Early-Bird Registration to Open in January for CHHSM Annual Gathering

Workshops, worship services, keynotes, and more are all falling into place for the 2025 Annual Gathering to be held March 11-13, 2025, at the Hyatt Regency Boston/Cambridge in Massachusetts. Early Bird registration opens in January. Watch your email and CHHSM’s Facebook page for the official announcement.

The theme of the 87th Annual Gathering is “Into the Deep: Casting Nets of Justice.” It calls CHHSM leaders — whether in affordable housing, health care, older adult ministries, or community service ministries — to take bold action and approach their work with courage, collaboration, and a dedication to creating a more just and compassionate world.

The CHHSM theme dovetails off the UCC’s General Synod theme, “Into the Deep,” and shares its focus scripture, Luke 5:4 (NRSVue) — “When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into deep water, and let down your nets for a catch.’” It will be woven throughout the 2025 Annual Gathering through worship services, keynote addresses, and workshops.

Boston’s nautical setting and historical context — Boston Harbor — inspired the choice of theme and focus scripture, mirroring the imagery of the deep waters in Luke 5. Boston’s history as a gateway to new possibilities, symbolizing economic opportunities as well as the place where transformative social movements began, as well as its pivotal role in the abolitionist movement, played a role in selecting the theme and focus. 

As in the past, early bird registration offers attendees a reduced rate for the Annual Gathering, and is $550. Following the early bird special, registration is $595. Scholarships for registration and the hotel also are being offered to encourage first-time attendees and make it possible for people from small organizations to attend. The scholarships are provided thanks to the generous sponsorship of the UCC’s regional Southern New England Conference, host conference of the gathering. Requests for a scholarship will be considered in the order they are received until funds are committed.

Inspiring Worship to Set the Tone

A highlight of the Annual Gathering is worship, and the 2025 Annual Gathering won’t disappoint. The opening worship service takes place March 11 with the Rev. Dr. Karen Georgia Thompson, UCC general minister and president, deivering the sermon. 

The special Wednesday evening service, during which the graduating class of CHHSM’s Nollau Leadership Institute will be consecrated as Diakonal Ministers, will feature a sermon by the Rev. Darrell Goodwin, conference minister for the UCC’s Southern New England Conference and a CHHSM board member.

Keynote Addresses Focus on Theme

Two outstanding keynote addresses will highlight the Annual Gathering. The opening address will be delivered by Jonathan A. King, Ph.D., professor emeritus of molecular biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). A recipient of the U.S. Antarctic Service Medal, former Guggenheim Fellow, and a recipient of the National Institutes of Health MERIT Award, he also is a recipient of MIT’s Martin Luther King Jr. Faculty Leadership Award.

King’s work in the peace movement goes back decades. He currently serves as board co-chair of Massachusetts Peace Action (MAPA), where he also is chair of the Fund People Over Pentagon campaign and the Fund Healthcare Not Warfare working group. Additionally, he is vice chair of MAPA’s Nuclear Disarmament Working Group. He was coauthor of the Science for Peace Resolution of the World Council of Churches, calling for continuing nuclear disarmament, and a leader of the successful national campaign of biomedical scientists to press the Senate to ratify the Biological Weapons Convention in 1989.

The closing keynote will be delivered by the Rev. Dr. Calvon T. Jones, assistant minister and director of the Memorial Church of Harvard University in Cambridge. Prior to assuming his post at Harvard, Jones served as youth pastor of the historic Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. His ministry centers in the love of Christ, and striving to be a light of love, justice, peace, and hospitality. 

Jones graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Morehouse College in Atlanta, with a degree in religion (2015). He earned his M.Div. degree from Yale Divinity School (YDS) in New Haven, Conn. (2018), where he was a William Sloane Coffin Jr. Scholar — named for YDS’ former chaplain and the former senior minister of The Riverside Church in New York City — and a recipient of the William Hallam Tweedy Prize for exceptional promise for pastoral leadership. Jones recently earned his D. Min. degree in homiletics and proclamation from Duke Divinity School in Durham, N.C.

More to See and Do and Experience

As in the past, the Annual Gathering also will include meaningful and educational workshops on a variety of cogent topics; affinity group gatherings; and plenty of time for reflection and renewing friendships with colleagues. Additionally, the final capstone projects of the graduating Nollau Leadership Institute class will be displayed throughout the gathering, with class members on hand to discuss their projects with other attendees.

“The 2025 Annual Gathering promises to be filled with poignant worship, thoughtful keynote addresses, and useful and inspiring workshops, and I look forward to welcoming everyone to Boston and Cambridge in March,” said Jamar Doyle, CHHSM president and CEO. “Our theme speaks to the power of partnerships — whether between organizations or communities, or a combination of both — in bringing about transformation and justice. In Boston, we will be enlightened and energized as, together, we explore the ways our collaboration can create a just, equitable, caring and compassionate world.”