Dr. Milton Loyer, Conference Archivist
March – 100 years ago
At the March 17, 1922, meeting of its Official Board, in response to a growing congregation and Sunday School, the Chinchilla Church, in Lackawanna County on the Clark’s Green charge, stepped out by faith and voted to purchase a new site and to prepare to build in the near future. Classes of the Sunday School had already turned into the treasury the price of the new lot, and the Ladies Aid Society had a fund of several hundred dollars towards the new building. But this was not the first or the last time this congregation would make a move.
The congregation was organized in 1818 and dedicated its first building in 1868. In 1905, a building used by the Baptists on Holgate Avenue was purchased and transformed into the congregation’s second facility. In 1924, the church projected in 1922 was built about where I-81 crosses Layton Road. When Interstate 81 was proposed in the 1950s, that location was in its path, and the building was condemned. The present sanctuary on Church Street was completed by Christmas Eve, 1961, when its first services were held. The congregation currently has about 60 members.
April – 50 years ago
The 1972 General Conference of The United Methodist Church met April 16-28 in Atlanta, Ga. The clergy and lay delegations were headed by: Central Pennsylvania—Rev. Daniel Shearer and Mr. Robert E. Knupp; Wyoming—Rev. Edgar Singer and Mr. Harry Gordon. Being the first General Conference since the 1968 Methodist-EUB union that created The United Methodist Church, the body was tasked with supplying some of the final details regarding that union.
One of the most discussed agenda items was approval of the new denomination’s SOCIAL PRINCIPLES. A final document was approved that gave “reluctant” approval to abortion under certain circumstances, approved remarriage of divorced persons in certain situations, and affirmed—while not condoning the practice of homosexuality—that homosexuals as well as heterosexuals are persons of sacred worth in need of the ministry and guidance of the church and are entitled to having their civil rights insured.
