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Mission Yearbook
After earning a PhD and teaching for a few years, Dr. Chanequa Walker-Barnes decided to enroll in seminary, where her eyes were opened in an unexpected and unpleasant way.
Well into his baccalaureate address at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary this past spring, the Rev. Dr. Justin Reed asked graduates from the classes of 2020, 2021 and 2022, “How is God different now than when you started?”
Communicators with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) used written, visual and aural tools of their trade to garner 10 awards during this year’s Best of the Church Press ceremony held online.
My minister father frequently uttered pithy sayings and pieces of Scripture, one of which was the text from Matthew 6:34 about today’s trouble being enough for today. Of course, given his generation, such sayings were usually offered in the King James Version of the Bible, so his quotation of Matthew 6:34 was: “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”
For the past five decades, the Rev. Jim Wallis has been exploring the complexity and possibility of two of his favorite words, “justice” and “faith.” Wallis, the founder of Sojourners magazine who now directs the Center on Faith and Justice at Georgetown University, recently delivered a talk at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., exploring whether American democracy is even possible given the threats to voting rights, civil rights and any number of other challenges Americans are facing.
The return to in-person worship is underway, and one can almost hear David’s joy echoed in Psalm 122, when he proclaimed, “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’”
What do working for the common good and crafting have in common? They both require the commitment, flexibility and hope to let something new emerge from something old, raw or broken. In 2018, North Decatur Presbyterian Church in Decatur, Georgia, a congregation with long-held commitments to social justice, created a new ministry that weaves both crafting and activism together. They call it “craftivism.” And its mission is simply to craft for a cause.
Those who attended the Synod of the Covenant’s Equipping Preachers recent webinar learned how well humor can work, even when it’s delivered from behind the pulpit.
The tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001, are 21 years in our past. The consequences of that infamous day continue to bring suffering and pain. Today we remember those who perished and seek to live in such a way that the lives lost bring good amid ongoing division and mistrust.
“The language of feasting is often the language of the church,” the Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney said to open a recent lecture in Watts Chapel at Union Presbyterian Seminary. “The expectation in Black church culture is you go to church to be fed to do the work you’re called to do.”
