The Washington Corrections Center for Women is both the largest and the only maximum and medium security prison for women in the state. It’s surrounded by barbed wire, and you have to go through five locked gates to get to the main population.
On behalf of the Presbyterian Mission Agency, the Mission Development Resources Committee recently approved Mission Program Grants to 11 new worshiping communities and one presbytery for its congregational transformation work.
The pandemic has forced us to embrace digital technology (Zoom, etc.) like never before, but in many places that has looked a lot different to what it looks like in the USA.
The Office of Mission Engagement and Support — whose charge it is to provide resources that educate, inspire and encourage the ministries of the PC(USA) — in conjunction with the PC(USA)’s Office of Public Witness in Washington, D.C., wants to ensure that congregations are prepared for Christian and Citizen Sunday on Sept. 20.
The Sunday after Labor Day has always been a big day of celebration for many Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) congregations around the country. But this year the beginning of Christian Education week — which is set aside in the PC(USA) as a reminder of the importance of faith formation and those who teach and plan for another church program year — looks and feels entirely different.
When the Rev. Jane Anabe — associate pastor at Silver Spring Presbyterian Church in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania — first heard about Minister Educational Debt Assistance through The Board of Pensions of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), she didn’t think she would qualify. One of the many programs the Board has implemented to provide support to ministers, particularly newly ordained ministers, Minister Educational Debt Assistance, offered through the Assistance Program, helps ministers repay educational debt, making it easier for them to accept a wide range of positions and wholly commit their best gifts to ministry.
She was disappointed and deflated as she reflected on three years of pastoring her church: This isn’t what I thought ministry would be like. Trying to be as gentle as possible, I asked, “What did you expect?”
