The 150th Annual Meeting of the Connecticut Conference - being held as part of the historic Tri-Conference Meeting June 16 - 17 at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford - will take up two resolutions.

One calls on the Meeting to declare the Conference to be an "Accessible to All Conference, working to remove and/or overcome barriers to welcoming, and including all people in the work and witness of the United Church of Christ, including our Conference facilities and ministries."

The resolution, submitted by South Congregational Church of Middletown, and the Disabilities Ministries Team of the Conference, further calls on the churches of the Conference to "diligently assess their facilities and ministries and work to remove and/or overcome barriers to welcoming and including all people in their work and ministries."

Finally, it calls on the Disabilities Ministries Team to continue to serve as a liaison between the Connecticut Conference and the UCC Disabilities Ministries Board, "to continue their ministries of presence at Conference gatherings, their offerings of resources and their advocacy, through preaching and teaching, to encourage our churches to become 'Accessible to All.'"

The second resolution, submitted by The United Church on the Green, UCC, in New Haven, recommends that churches mark Transgender Remembrance Sunday annually on the Sunday prior to November 20th, which is recognized internationally as Transgender Day of Remembrance.

The resolution reminds readers that "we affirm all persons as created equal in the image and likeness of God (Gen, 1:27)" and goes on to explain that transgender people are a minority who are victims of verbal and physical abuse "out of proportion to their numbers due to ignorance, prejudice, and a lack of understanding or education among the majority." 
 
The resolution cites statistics showing that in the last five years 1200 transgender people, more than 200 each year, have been reported killed, and that 41 percent of transgender people living in the United States have attempted suicide )

The resolutions, along with the vote on the proposal for a new Conference, will be taken up during a Connecticut Conference plenary session in the afternoon of Saturday, June 17. Each of the three Conferences will have their own separate business sessions at that time. Hearings for the resolutions will be held Friday, June 16, at 3:30 PM.

Full text of the resolutions can be found on the CTUCC Annual Meeting Page. 

A new database of resolutions passed by previous Annual Meetings is now available at: www.ctucc.org/resolutions.