United Methodist Women

The Washington United Methodist Women met at 11:30 a.m., Friday, Sept. 12, 2014, in the Fellowship Hall at the church. Twenty-two members and one guest, Pastor Jim Stiles, were present. A delicious potluck dinner was served. Hostesses were Oma Munn, Virginia Tschantz and Gerry Schmidt. Ilene Schnicker gave a blessing before the dinner.

The secretary?s report for the last meeting, in May, was written by Margaret Crawford and was read and approved.

Shirley Pfeifer gave the treasurer?s report. She reported on the Ingathering kits and encouraged members to bring items and put them in the yellow box at the back of the sanctuary. The Ingathering will be Nov. 1 in Mount Pleasant. She then reported on the Pink Impact Christian Women?s Conference and the DVDs that were downloaded. Three two-hour sessions had been scheduled on successive Mondays from 7 to 9 p.m. in Fellowship Hall for viewing the DVDs, the dates being Sept. 22, Sept. 29, and Oct. 6. She had also brought school kits for members to fill.

Charlotte informed the group of the results of the nominating committee, and thanked the officers and coordinators for accepting another year of service.

It was noted that Marilyn Whitenack, Spiritual Growth, was absent due to a torn rotator cuff and could use some uplifting.

Sharon Wagner, Social Action, gave a report on the 19th Amendment to the Constitution (1920), on citizens? right to vote. She gave information on education, civil rights and global concerns. She provided a candidate checklist: ?A Questionnaire for Candidates Seeking Election,? as preparation for this year?s midterm elections. She left a detailed list of those running for various offices in the surrounding areas. She encouraged everyone to get out and vote.

Virginia Tschantz, Education and Interpretation, reported on three missionary birthdays. She shared an article from the September ?Response? magazine, ?Bright Lights,? and reminded members of the informative and interesting articles in the magazine available for all to read. She read from her ?God?s Little Devotions Book? and shared a cute story, ?Looking Through Old Stuff,? always bringing humor to the group.

Ilene reminded the group of the Country Fair coming up in November, and a possible cookie walk.

Jennine Wolf gave the program on food safety, which is an environmental health issue that affects every American citizen. Her program focused on food-borne illnesses and the hardest-hit population (HRP) ? children under 10, the elderly, pregnant women, and the sick and immunocompromised. An interesting statistic from the 2000 Census was that children under 10 and the elderly over 50 make up 40 percent of the Washington County population. Lessons learned from our mothers about food safety have progressively changed over the years with the frequent food process advancements that result in new emerging safety concerns. The attendees learned about many food-borne illnesses, such as cholera from contaminated water; botulism from home-canned food ? not killing the dirty spores from the ground; Brucella from raw milk; trichinosis from uncooked pork; mycobacterium from raw milk; typhoid fever from contaminated water, hands, and raw milk. The worst one of all was: eating no more raw cookie dough due to salmonella from chickens. It was a very interesting and informative meeting. Jennine also left the Web site for the Washington Environmental Health.

The next meeting will be Oct. 10, with dessert at 1 p.m. The program will be ?Human Trafficking,? with a special speaker.