hollywood-united-methodist-church

Stepping Into Tomorrow

Thu, 15 Jan 2026 18:36:13 GMT

How will we get there?

Hollywood,

1868

A gathering of Methodists in Hollywood became an officially-recognized congregation of the Methodist Episcopal Church,

named Joy Chapel.

1933

Following a fire at Joy Chapel, a new sanctuary was constructed at our current site.

1946

The foundation was laid for the sanctuary of Hollywood Methodist Church that we still worship in every Sunday.

1961

An education building was added, that continues to provide space for the preschool, youth group, Bible studies, offices, and community events.

Such is a snapshot of the history of what is now called Hollywood United Methodist Church. While it is far from a complete history, it lists some major events. We could add in the replacing of the original Joy Chapel in 1894. We could add the renaming of the fellowship hall to Galilee Hall in 1983 following the closing of Galilee United Methodist Church in Oakville. We could add the early 2000’s, when funds began to be raised to build a new sanctuary upon getting news that there was no space for a new septic (space was later found). We could add 2025 when those formerly-raised funds were used to breathe new life into our buildings with restored stained glass windows, a new sanctuary roof, and new flooring throughout our space.

All of these events tell the story of our church. All of these events help paint a picture of where we have been. All of that is true and good and deserving of celebrations and thanksgiving. And yet telling our story like this strikes against a well-loved hymn. The words of Richard Avery tell us,

“The Church is not a building; the Church is not a steeple; the Church is not a resting place; the Church is the people.”

Our buildings are a part of our history, but only in that they were the space where the Church - that is, the people - were able to gather, to worship, to study, to grow, to celebrate, to serve. These buildings have been such a gift to the congregation throughout the years and will continue to be well into the future. The question we have to ask ourselves is

“How will we faithfully use these gifts to be the Church that God is calling us to be in 2026 and beyond?”

This is a question that the Hollywood Unified Board (HUB) wants to answer. As the leaders of Hollywood UMC, we want to know where God is leading the people called Hollywood UMC and how we can best use our resources to follow it. We want to know the gifts and graces of the people. We want to know the dreams of the people. We want to know who we are missing in our discussions. It’s a tall order, but I think we can do it with some help.

The first help is one that we have already begun using. The Baltimore-Washington Conference has an entire program devoted to Church Vitality. It is staffed by pastors who are trained to come alongside congregations that are asking the questions we are asking. They will walk with us. They will give us tools to better understand the questions we are asking. They will give us the tools to get a better understanding of our community. They will provide us with a Vitality Coach to work with us through it all. And the best part? It is of no cost to Hollywood UMC. This program is funded through Apportionments/Mission Shares that we–and other churches in the Conference–send to the Conference every year. This is what being part of a connectional denomination looks like.

The second help we need? That’s where you come in. To help us and the Vitality Coach best understand where we are, there is a survey. It’s one some of you actually might have done a few years ago, but we weren’t ready to begin this process then. Yes, it is a long survey. It might ask some questions you don’t know the answer to. It might ask questions you didn’t even think were relevant. The more who complete the survey, the better the information we will have to walk the road before us. If you are reading this letter, you are eligible to take this survey.

Link: https://app.readiness360.org/survey/login

Code: 0975764732

This process is one I believe we make with thanksgiving and faith. I remain so thankful for the road we’ve walked thus far, before I was called to be your pastor and the road we’ve walked together since 2020. From your presence in worship to your continued generosity, to your participation in our ministries, to your unending prayers, I am grateful. I am excited by the work we have before us because of the people I am with. May the God who started our story over 150 years ago walk with us into the future that God has planned for us.

Grace & Peace,

Pastor Matthew

A Sheep, a Coin, and a Son

Sat, 04 Oct 2025 17:02:09 GMT

What Don't We See?

“A man had 100 sheep…”

“A woman had 10 coins…”

“A man had 2 sons…”

This is how a set of Jesus’ parables open in Luke 15. The first quickly loses one of those sheep. The second loses one of those coins. The third loses a son. Our current Tuesday Bible study just discussed these three parables this week and the ways we interpret them. The general consensus was the sheep and sons parables were powerful for us, while the lost coin was a bit more meh. We spoke of how these parables bear witness to God’s joy of welcoming the lost. We spoke of how repentance works. We spoke of how some parables speak to us differently at different times in our lives. We spoke of how much harder people are than sheep and coins.

Amy-Jill Levine, the author of our current study, offers some insights and challenges to how we read these parables 2,000 years after Jesus spoke them. While she is not one to give an emphatic, universal interpretation to parables, her gentle nudging has impacted the way I read them. When it comes to this triplet of parables, she has drawn my attention to our calling and subsequent failure to “see all the people.” It’s interesting that we imagine a person who is able to see 1 missing sheep (out of 100), 1 missing coin (out of 10), but fails to see 1 missing son (out of 2). Yes, he seems keenly aware of when the younger son (the so-called prodigal) has run off to a foreign land, but is he aware when the missing one is the eldest (the so-called prudent)? Things that make you go hmmm.

It’s been on my mind since Tuesday, but it has become all the more powerful today as Joyce Anderson and I worked through our annual “Care of Members Report.” This is an annual report all UMC congregations must do as part of our annual Church Conference. It’s a way for us to consider whether we are seeing all the people. When a person becomes a member of Hollywood UMC, both the individuals and the congregation make a covenant to care for each other; pray for each other; see each other. When someone is not seen (i.e. absent), churches often blame the missing person, while forgetting the covenant works both ways.

At present, Hollywood UMC has 288 professing members. Some of those members have children who have not become full members. Not every person who is a regular part of our Sunday worship is a member of the congregation. We currently worship with roughly 94 people in the pews on Sunday and maybe 30-40 people joining us through YouTube. Who don’t we see? Who is missing? If you were here then, who did you see on March 15, 2020, but you don’t see now? Maybe there is someone who has come to join us since then, but you don’t see. Who don’t you see?

My first Sunday as the pastor of Hollywood UMC, I did not see all the people. I could not see all the people. We were just a couple of months into the COVID pandemic, and almost all of the people could only be a part of worship through the wonders of YouTube. Slowly, the doors reopened and the pews refilled. It is truly a joy that we are able to continue to offer YouTube as a way for people to worship with us when they are not able to attend in person. It is a wonderful way we allow people to dip their toe into the water of Hollywood UMC before joining us in the building. Still, most Sundays, I do not see all the people, and I confess I do not know who I do not see.

One of the things that is shared by all three of those parables is the way in which the one who lost the thing seeks it. The shepherd leaves behind the 99 to search for the 1. The woman lights a lamp and cleans her house to look for the coin. The father, upon seeing the prodigal walking, takes off running to embrace him. We can’t always know why the sheep or the coin or the son wandered off, but we can seek them out. We can call them. We can let them know we miss them. We can get some coffee with them, maybe even coffee on the church lawn this Sunday (October 5, 2025). We may not see all the people now, but can we search for those we don't see anymore? And when we find them, can our joy be known in a way like a shepherd find a sheep, a woman finds a coin, and a father finds a son? Can we truly SEE. ALL. THE. PEOPLE?

Society of Violence

Thu, 11 Sep 2025 21:41:33 GMT

Is this our society?

I woke up this morning feeling a tad overwhelmed. A night of sleeping after the events and ensuing discourse of yesterday did not soothe the feelings. If anything, it made me question the “soothing” after past events like the murder of two politicians in Minnesota, shootings in countless schools, attempted murders of presidential candidates, and the day we are called to remember, September 11, 2001. Was I soothed in a healing way or did I just forget and move on?

I’m only 35, but my years of awareness (Middle school through today) speak of a society filled with violence. Yes, countless tragedies of physical violence inflicted on children of God. Endless diatribes filled with violent rhetoric. I’ve seen a society that seems to live and thrive on violence, where the most violent rhetoric is rewarded with clicks and speaking engagements and financial wealth and political ascent. We can all say this is unacceptable, but it seems to be the society in which we find ourselves. No sooner is one moment of violence over, and we are hearing cries of retribution or vengeance or conspiracies about what really caused the violence.

And while I do not know if it is causation or correlation, my life has also seen an intense push of identifying ourselves by our partisan politics. Everything is a left vs right, Republican vs Democrat, Them vs Us situation. It’s not “American murders American.” It’s not “Child of God murders Child of God.” It’s “Crazed Leftist assassinates Paragon of Freedom.” It’s “Conservative zealot kills Defender of the Vulnerable.” Once we’ve identified ourselves and the other, the road from rhetoric to action is a slippery slide. And even if we are lucky enough to keep it at rhetoric, our feed is filled with obituaries we read with great satisfaction along the way.

In the coming weeks, the news we choose to consume and the news the algorithm force-feeds us will continue this pattern. While a house divided against itself cannot stand, it can make some savvy people a lot of money in the ensuing destruction. Here’s the best advice I can give. I give it not because I know better, but because I need to give myself the advice.

Remember who and Whose you are . We are not, at our roots, Republican or Democrat or MAGA or Progressive. We are a creature of the God who speaks, saved by the Christ who came, died, and rose again. It may very well be that our faith bids us to be engaged in partisan politics, but the minute it begins to become our identity, we have forgotten our identity and risk belonging to somebody other than Jesus the Christ.

Where is the log in our eye? I have seen countless people using this time to castigate “the other side.” It seems the way of today is to be steadfast in our belief that violent rhetoric and acts are only ever done by the other side. And even when somebody whose politics we agree with does it? Well, that’s not a real *insert partisan identifier.* At 35, I cannot say “which side” started this new logic, and I’m not sure it matters much. The violence is legion and culpability is everywhere.

True unity can not be achieved through ignoring differences. After yesterday, millions of people feel real pain because of what Charlie Kirk has meant to them. His words and his program were foundations to their daily life and way of being. It’s also true that millions of people have different, if not contradictory, views on his legacy. They may even be some of the people you worship with this Sunday. Is there a space for us to be together, hear the feelings of the other, and maybe even be changed by their presence? What makes the person whose feelings contradict yours feel the way they do?

Enemies are constant. As long as there has been the Church, there have been enemies. Christ said as much. We have also been given the way to defeat enemies, loving them. Christ not only told us, but showed us the way. When we were sinners, Christ died for us. When were enemies, Christ reconciled us. As Jesus was being arrested, we are told a disciple (Peter?) used his sword to strike a member of the group arresting Jesus, Jesus' response is simple and true. "No more of this!"

One of the things I have been doing over the past couple of weeks is helping our siblings from Olivet UMC with their weekly service at the Ripple Center at the old Hollywood Elementary. This is a senior citizen day care center (for lack of a better term) for people with developmental, physical, or memory problems. As I walked out of my house this morning, rain was the first thing I encountered. And y’all know what I have to say about rain. And so I took that with me to the saints of the Ripple Center.

And so I bring it to you. As a part of the Body of Christ, we are the baptized. We have been claimed by the God who formed us, in whose image we live. The waters are a promise. It was true the day you were baptized. It is true this day. And this water has the power to remove from us our sin, our partisan identities, all the things that would tell us that we are anything other than a child of the Living God. And as baptism is first and foremost about the love of God, there is nothing that can separate us from it.

Not the wrongs we commit

Not the wrongs committed against us

Not our partisan politics

Not the last administration

Not the current administration

Not the next administration

Not even the violence of this world

There is nothing that can separate you, me, us, Charlie Kirk, leftists, MAGA, anybody from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Be gentle with yourselves. Be gentle with your neighbor. I’ll see you Sunday.

On Cracker Barrel

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 18:35:50 GMT

Is there something to be learned here?

You might have heard from somebody recently that Cracker Barrel has decided to do some massive rebranding. What people seem to be talking about the most is the new logo they will be using, but this rebranding appears to also include a change in their iconic interior. I’ll confess that I do not know the entirety of what it will look like after the change. I do not know what it will mean for their magical store of old candy, sodas, and tchotchkes. I do not know what it means for their menu and your favorite dish that you are worried will disappear. That’s not why we’re here.

It should come as a surprise to no one that perhaps Cracker Barrel is not doing well over the last few years, at least not as well as they used to be doing. Like so many of the chain restaurants that were once the powerhouses of the late 20th Century, Cracker Barrel is no longer the place to go for younger generations. Maybe it’s because of the general economic climate; maybe it’s because of feeling “out-of-date”; maybe it’s a bit of both and more. Regardless, it seems that the leadership of Cracker Barrel decided they needed to make changes to survive, if not thrive, in today’s world. Maybe it will work. Maybe it won’t.

Again, that’s not really why we are here. The question we might ask ourselves instead is, what can we learn from this for Hollywood UMC? Our goal each year might not be profit, but we all have our own metrics-of-choice for how we know we are living out the mission we have undertaken to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world by knowing Jesus and making Jesus known. Maybe for you that is the similar-to-businesses metric of meeting our budget. Maybe your metric-of-choice is increasing attendance on Sunday morning. Maybe your metric-of-choice is a growing Sunday School and Youth Group. Whatever your metric-of-choice is, is Hollywood UMC meeting it?

Back to Cracker Barrel for a minute. What was it that led people to Cracker Barrel in the past? What was it that made people love Cracker Barrel? It might be that it allowed people to remember a time that has passed, a time of general stores and idyllic living. As one article I read this morning taught me, most people do not have the frame of reference for such a time. While I do have some memories from Bushwood and Seventh District, those memories are not what makes me nostalgic when I step into Cracker Barrel. No, that nostalgia is from Cracker Barrel itself. The memories the store takes me back to are 6:00 am breakfasts along the interstate on our way to Myrtle Beach or Florida during summer vacations of my youth. The restaurant pointed to itself. With a shrinking number of the public that has the childhood memories of Cracker Barrel and even fewer people remembering the pre-war general stores, Cracker Barrel seems to have determined they cannot thrive on nostalgia alone.

Likewise, churches often bring a sense of nostalgia — or at least they often claim to. Church buildings are filled with memories - memories of baptisms and youth groups and weddings and funerals. Whether you were born and raised at Hollywood UMC or have joined us more recently, coming into the church might bring back a deluge of memories, perhaps no different than our memories walking into a Cracker Barrel. What do we do then when people don’t have that point of reference to bring about that same nostalgia. Could it be similar to walking into a Cracker Barrel for the first time with no memory of old general stores or old memories of a Cracker Barrel along the interstate?

This is what has been sticking in my brain since I saw the news, at least after I processed my own feelings and grief about it. It’s not a matter of changes MUST be made, but it’s a question of how can Hollywood UMC be positioned to meet its mission statement of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world by knowing Jesus and making Jesus known. Pointless change is just that, but are there faithful and bold changes that might be made to serve in a world that no longer has the reference point of church it once did? How can we function so that we do not simply invoke a reference point of nostalgia of the “good old days,” but lead people to the reference point of Christ?

People say Cracker Barrel’s changes will lead to its failure (aka its inability to make money). They obviously see it reversed. Not only do they seem to think these changes will allow them to thrive, but to not change is a threat to their continued survival. Time will tell, I guess. For a congregation, every change - and lack of change - is a risk. Maybe it’s a risk to members. Maybe it’s a risk of money. Maybe it’s a risk of reputation. What is never at risk, though, is the work that Christ has done. We stand in the shadow of the cross, free to serve God in this day and age, free to take risks. The question is what risks will we take? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Year Six Begins

pastor@hollywoodumcmd.org (Matthew Tate) — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 17:32:01 GMT

A Look Back and Forward

Hollywood UMC,

In the United Methodist Church, July 1 is a big day for pastors and congregations. When there are times of pastoral transitions, July 1 is when these new appointments take effect. Congregations and pastors are beginning new relationships starting today, not knowing what the future holds for them, but trusting in the God that formed them to guide them every step of the way. It can be a time full of uncertainty and hope and grief and all the number of emotions that come along with any change in our lives.

For me, today begins the sixth year of me being appointed as pastor of Hollywood United Methodist Church. As with so many anniversaries in our lives, today calls for a moment of contemplation and celebration. The world was so different on that first day. What we might have called the middle (or, optimistically, the end) of the COVID-19 pandemic turned out to still be the beginning. As I preached my first sermon that Sunday, the sanctuary was largely empty. It would remain that way for a couple of months before we began slowly inviting people back into the sanctuary. Other than that, it was all about YouTube, Zoom, and parking lot Communion.

To say things have changed since then would be an understatement. While we do continue to stream our service on YouTube, we now see the sanctuary filled with people every Sunday. Some of these faces are ones that have been ones who have been a foundational part of the congregation for decades; some have come to join us for the first time. So far in 2025, we are averaging 92 people in the sanctuary every Sunday, with 171 people celebrating Easter with us!! We have bid farewell to some of our staff over the years, but also welcomed new ones to our team. I want to list off some of my favorite things of my first five years:

This past December, our Director of Music, Mary Jane Seanor, led our incredible choir in the first cantata since before the pandemic. It was a true joy to hear the story told through their songs and see so many join in to help the choir. Mary Jane continues to lead the strong music ministry that has been so foundational at Hollywood UMC over the years, incorporating the choir, quartet, soloists, and instrumentalists as we worship.
Ryan Quinn, our Youth Director, led 18 Youth on a retreat to West River earlier this year that helped them dive deep into their personal relationship with Christ and grow deeper in their faith. Even better than that, they returned to us and led a worship service to witness to us grown folks how we can follow their footsteps of faith.
Janet McGovern, following a wonderful term as Council Chair, has really thrown herself into getting our ministry to children up and running. What has come from this is an incredible Sunday School program running in what was the Children’s Church segment of worship with a wonderful group of volunteers ready to love and teach any and all children, from nursery through elementary school, that the Holy Spirit brings into our sanctuary.
Brian and Gail have undertaken the incredible task of ensuring that we continue to remember and celebrate our history, most notably through the beautiful stained glass windows our ancestors in the faith have given us. Not only are they a reminder of the saints that came before us, but they continue to tell the Gospel story. Through their steadfast work and the contributions of many, we have already seen ⅔ of our windows restored to their original beauty, with fundraising ongoing as the final windows are being worked on.

All of this is just the tip of the iceberg of what God has been doing in the life of Hollywood UMC over the last few years. There are countless others that have been alongside on this journey so far, supporting our ministries with their prayers, presence, gifts, service and their witness. That includes you! It is because of God’s steadfast presence and power through this congregation over the last five years that I have so much hope for what the future holds.

As I write this letter, our Unified Board is hard at work discerning the long term vision of Hollywood UMC. We have been having incredible conversations into where we believe the Holy Spirit is leading us. What are the gifts we’ve been given? What are the needs of the community? What changes might we need to make to be the people God called us to be back in 1868? How can we use our wonderful building to best be Hollywood UMC. This is the work of the Church, and I firmly believe God is moving through us to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow. And I hope you will continue to walk with us on this journey!

Back on that first Sunday, the text was Philippians 3:1-11. Here, Paul reminds the Philippians that every reason he might have to boast is nothing when compared to knowing Jesus Christ. That’s the new paradigm in which we live. Yes, our pews are filling more and more. Yes, we have the best staff around. Yes, we have so much fun together through potlucks and talent shows and trivia nights. Yes, we have incredibly beautiful stained glass windows. All of that is NOTHING if we do not know Jesus. And so it is that that moves us forward. It is about how full pews and incredible staff and loving fellowship and beautiful windows help us know Jesus all the better so that we may walk into an unknown future to make Jesus known. And it is because of that that I have hope for year six.

See you Sunday!

Pastor Matthew