St. Paul's Wolf's Covenant Church in York, Pennsylvania, was adopted and received into membership during the conference's Annual Meeting last weekend. German immigrants formed the congregation in 1763. The church formerly was a member of the United Church of Christ. "It has a lot of history, a lot of energy, and a warm embrace," says retiring Conference Supt. Robert Dvorak.

At the conference, delegates also received four other churches, elected Howard K. Burgoyne to be its new superintendent, and celebrated Dvorak's ministry.

The Covenant planted three of the new churches:

• Queenswest Covenant Church is located in Long Island, New York. The church launched in 2004 and has an average attendance of 100. Peter Sung is the pastor. Queenswest meets at a local high school.
• Metro Community Church is located in Fort Lee, New Jersey, and was launched in 2004. Establishment of the new congregation came about through a partnership of the East Coast Conference, the Department of Church Growth and Evangelism, and NewSong Covenant Church in Irvine, California. The new church has an average attendance of 140. The church meets at the Jewish Community Center. Peter Ahn is the pastor.
• Brooklyn Covenant Ministries is located in Brooklyn, New York, and has an average attendance of 55. Conway Boyce is the pastor.

In addition to St. Paul's, the other adoption was Cornerstone Church of Boston, which launched in 2004 as an independent congregation. About 230 attend worship services each week. It currently rents space from The Church of the Covenant, a landmark building that is more than 200 years old.

Dvorak says he is excited that the three plants are multi-cultural congregations. Two of them, Metro Community and Queenswest, have a large Asian population. Cornerstone has large student and Asian American populations.

Burgoyne will begin his duties September 1. Conference participants feted Dvorak during a dinner on Friday night. "I've meet such wonderful people," says Dvorak of his tenure. "I love the churches. This is the conference for me."

However, "it's time for me to go," he quickly adds. "The conference is going to do well with new energy."