News in brief

LaGrange teacher earns outstanding educator award
UM Center shifts June 11 to summer operating hours
Austin UM receives award May 20 for pastoral care
Connectional giving runs $294,000 ahead of ’06 totals
Giving to Easter offering surpasses $116,000 mark
42 UM congregations pay ’07 apportionments in full
$642 million spending plan goes to General Conference
Bishop David Lawson, 77, dies May 31 at Indiana home
President nominates UM for surgeon general post
National Council urges FEMA to investigate trailers

LaGrange teacher earns outstanding educator award
A LaGrange teacher has earned the Board of Church and Society’s Outstanding Public Educator Award for 2007.
Noreen Dopslauf, a member of First UMC, LaGrange, and a prekindergarten teacher at Hermes Elementary School, is to be recognized during an awards banquet Friday in Corpus Christi. The event is part of the Southwest Texas Annual Conference session. The award recognizes a teacher’s work with at-risk children.

UM Center shifts June 11 to summer operating hours
The UM Center in San Antonio is adjusting its operating hours June 11 for the summer.
The center is to be open from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 8:30 a.m. to noon Friday. Operating hours return to 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday Aug. 13.

Austin UM receives award May 20 for pastoral care
A member of Bethany UMC, Austin, received the Donald Capps Award in Pastoral Care last month at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.
Tina Wynn Stenftenagel was honored May 20 during commencement ceremonies. The award, named for a seminary professor at Princeton University, goes to a graduate with gifts for caring ministries.
Stenftenagel is interested in pastoral care, chaplaincy and hospices services. She is entering a summer clinical pastoral education internship at Scott & White Hospital in Temple.

Connectional giving runs $294,000 ahead of ’06 totals
Southwest Texas congregations gave $294,013 more to connectional causes through May than they did during the first five months of 2006.
Contributions to apportioned funds totaled $3.8 million. That’s 38 percent of the $10.1 million asking for the year. The remittance rate is up 1.6 percent from May last year.
The San Angelo District had paid the highest percentage of apportionments through May—44.85.
Other district percentages were Kerrville, 42.98; McAllen, 39.85; Victoria, 39.83; Corpus Christi, 37.09; San Antonio, 36.32; and Austin, 34.77.

Giving to Easter offering surpasses $116,000 mark
Southwest Texas congregations have reported more than $116,000 in contributions to the Easter offering for a disaster-response center as of May 31.
“This is an excellent one-time offering,” said the Rev. David A. Seilheimer, treasurer.
One-hundred-forty-two of the 344 congregations in the conference—or 41 percent—have sent in contributions.
Bishop Joel N. Martinez called for the special Easter offering to help pay for a Volunteers in Mission Training Center and Disaster Response Warehouse in Fair Oaks Ranch.

42 UM congregations pay ’07 apportionments in full
Forty-two of the 344 Southwest Texas congregations had paid their 2007 apportionments in full as of May 31.
Three McAllen District congregations led the list.
San Juan UMC had paid 102 percent of its share of expenses for ministries across the state, nation and world.
Bruni UMC and Scott’s Chapel UMC, Kingsville, had both paid 101 percent of their apportionments.
The count of “100 percent” congregations by district was Austin, 10; Corpus Christi, 6; Kerrville, 5; McAllen, 4; San Angelo, 6; San Antonio, 3; and Victoria, 8.

$642 million spending plan goes to General Conference
NORCROSS, Ga.—The 2008 General Conference will receive a proposed four-year budget requesting $642 million to support UMC ministries through 2012.
Approved by UMC leadership May 24, the proposed spending plan is designed to fund the denomination’s 21st century mission initiatives of leadership development; building new congregations and revitalizing existing ones; ministry with the poor, especially children; and combating the preventable diseases of poverty, such as malaria, HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis.
The proposed budget for the 2009-2012 quadrennium is 4.8 percent higher than the $612.5 million budget for the denomination’s current four-year cycle. However, it is about 6 percent less than the overall amounts requested by UM entities to meet ministry goals.
The budget recommendation goes to the General Conference next April in Fort Worth.

Bishop David Lawson, 77, dies May 31 at Indiana home
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind.—Retired Bishop David Jerald Lawson, who played a key role in establishing and developing Africa
University, is dead at age 77.
Lawson died May 31 at his home in Franklin, Ind., following a lengthy illness. A memorial service is planned for June 11 at St. Luke’s UMC, Indianapolis.
Lawson served for 12 years as bishop of the Wisconsin and Illinois areas until retiring in 1996. During that time, he served on the site selection committee for Africa University, which opened in 1992 in Old Mutare, Zimbabwe.

President nominates UM for surgeon general post
WASHINGTON—A UM physician from Kentucky has been nominated to serve as the 18th surgeon general of the United States. President Bush announced the appointment of Dr. James W. Holsinger Jr. as his nominee May 24.
Holsinger, who is a professor of preventive medicine at the University of Kentucky, has led that state’s health care system and taught at several medical schools.
A member of Hope Springs UMC, Lexington, Ky., where he serves as administrative pastor, Holsinger has been active at all levels of the denomination. He is president of the Judicial Council and is treasurer of the World Methodist Council.

National Council urges FEMA to investigate trailers
WASHINGTON—The National Council of Churches has called on the Federal Emergency Management Agency “to launch a full investigation into the health risks associated with the trailers” supplied to the victims of hurricanes Katrina, Rita and Wilma.
The council also called on FEMA to suspend selling the trailers until they are proved safe. Reports have surfaced that some of the trailers contain toxic levels of formaldehyde.