| Bishop Mathews honored during weekend symposium BY LINDA WORTHINGTON UMCONNECTION STAFF  Bishop James K. Mathews and Eunice Mathews were honored April 4-5 at the third annual Servant Leaders Symposium, sponsored by the United Methodist Higher Education Foundation and Wesley Theological Seminary. The events included a banquet at Metropolitan Memorial UMC in Washington, D.C., a reception at the home of Sen. Dale and Betty Bumpers, and a panel discussion on the book Clash of Civilizations: The Challenge to Our Institutions of Higher Learning, by Samuel Huntington. The retired bishop is known for his intercultural work in India and around the world. Eunice Jones, the daughter of United Methodist missionary E. Stanley Jones, was born in India and married James Mathews there in 1940. After they served with the Methodist Board of Missions in New York in the late 1940s, India beckoned again and elected Mathews bishop in 1956. He declined the post, saying that the people of Indian heritage needed to lead their own people. The Northeastern Jurisdiction elected him bishop in 1960. He served the Boston Area until 1972, then the Washington Area until 1980, when he retired. The bishop served the denomination three times after his retirement: as bishop of the Zimbabwe Annual Conference in 1985-86, as bishop of the newly created Albany (N.Y.) Area in 1990 until jurisdictional elections in 1992, and as bishop of the New York Area in 1995 when the active bishop went on medical leave. Both Mathewses continue to work in the ashram or retreat movement in India and with schools in India started by Eunice Mathews parents. At the banquet, Bishop Felton Edwin May cited a letter from Mathews to the Washington Area dated May 21, 1980, urging church members to be peacemakers and reconcilers in the then-crisis with Iran. I am greatly disturbed by the present situation, Mathews said of the war in Iraq. In an interview with the United Methodist News Service, he said all people are connected. Our connectedness is a profound reality and ought to govern everything we do, as it ought to govern the affairs of nations, he said.  George McGovern, who delivered the keynote address of the Servant Leader Symposium, the war against Iraq was not so much a clash of civilizations or cultures as a conflict between the United States and the people of the rest of the world,
McGovern, a United Methodist, U.S. ambassador and history professor, said the U.S.-led war was a conflict with the United Nations, the Hebrew prophets, the Sermon on the Mount and positions taken by U.S. leaders throughout history. Were out of step with the rest of the world, he said. McGovern, a Democrat, criticized President Bush, a fellow United Methodist, for squandering the good will much of the world felt toward the United States. Hes united the whole world against us. It will take a long time to mend this damage. Addressing the role of higher education, Bishop Mathews said, One might conclude campuses are hotbeds, or seedbeds, of discontent, (but) you have a larger vision in a world with more threats. Campus ministry is playing a larger role in preparing students for the future. | 
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