—\u00a0The Mission and Ministry Board meeting<\/strong>\u00a0location was moved from the Brethren Retirement Community in Greenville, Ohio, to Oakland Church of the Brethren, hosted by Southern Ohio and Kentucky District. The denominational board began meeting this morning and planned to continue through Monday morning. Board chair Patrick Starkey noted the \u201crapidly changing protocols for nursing homes\u201d in his announcement of the change of venue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n — Bethany Seminary and the Brethren Academy<\/strong> are moving remaining spring 2020 class sessions to Zoom or online formats beginning March 16 until at least April 6. \u201cAll students who would have attended classes in person will join remotely using Zoom synchronous technology,\u201d said an announcement today. \u201cFaculty will be able to teach via Zoom from the classroom, their offices, or their homes. Online courses will proceed as scheduled. In addition, all on-campus activities and gatherings will be suspended for the same period. After this period, President Jeff Carter and Dean Steve Schweitzer will evaluate on a weekly basis whether classes and activities should resume.\u201d — A performance by Ken Medema and Ted Swartz<\/strong> has been canceled by South Central Indiana District. The event was scheduled for this Saturday, March 14, at Manchester Church of the Brethren. \u201cWe hope to reschedule it for later this year,\u201d said the announcement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n — The District Women\u2019s Retreat in Middle Pennsylvania District<\/strong> has been canceled. The retreat was to be led by Sarah Steele on the topic, \u201cPsssstttt…. Are You Listening?\u201d and was scheduled for April 3-4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n — A \u201cSeeking First the Kingdom\u201d training event<\/strong> led by Ronald Sider and Shane Claiborne has been canceled by Lancaster (Pa.) Church of the Brethren. The event was scheduled for March 21-22. \u201cEfforts will be made to reschedule the event for March 2021,\u201d said an announcement. \u201cWhile we do not want to panic,\u201d said lead pastor Misty Wintsch, \u201cwe do want to be prudent.\u201d She and pastor Don Fitzkee will preach for the March 22 services instead of Shane Claiborne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n — A Ted Swartz and Ken Medema production<\/strong> of \u201cCan We Talk? Conversations for Change\u201d has been canceled in Southern Ohio and Kentucky District. The event had been scheduled for March 15 at Northmont High School Auditorium. The district also has canceled the Camping and Retreat Ministries Simple Living Weekend that was scheduled for March 27-28.<\/p>\n\n\n\n —\u00a0Bridgewater (Va.) College<\/strong>\u00a0is among the colleges and universities that have made the decision to cancel all classes and school-sponsored events and travel.\u00a0Juniata College<\/strong>\u00a0in Huntingdon, Pa., is among those that have extended spring breaks and made decisions to move classes online, while caring for students who may still need on-campus housing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Events at all levels of the Church of the Brethren denomination have been changed, canceled, and\/or postponed because of the spread of coronavirus COVID-19, from the Mission and Ministry Board to Bethany Seminary and the Brethren Academy to districts, congregations, and other groups. Here are some of those announcements: —\u00a0The Mission and Ministry Board meeting\u00a0location<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":14710,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[27,1269,131,1656,1657,85,201,963,760,1616],"wf_post_folders":[],"class_list":["post-14721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bethany-theological-seminary","tag-brethren-academy","tag-bridgewater-college","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-19","tag-juniata-college","tag-lancaster-church-of-the-brethren","tag-middle-pennsylvania-district","tag-mission-and-ministry-board","tag-southern-ohio-and-kentucky-district"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14721"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14722,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14721\/revisions\/14722"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14721"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=14721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/06\/bethany-theological-seminary-1.jpg\")
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The announcement included information that employees will continue to work on campus and, at this time, the board of trustees meeting will go forward on campus as scheduled. Commencement also will be held as expected. \u201cAny decisions to further restrict campus activity or to resume regularly scheduled classes and activities will be communicated immediately and widely,\u201d the announcement said.
The Brethren Academy directed independent study units scheduled in conjunction with the Church Planting Conference in May and the Minister\u2019s Association Pre-Annual Conference Event will be held contingent upon whether those events proceed as planned.
For questions regarding Bethany Seminary course and activity scheduling contact the dean\u2019s office at deansoffice@bethanyseminary.edu<\/a> or 765-983-1815. For questions regarding Brethren Academy courses contact Janet Ober Lambert at oberja@bethanyseminary.edu<\/a> or 765-983-1820.<\/p>\n\n\n\n