The Reverend Byungmoo Lee was appointed to serve the Wesley United Methodist Church on North Maple Street in Hadley effective July 1, 2016, as announced by Bishop Sudarshana Devadhar, Resident Bishop of the New England Conference of the United Methodist Church.
Rev. Lee, who prefers to be called "Moo", is a native of Korea. He finished college at Yonsei University in Korea, and came to the United States in 1992. He studied theology and comparative religion at Boston University. Rev. Lee is an ordained elder in the New England Annual Conference. He has served Barrington United Methodist Church and First United Methodist Church of Warren/Bristol, RI; at Tewksbury United Methodist Church in Tewksbury, MA; and as associate pastor at North Boston Korean United Methodist Church in Boston, MA.
As a way of introducing himself, Rev. Lee has provided the following information: My personal interest areas are comparative philosophy of religion, especially Buddhism and Confucianism, and interfaith dialogue, that I have studied for about three decades. As a pastor, my main concerns are economic justice and hunger issues. I believe that transformation happens only when one intentionally studies the Bible and the complexity of the world through “honest sharing,” which means facing our existential situation without pretense, and one puts these into his/her practices in daily life. My understanding of “faith” is “the power that makes us to face the realities of ourselves and the world without fear.
Rev. Lee resides in a home owned by Wesley United Methodist Church, located off East Pleasant Street in Amherst with his wife Bo Yeon Han, who prefers to be called "Bo". He replaces Rev. Ronald Wilson, who has retired from active ministry.
