2026 is a year of significant ministry anniversaries in The United Methodist Church, for full clergy rights for women (70 years), UM Volunteers in Mission (50 years), the Northern Illinois Conference's decision to become a Reconciling Conference (40 years), and the establishment of the order of deacons (30 years). Northern Illinois Conference celebrated these on June 15.

70th Anniversary of Full Clergy Rights for Women

• In 1847, the United Brethren Church commended the first woman to preach, approving licensing and ordaining women, and granting conference membership in 1889.
• The Methodist Protestant Church ordained its first woman deacon in 1866, and its first elder in 1875, although Anna Howard Shaw, ordained an elder in 1880, is perhaps the most well-known.
• In 1920 the Methodist Episcopal Church granted women the right to preach, and, in 1924, decided to ordain women as local deacons and local elders.
• The approval of full clergy rights for women by the 1956 General Conference of the Methodist Church was commemorated in 2006 by the UMC’s year-long celebration of the 50th anniversary.

(Information from the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry)

50th Anniversary of United Methodist Volunteers in Mission

UM Volunteers in Mission is a grassroots movement of United Methodists who seek to put their “Christian love in action.”  Since the 1970s, UMVIM has offered a framework through which disciples can engage in short-term mission locally, nationally, and globally.  Volunteers are lay and clergy, young and old, with differing abilities and vocations, from all walks of life. Tens of thousands of United Methodists engage in short-term mission each year in ministries as varied as disaster response, community development, pastor training, microenterprise, agriculture, vacation Bible school, building repair and construction, and medical/dental services.  

UMVIM emphasizes matching people with opportunities because we believe that God calls all Christians “to bring good news to the oppressed [and] to bind up the brokenhearted” (Isaiah 61:1) and to love their neighbors as themselves.  They believe that the neighbors we are called to love exist both next door and halfway around the world. 

40th Anniversary of the NIC's Becoming a Reconciling Ministries Network Conference

In 1986,  the Northern Illinois Annual Conference made history by voting to become the first annual conference to join the Reconciling Ministries Network as a reconciling conference. The Wisconsin Annual Conference adopted a resolution suggesting that its local churches consider becoming reconciling congregations. 

Reconciling Congregations began in September 1982 at a meeting of Affirmation: United Methodists for Lesbian/Gay Concerns in Boston,  which approved the idea of “developing a program in which local churches will declare their support for the concerns of lesbians and gay men." The model of the More Light Program, begun in 1978 by the  Presbyterians for Lesbians and Gay Concerns, of a local church adopting a statement affirming lesbians and gay men and inviting their full participation in the life of the local church, was adapted for United Methodist congregations.  

Discussion about the need for “reconciliation” between The United Methodist Church  and lesbians/gay men at a November 1982 meeting of Affirmation’s General  Conference Task Force inspired the name “Reconciling Churches.” This was modified to “Reconciling Congregations” in order to clearly emphasize that this would be a local church network. 

30th Anniversary of the Order of Deacons

Deacons are ordained and elected into full clergy membership in ministries of  Word, Service, Compassion, and Justice.  They serve as Christian educators, outreach ministers, missions leaders, social workers, chaplains, denominational leaders, and in places where God's love meets the world. They lead the church outside of its walls and into mission and ministry.

For many years, The United Methodist Church's pattern of ordination and clergy membership was initially to ordain those called to pastoral ministry first as deacons and election to probationary membership and then as elders and election to full membership in the annual conference. In 1976, following an ecumenical movement to revive the ancient and distinct order of the diaconate, the lay role of diaconal minister was created. Diaconal ministers connected lay people to their ministries in the world and assisted the elder at baptism and communion. They served as Christian educators, ministers of music, youth pastors, and other roles in the church, as well as in serving ministries outside of the congregation. 

In 1996, after a time of study of ministry, the General Conference approved the ordained order of deacons and eliminated the two-step ordination process for elders.