, including Worship Matters, Rendez-vous and the Go Project. She has extensive experience in youth ministry and has worked with the Kenya Alliance for the Advancement of Children, a United Church global partner. Lauren is currently part of a young adults house church community, where she is constantly surprised by the space she finds in this group for creative connection and meaningful worship. Lauren believes that we’re being called, as a church, to explore new, creative ways of being together and living out community; she hopes that this first discussion forum will spark all sorts of conversation about community and church. Come check it out!
RAFAEL VALLEJO
Rafael Vallejo serves as Minister and Teaching Elder at Queen St. East Presbyterian Church east of Toronto’s downtown core. He is a Filipino-Hispanic mestizo with a warm heart for the urban poor, especially migrants and refugees. Currently he is researching theologies of “Mission and Migration” together with a group of Latin American scholars from Venezuela, Brazil, Peru, Argentina and Mexico. For just over a year now, he also curates an online-community on Facebook called “CASA” (from the Spanish word for “home”) with over 800 members.
Some of the questions Rafael will bring into this conversation is how social media might change the way we think about “what it means to be human”. How it might change the way we talk about the practice of God, church, ministry, sacraments, liturgy, prayer that we used when we were in the “brick-and-mortar” church; how we might use “post-human” categories when we think about community, and how to de-construct the idea that we have to be “united” in order to be “church”
Digital Church? Join the discussion at http://t.co/VGQR1rcb4z #UCCan #UnitedFuture
unitedfuture.ca . United Future is a way for you to share your hopes, fears, dreams, and vision
for The United Church of Canada. Started by the Comprehensive Review Task Group, this important conversation invites you to reimagine our church for the future.