ISAAC to Honor Roy Sano with Legacy Award

Bishop Roy I. Sano. Photo Credit: Felipe Castillo

Bishop Roy I. Sano will be presented with the ISAAC Legacy Award at ISAAC’s 5th Symposium on October 5th. [1] The Legacy Award honors pioneers and leaders from the Asian American Christian community. Past recipients include Rev. Dr. Hoover Wong and Eleanor Huang, LCSW.

Bishop Sano is being recognized as an invaluable and long standing leader in the community. His CV includes degrees from UCLA, Union, GTU and Claremont Graduate School. Ordained in 1957, Bishop Sano served the United Methodist Church on the U.M. General Board of Global Ministries, the U.M. General Board of Church and Society and the General Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns.

Perhaps more importantly, Bishop Sano carries with him the deep and compelling wisdom that only experience and reflection can cultivate. As a survivor of FDR’s Executive Order 9066, Sano — along with 110,000 other Japanese Americans — was forced to relocate into internment camps after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. These early experiences have shaped Bishop Sano’s conviction for both grace and justice.

Sano describes those early trials as “a wound that has healed, but the scars of a wound remain… a scar as a reminder: ‘never again’ if I can in any way prevent that or oppose that.” [2] This understanding has no doubt served him in his positions as President of the UMC Council of Bishops and its first Executive Secretary. Bishop Sano comments that these appointments “say a lot about the graciousness of my Episcopal colleagues who deeply disagreed with me on some missional participation.”

Speaking on his call to the ministry, the Bishop describes his decision “to work for this island of acceptance in this turbulent ocean of hate.” It is his lasting impact in this work that ISAAC recognizes and honors with the 2013 Legacy Award.

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[1] ISAAC’s 5th Symposium: Healing of Memories, Healing of Finances will be held on October 5th at Evergreen Baptist Church, San Gabriel Valley.

Registration Now Available HERE.

[2] “Wartime Internment Teaches Bishop The Importance of Grace” by Cecile S. Holmes

 

Money Matters: Healing of Finances

A MESSAGE FROM ISAAC PRESIDENT, DR. YOUNG LEE HERTIG:

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:21)

More than ever the power of money rules every sector of American society and yet discussing money matters remains taboo. Unfortunately, this collective silence is found in our seminary curricular and in our church life, despite Jesus’ connection of money to the gravitas of people’s hearts. Considering that the soil of ministry is the hearts of the people, and pastoral leadership also entails financial stewardship, breaking the eggshell of money matters is crucial, especially in the aftermath of 2008 economic meltdown.

Personally it wasn’t until my fifties that I began to overcome my discomfort about addressing financial matters. Eight years of leadership in a nonprofit organization has shown me how money matters take human relationships to a whole new dimension. For example, relationships take on a whole new dimension when the money issue is raised. Until one deals with money matters with another person, no matter how long the relationship has lasted, we don’t know that person’s heart. To make matters more complicated, our relationship with money is also shaped by culture and family scripts. One culture’s taboo is not another’s. In the early church, it was taboo not to reveal one’s financial assets; in the contemporary Christian scene, it is taboo to do so. Hence, until we deal with money matters with a circle of people, we don’t fully know those people no matter how many years of friendship we have invested. Indeed, as Jesus stated, money reveals where our hearts reside.

Having taught in a classroom where all the behind the scenes matters are taken care of, and having delegated household financial matters conveniently to my spouse, I honestly haven’t paid much attention to financial matters until I joined the world of running a nonprofit organization. Yes, I am a latecomer to this matter and therefore am passionate about one of the most important but silent issues that dictate all spheres of life.

The economic meltdown worsened an enormous income gap between our nation’s top 1% and the remaining 99% of American people. People are revealing their hearts through money matters more sharply than ever. All kinds of break ups—couples, friendships, and churches involve finances! Yet, addressing money matters is a taboo and therefore when it is addressed, we discover the hidden dark sides or generosity in people of which we were not aware of previously.

For these reasons, ISAAC’s 5^th Symposium will devote the morning session to “Healing of Finances” (Saturday October 5), drawing the expertise of Christian leaders in the financial sectors. The objective of the morning session is to learn about financial systems and to balance taking and giving as Jesus emphasized numerous times in his teaching. More than ever we all need to increase our financial knowledge and the toolbox so that we may exercise healthy stewardship within our interdependent relationships of family, church, society and eco-systems that we rely on for our sustainability.