UM News Digest - Nov. 24, 2025

UM News Digest - Nov. 24, 2025

Food pantry works to overcome challenging year
Asian young adults embrace servant leadership
Rural church honors bishop with walking trail

“There’s some that this is such a dire need of theirs. We go with them as they’re going through this need.” — Lowell Peck, on the free grocery store at Dyersburg First United Methodist Church.

Danny Fisher selects some canned goods at the Rhea House, a free grocery store in Tennessee operated by United Methodist Reelfoot Rural Ministries and Dyersburg First United Methodist Church. Video image by Lilla Marigza, UM News.

Foodpantry works to overcome challenging year
DYERSBURG, Tenn. (UM News) — This year has seen cuts to federal funding, rising food costs and a prolonged government shutdown that delayed federal food assistance. These challenges have led to more demand at food pantries and higher costs to operate these vital ministries. Just before Thanksgiving, Lilla Marigza reports on the Rhea House, a free grocery store at Dyersburg First United Methodist Church that operates in partnership with United Methodist Reelfoot Rural Ministries.

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UM News: Food ministries sound alarm on rising needs

The Rev. Young Min Paik, Lead Hub director for South Korea for the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry, delivers a lecture during ASCEND 2025. Photo by the Rev. Thomas E. Kim, UM News.

Asianyoung adults embrace servant leadership
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Methodist young adults from Cambodia, Laos, Mongolia and Vietnam came together Nov. 3-7 for ASCEND 2025, which was centered on one conviction: Servant leadership is not an idea to admire but a life to practice. The Asian young adults leadership training featured a week of study, worship and hands-on learning. The Rev. Thomas E. Kim has the story.
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Texas Conference
Rural church honors bishop with walking trail
CROCKETT, Texas — First United Methodist Church of Crockett gathered on Nov. 4 to dedicate the Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey Harmony Trail, a community walking path created as a gift to both the congregation and the wider Crockett community. The celebration reflected the church’s renewed sense of unity and continued commitment to offering a faithful public witness to the love of Christ. Alisha Bynum has the story.
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Colorado Public Radio
Church fined $1,000 for homeless camp
MONTROSE, Colo. — A year-long dispute between Montrose United Methodist Church and the city of Montrose was capped off by a trial and a guilty verdict on a handful of ordinance violations. At issue in the dispute was the camp for homeless people that the church allowed on its property. A municipal judge sentenced the church to two years’ probation and a $1,000 fine. More charges could be pending. “Montrose UMC gave shelter to unhoused neighbors last winter as temperatures dropped to dangerous levels, and after their initial response attempted to work with the city to respond to the needs and lives of real people,” Mountain Sky Conference Bishop Kristin Stoneking told UM News. “The response could have been perfected with collaboration. Though the judge has ruled Montrose UMC guilty of violating city ordinances, the church is not guilty of failing to see each person as Christ.” Tom Hesse reports for Colorado Public Radio.
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Holston Conference
Churchgoers go extra mile to provide food
ALCOA, Tenn. — When the Rev. Terry Goodman heard in his covenant group that a small church in an isolated area was struggling to help people who needed food, he knew he had to do something. He is among the United Methodists in Holston stepping up to keep neighbors fed amid delays in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Annette Spence reports.
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New England Conference
Ecumenical group honors church’s compassion
PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The Rhode Island State Council of Churches named Mathewson Street United Methodist Church in Providence as this year’s Congregation of the Year. Over the past year, the church has served more than 40,000 meals, distributed over 10,000 essential items, provided 225 free bus passes and offered emergency housing and case management to hundreds of individuals and families. Ben Musasizi has the story.
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Pew Research Center
A look at U.S. religious composition
WASHINGTON — If the U.S. had 100 people, 62 of them would be Christians. They would include: 23 evangelical Protestants, 19 Catholics, 11 mainline Protestants and five people who identify with historically Black Protestant denominations. Becka A. Apler and Aleksandra Sandstrom offered this analysis based on Pew’s 2023-2024 Religious Landscape Study.
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Higher Education and Ministry
Agency boosts historically Black colleges
ATLANTA — Roland Fernandes, the top executive of United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry, announced that the agency plans to set aside $4 million in reserves to help the 11 United Methodist-related historically Black colleges and universities in the U.S. He made the announcement as the schools’ Council of Presidents met online Nov. 18 to discuss campus growth initiatives as well as growing challenges including federal cuts. As a part of This Moment Matters, the agency is stepping into the gap to support education.
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Wipf and Stock Publishers
Scholar releases new book on Charles Wesley
DURHAM, N.C. — Charles Wesley is known primarily as a distinguished hymn writer and joint leader with his brother John of the Methodist reform movement within the Church of England. S.T. Kimbrough Jr., a research fellow at Duke Divinity School, has published “Charles Wesley, a Prisoner of Hope” examining how the struggles as a child and as an adult shaped the person he was ever becoming.
Learn more and order book