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BY BARBARA COWARD
UMCONNECTION CORRESPONDENT

UMNS

Amy Spaur is commissioned as a mission intern and missionary of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries during a service that included US-2 missionaries. Mission interns serve three years both overseas and in the United States.

For many people, the concept of missionary work evokes images of toiling in remote villages in such faraway lands as Kenya, Mexico or Swaziland.

But one doesn't have to travel such great distances to find missionaries hard at work. In fact, some important missionary work is happening right here in this region by three recent college graduates.

'A lot of people have different ideas of what missionary work is,' said Lauren Kilbourn, a seminary student from Duke Divinity School who is working at the Christ United Church of the Deaf in Baltimore as part of her summer internship.

'They think it is about going to Zimbabwe or the Appalachian Mountains, doing the work and then leaving,' she said.

'But missionary work is preaching out against oppression in any situation, learning how to love our neighbor and helping people with disabilities or their (civil) rights.'

A member of the Florida Conference of The United Methodist Church, Kilbourn, who plans to go into parish ministry, has been interested in serving people with disabilities for a long time.

'People with disabilities are one of the biggest groups that are left out of the church,' said Kilbourn. 'I want to serve all of God's people.'

In addition to helping with worship services at Christ United Church, which is one of only a few United Methodist churches for deaf ministry in the country, Kilbourn is assisting in providing pastoral care to the deaf in prisons and mental institutions and spent a week in June at a deaf and blind camp at West River Center in Churchton.

'People who are deaf are more isolated,' she added. 'The goal of Christian ministry is visiting people and proclaiming the gospel of truth that God loves them and will never leave them.'

Kandis Samuels is another recent college graduate who is helping to build a brighter future for residents in marginalized communities in Baltimore.

She is one of seven missionaries working throughout the country as part of the US-2 mission program sponsored by the General Board of Global Ministries of The United Methodist Church. The program gets its name from having missionaries assigned to the 'US' for '2' years.

As part of her two-year assignment at the Hampden Family Center in Baltimore, Samuels works as a children's program associate helping with their after school program for 2nd to 5th graders from low-income families. She picks the kids up from school, gives them snacks, and provides academic support and enrichment projects until their parents get home from work.

'This experience has given me an outlook of different needs that people have,' said Samuels. 'I am more understanding of people and where they come from. ? Everyone has a story.'

While most missionaries in the US-2 program have studied religion or social work in college and have plans to go into the ministry, Samuels is unique with her science degree and desire to attend medical school.

A graduate of Delaware State University who discovered the US-2 program through a pamphlet in the United Campus Ministries office, Samuels believes that this experience will help her become a more compassionate emergency room doctor or surgeon.

'I always wanted to help people with different backgrounds from my own,' she said.

Living in a former parsonage and receiving a $200 monthly stipend, Samuels also works at the community service center at Hampden UMC where she assists people who need help with their gas or electricity bills and getting prescription refills.

'Missionary work is providing service to people in need,' said Samuels.

'You don't have to go overseas. There is always someone in need who is looking for assistance.'

Laura McDowell, a third US-2, will begin work in September at the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society in Washington, D.C.

McDowell, a student leader at King Avenue UMC in Columbus, Ohio, will be designing and implementing seminars on issues such as racism and hunger.

'I am excited to have the opportunity to be in service full time,' she said.