The Rev. Dr. Seth Agidi, moderator of the General Assembly of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Ghana (EPCG), came to the 223rd General Assembly (2018) of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) to strengthen relationships with his brothers and sisters in Christ, but also to visit family – his Lake Erie family.
Coffee is a major agricultural product of Mexico, the beverage of choice among millions of people in the U.S., and a link in a mission partnership that transforms people in both countries.
Working with decision makers looks different depending on where you are. Convincing your toddler to brush her teeth looks different from convincing your teenager to write a college admissions essay, which is different still from convincing the school board to keep funding the arts program you care so deeply about.
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) continued to lose members in 2017, extending a pattern that has persisted since the mid-1960s. At the end of the year, church membership totaled 1,415,053, a decline of 67,714 members from 2016.
When Presbyterian pastor the Rev. Dr. Marcia Mount Shoop saw the premiere of Student Athlete in New York City this past fall, with her husband, John Mount Shoop, she felt incredibly sad — yet hopeful.
You would never know from the joyful exuberance of the dancing children that they live in the midst of grinding poverty.
The Sancti Spiritus Presbyterian Church of the Presbyterian Reformed Church in Cuba established a mission in Toyos — one of the poorest neighborhoods in the town of Sancti Spiritus — to provide hope to the barrio’s hopeless.
In 1993, during a study abroad program to Central America, I visited El Salvador, a small Central American nation that had recently signed peace accords after more than a decade of civil war. In a unique exchange with Salvadoran youth, during a Bible study on the beach, we privileged, and somewhat sheltered North American college students were interrogated about our countries’ policies and forced to reflect on our own complicity.
Nearly 8,000 miles separate congregations in Santa Barbara, California, and Chiang Mai, Thailand. Yet nothing can separate the growing bond they have shared as sister churches in mission since 2013.
By the time Newark (N.J.) Presbytery was invited to participate in a two-year Vital Congregations Initiative pilot program, it had already been placed under an administrative commission in the Synod of the Northeast.
Iona, an island off the coast of Scotland, was home to a medieval monastic community. By the early 1900s, the community was long gone, and the buildings were in ruins. George MacLeod, a pastor in a working-class dockside congregation was frustrated by the men being sent to him for internships from the seminary. They had head smarts but were unable to connect with the men on the docks and the families in his community. So, he devised a plan. During the crushing years of the Depression, MacLeod brought together unemployed tradesmen and young seminarians and sent them to rebuild the monastic quarters and the abbey chapel. Working, praying and sharing in everyday life, they rebuilt not only a historical landmark but also a spiritual community that continues to have global influence today.
