Thank you to all those who submitted entries for our 2018 Stigma Free Essay Contest! And congratulations to our contest winners!:

Junior High Essay Winner: Melody Hart, Homeschooled (Gillette, NJ), 8th Grade
Junior High Project Winner: Melody Hart, Homeschooled (Gillette, NJ), 8th Grade
High School Essay Winner: Samia Shivon, Boonton High School (Boonton, NJ), 11th Grade
High School Project Winner: Esme Lockwood, Montville Township High School (Montville, NJ), 11th Grade

Click HERE to view the winning essays and project ideas. Also, click HERE to see what some of our contestants had to say about why it’s important to be stigma free!

The Montville United Methodist Church and Boonton United Methodist Churches recently sponsored an exciting, hope-filled, and stigma-free related event for the community called:

“Rising Out of the Ashes”

We want to give a big THANK YOU to all who helped to make this event a huge success! We had countless food donations from Boiling Springs, Shop Rite, the Village Market, Red Barn, 5 Brothers Bagels & Deli, and Don’s Sandwich Shop.

We were also blessed to have organizations such as New Pathway, HEART (Helping Educate At Risk Teens), Montville’s Stigma Free Task Force, Boiling Springs, and Mickey Gilbert’s College Choice present, helping to inform and resource everyone there.

Finally, we were privileged with the opportunity to have the NJ Mental Health Players offer powerful and meaningful skits to help speak into stigmatized issues of our day such as mental health and addiction.

Who knows what Boonton UMC & Montville UMC will do next in regards to this Stigma Free Movement sweeping the state. But whatever it is, we sure hope that you’ll choose to be a part of it!

Last year, from October 7-November 4, 2018, we delved into some very difficult, but relevant topics that were affecting people within our communities and across our nation to a tremendous degree. This was the beginning of the Stigma Free Movement within our local church, and we were grateful for the congregation’s and community’s willingness to engage in such meaningful dialogue. In fact, we hope peoples’ engagement with these topics and participation in these conversations continue!

Are you an organization or church that is interested in doing
a similar thing to help spread this important message?
Feel free to reach out to Pastor Donald to find out more!