United Methodist Church Rancho Cordova

12/24/2025

Our Christmas Eve Service begins in the church at 7 PM tonight and culminates at the Living Nativity, where we will sing Silent Night by candlelight. Please join in the holy mystery and wonder of Christmastime !!

12/10/2025

Thank you to all who showed up and dressed up for our annual Living Nativity display at the tree lighting ceremony in Rancho Cordova on November 30th! You can see our living Christmas postcard again December 22 - 24th where we'll have the manager scene set up at the church. We'll wrap up with a candlelight finale at the conclusion of our Christmas Eve service. We look forward to seeing you there!

09/12/2025

A word from Bishop Plambeck of the Dakotas/Minnesota Annual Conference of the UMC:

A word of truth and hope

~ We Need a Better Way ~

The killing of Charlie Kirk today stops us in our tracks. A life ended by political violence is not simply a headline - it is a rupture in the body of our nation, a wound to our shared humanity, a grief that must be named.

And this is not the first time. We remember Gabby Giffords, shot while meeting her constituents. We recall the congressional baseball field turned battleground. We lament the assaults on Rand Paul and Paul Pelosi in their own homes, the assassination attempt on now-President Donald Trump, the death of Minnesota’s Rep. Melissa and Mark Hortman, and amid all of this we cannot ignore the epidemic of school shootings plaguing this country most recently at Annunciation days ago and in Evergreen, Colorado today.

We must also name the long shadow of racialized violence. From the killing of George Floyd here in Minnesota to the murders at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, from Buffalo’s grocery store to Jacksonville’s Dollar General, violence fueled by racism continues to poison our land.

These wounds are not separate; they are threads of the same tapestry of hate, fear, and division.

This evening, after my return from the Dakotas, I turned on CNN, Fox, and MSNBC - watching each for 30 minutes or more. Three channels. Three different spins. And yet one common thread: an undercurrent of us vs them, right vs left, good vs evil, liberal vs conservative. Even our news can seduce us into categories that divide, inflame, and harden our hearts. We must be cautious, discerning not only of the violence in our streets, but of the voices we choose to follow in our homes. Bias is real. Narrative is powerful.

And the stories we consume shape the lives we live, the opinions we hold, and who we see as friend or foe.

As a priest, I hold all this before God in prayer. I invite you to join me in lifting these names, these lives, and this wounded nation into the hands of the One who heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds (Psalm 147:3).

As a pastor, I ache with you. Fear grows when we cannot trust that schools are safe, that homes are sanctuaries, that political disagreements will not end in death, that skin color will not make someone a target, that even our sources of information will not deepen division. Yet even in our fear, we are not alone. The Spirit of Christ remains in our midst, whispering, “Do not be afraid, for I am with you.”

As a prophet, I must speak plainly: violence - political, racial, or domestic - is not the way of Christ, nor is it worthy of a people who claim liberty and justice for all. The normalization of guns, the idolization of power, the demonization of opponents, the dehumanization of neighbors, and the manipulation of truth - these are false gods demanding sacrifice. We must repent, we must turn, we must choose life. To lawmakers, to leaders, to neighbors alike: now is the time for courage, accountability, and change.

And as a poet, I dream still. I dream of a nation that listens more than it shouts, that builds bridges instead of barricades, that dares to believe our better angels can rise again. I dream of plowshares where once there were swords, of children who can sing without fear, of streets where love is louder than gunfire, of communities where no one is hunted down because of the color of their skin, and of citizens who hunger more for truth than for outrage.

Let us refuse the voices that divide us. Let us resist the powers that pit us against one another.

Let us walk instead in the way of Jesus - who turns mourning into dancing, strangers into neighbors,
and enemies into friends.

This is not naïve hope. It is the deepest truth of our faith: that light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot overcome it, that love is stronger than hate, that death does not have the final word, and that God's goodness and grace can heal the soul of humanity.
Beloved, the better way is before us.

By God’s mercy, may we have the courage to walk in it - together.

~ Bishop Lanette

05/11/2025

A truly lovely afternoon tea!!

03/07/2025

Friends, we're hiring a very part time child care provider.

12/17/2024

The People's Pantry is On!

11/20/2024

An important word from Bishop Olewine this week.

Bishop Olewine's Monday Musing

Good Monday morning, Cal-Nev family,

There is much for which I am grateful for in our Wesleyan way of being Christians. John Wesley was a practical theologian, more passionate about people growing and living a life of faith that was rooted in acts of love for God and neighbor than in having them be able to attest to dogma. The three general rules of the church: do no harm, do good and stay in love with God, were guidelines that if one sought to live out Wesley felt people could live a vital Christian life. They were guidelines that also called everyone to grow and expand how one lived out those rules every day in all circumstances. While they seem simple, living them out is anything but. One of the roles of class meetings was for participants to have support from one another as they sought to grow in their capacity to live into those rules.

Lifelong learning was foundational to Wesley’s understanding of a life of faith and was why from the earliest days, education was essential to Wesley’s revival movement. Historians note that John was as much an educator as a preacher. His aim was to create ‘model schools’, places where relationships were good and where learning could flourish. But learning for Wesley was never primarily about knowledge for knowledge’s sake. Learning was to help us grow in our capacity to love more abundantly. This commitment to education has continued throughout our entire Methodist history, both in building schools and in funding students. There is much to be grateful for in this witness.

Yet, United Methodists today must face that our history in education has not always been a gift to communities, often violating the first general rule, to do no harm. In a first-of-its-kind report the United Methodist Commission on Archives and History released the findings from a multiyear, multiphase initiative between the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries, United Women in Faith and Archives and History related to boarding schools for Native American children, “The United Methodist Church and Indigenous Boarding Schools.”

I commend this study as a first step in our own learning about the Methodists role in these boarding schools. In a recent meeting, Ashley Boggan, General Secretary of Archives and History, shared, “The general philosophy that pervaded the institutionalization of Indigenous boarding schools in North America was one of ‘Kill the Indian to save the man. This genocidal view was one which saw little-to-no positive qualities in the Indigenous way of life, and, instead, viewed the Western form of civilization, including its styles of Christianity, as both inherently superior to Indigenous lifeways and absolutely essential for the salvation of Indigenous peoples.”

As Methodists, we were part of the genocide of Indigenous people across this nation. While remembrance and repentance are the goals of the initial report, that is only a very first step in seeking repair. One of our commitments must be to listen to and partner with our Indigenous siblings, both within and beyond the church, to find paths of healing, repair, restitution, seeking to move towards more just relationships. Boggan stated, “This is about more than merely admitting past wrongs, but also the salvation of the soul of the church and uncovering its role in rectifying the innumerable and unimaginable harms of genocide.”

I pray we have the courage to enter this walk.

Let’s do this, Cal-Nev family,
Bishop Sandy

11/02/2024

11/02/2024

Holiday Faire fare!
Come one come all!!