|
| |
|
You are invited to attend the UMORE
Fall Retreat at Camp Wesley Woods
Indianola, Iowa, November 19-20, 2004 |
| The following is condensed
from an article about Pastor R.D. Streeter, 2004 Luncheon and Fall Retreat
leader, by Chuck Offenburger and printed in OKOBOJI Magazine, September
2003. Photography is by Shawn Fagan. This material is reprinted with
permission from OKOBOJI Magazine. Early this
past July, when the campaigns for and against the idea of putting a gambling
boat on the Iowa Great Lakes were most intense, there appeared on the front
lawn of the Methodist parsonage in Arnolds Park the front half of a motor
boat. The stern had been cut off. Blue waves of water had been painted where
the cut had been made, and beside the unusual display was a big sign: "Sink
the boat.” |
.jpg) |
Also there on the lawn, at different moments during the
campaign, were life-size, cut-out photo figures. One was of Elvis Presley
holding a sign saying, “Vote no! Thank you, thank you, very much!” Clint
Eastwood held a sign, “Vote no, or make my day.” John Wayne's sign said,
“Vote no, pilgrim.”
Presiding over the displays from the nice wooden deck built on the front of
the parsonage was Rev. Richard Dean (“call me R.D.”) Streeter, in his fourth
year as pastor of Calvary United Methodist Church.
Wearing tattered shorts, a black T-shirt with “CasiNO!” on the chest and
dark sunglasses, the grinning Streeter was waving at the people who were
driving by and honking.
“You know,” he said, “you can get a lot said with a little humor.”
Streeter has used a lot of that in one of the most unusual ministries in the
Midwest.
“It's unusual because, in a resort area like this, you get a new
congregation every week,” he said. “In a way, it's like preaching in an
elevator — you have a captive audience for a few minutes, and a new one on
every floor. You can't find out who your regular, active members are until,
like, October.”
To serve them, he has a traditional Sunday service at 9:00 a.m. in the
church along U.S. Highway 71 in the heart of Arnolds Park. But from May
through September, he also conducts a popular “Boat-In” service between West
and East Okoboji, adjacent to the bridge on the Iowa Great Lakes Trail.
For both services, he typically turns out in wild, brightly-colored
Hawaiian-style shirts, white trousers and beige loafers. With a mane of dark
curly hair that he wears long over his collar, and always with the
sunglasses when he's outdoors, he cuts quite a figure.
R.D. grew up in Des Moines, the youngest of eight children in a broken
family. After graduating from East High School, he joined the U.S. Navy and
served five years as a radio operator, including six months in Vietnam in
1966, in the early stages of the war there.
After the Navy, he “partied a little too much,” but went to work as an
assistant service manage at a Firestone tire and appliance store in downtown
Des Moines.
He also married De Simmerman, a native of Winterset, whom he met when her
older brother married R.D.'s sister in 1961.
He felt the first stirrings of a call to the ministry when he was working in
Des Moines and attending Easton Place UMC.
“I was married with two children, leaving a job where I was making $30,000 a
year for a job where I'd make $12,000, giving up a Cadillac and two Gold
Wing motorcycles for a Ford station wagon,” he said. And yet it seemed
right.
Serving three churches was a challenge— “what you need in that situation is
a good sermon and a fast car” — and he added to it by commuting for seminary
training at St. Paul's United Methodist Seminary in Kansas City. He also
began studies in psychology at Indian Hills Community College in
Ottumwa…earning his bachelor degree from Buena Vista University's Mason City
Center.
His public stand against gambling during the campaign at the Iowa Lakes this
past summer (2003) was not out of character for him. He fought the casino
boat issue with sermons, with the displays on the front yard of the
parsonage and in a public forum that casino proponents sponsored in
mid-June.
“I hadn't even planned on going to that meeting, but then De told me I
should,” Streeter said. “When I got there, it turned out that all of the
people like me who were opposing the casino stayed away. The only people
there were those in favor, but as kind of a show, they put one empty chair
up on the stage where they had several of their speakers sitting. They made
a big announcement that the empty chair was for the opposition, and they
invited anybody to come fill it and have their say - not expecting that
anybody would. I hadn't prepared anything to say, but I felt I had to go up
and sit down in that chair.”
When it came time for Streeter to speak, he talked about his father's
gambling problems, and about how so much cash is unaccounted for in casino
operations.
“My out-pitch to them,“ he said, “was that when I think of gambling, the
thing that comes to my mind is of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ hanging on
the cross, and the greedy people below gambling for his robe.”
What kind of reaction did that get? “Stone silence,” he said. “I loved it!”
When the voting ended…and the anti-casino forces had prevailed, Streeter was
among the first to begin trying to heal the split in the lakes area. “My
message was that there be no ‘in your face’ attitudes after the vote,” he
said. “We need the ‘FIDO’ policy — Forget It, Drive On.”
“Rev. Streeter is a colorful, one of a kind, gospel preacher, who has a
heart for the downtrodden and dispossessed,” said Rev. Marcia Sangel, the
superintendent of the Spencer District of The United Methodist Church.
“As such, he is a tireless fundraiser whose mission is to help those in
need. His good-natured humor and southern drawl give people the first
impression that he is a laid-back witness for Christ. But underneath, he is a
champion against injustices and an outspoken zealet against the evils of
gambling.”
Editor’s Note: UMORE is pleased to endorse Pastor R.D. Streeter as our 2004
Annual Conference Luncheon speaker, and leader of our 2004 Fall Retreat at
Camp Wesley Woods, November 19-20. |
|
Click here to view the retreat schedule |
|
Your $45 registration includes Friday night
snacks and lodging, Saturday breakfast, Saturday lunch and all snacks.
Please bring a snack lunch for the Friday evening meal. Drinks will be
provided. A map and general information will be mailed to you
when your registration is received.
Click
here to register. |
|
|
|
