The largest conference to ever be held at Ball State University is beginning Thursday.
Ball State will host the Indiana United Methodist Church's annual conference Thursday through Sunday, bringing about 2,500 to 3,000 United Methodists to campus.
Rita Stewart, director of conferences and special events at Ball State, helped to coordinate the event.
"It's bringing statewide recognition to Muncie and Ball State," she said. "This conference is bringing people from all across the state from the northern reaches to the Ohio River."
This conference will be the first for the two newly united northern and southern conferences Dan Gangler, director of communications for the Indiana Conference of the United Methodist Church, said.
"For a conference our size, there are not many places across the state that could have this," he said. "We have been meeting at West Lafayette at Elliot Hall of Music, but most hotel space was across town."
People attending the conference will be staying at the newly renovated DeHority Hall, and will be the buildings' first occupants since completion, Stewart said.
Gangler said that the church's south conference originally met at Indiana University's auditorium, which could not hold both unified conferences.
"We decided to go to Ball State because of centrality," he said. "And it's much cheaper than going down to the convention center in Indianapolis."
The conference's theme is "Rethink Church," which is also a national advertising theme of the church across the nation, according to a press release.
"One of the reasons we meet for annual conference is to remember those pastors who have died in the past year and remember them in a special communion service as well as commission and ordain those coming into ordained ministry," Gangler said.
The conference will feature several notable pastors from within the church, including a pastor from a church in Kansas City, which is the largest United Methodist church in the United States, Gangler said.
Other guests include Indiana United Methodist Bishop Mike Coyner, who will appoint 1,000 pastors to their congregations at an ordination service Sunday.
Stewart said that because the two conferences will be combining speakers and interchanging ideas for the first time, it will be a new experience.
"They'll meet people and exchange ideas that they've just never experienced before," Stewart said. "That's going to be enlightening."
Stewart said the conference will bring much-needed money to the university and Muncie community to keep things functioning during the summer.
"They're bringing quite a number of dollars to Muncie in a tough economic time," she said. "They provide work to the people employed by the university who might not normally have work at this time of year."
On Saturday, 1,000 volunteers from the conference will lend their help to the Muncie community by working at soup kitchens and food pantries, cleaning the streets and visiting nursing homes, Stewart said.
Read More
Three Air Jam teams take home the win
October 12, 2012Nineteen teams shimmied, shook and flipped for a sold out John R. Emens Auditorium on Thursday night during the 25th annual Air Jam.
Bill Clinton Speaks at North Central High School
October 12, 2012Former President's Speech Could Have Effect on State Senate Race
