For 120 years now, First Presbyterian Church of Kewanee, Illinois, has possessed two rare treasures that members and friends often took for granted.
The sanctuary of the church of about 60 members, located an hour southeast of the Quad Cities, is home to two stained-glass windows featuring people of color, including Jesus and Mary Magdalene.
Panelists recently convened to discuss protecting voting rights that in many states are increasingly imperiled decided by the end of the hourlong webinar that churches have an important role to play.
Blacks, Indigenous peoples, and other people of color (BIPOC) are not simply those who are marginalized because of their race. They often find themselves working the hardest for racial justice. My friends of color tell me it is grueling to feel the oppression and to also be left with most of the responsibility for fighting it. Working toward racial justice can be exhausting.
After COVID-19 forced the cancelation of planned projects and in-person worship, Coastland Commons, a 1001 New Worshiping Community in Seattle Presbytery, moved to Zoom discussions about their city’s history of land use by Black, Indigenous and people of color communities. After about six months of Zoom gatherings, they figured out a safe way to see Seattle anew through socially distanced community walks. They reached out to the Museum of History and Industry (MOHAI), which organizes redlining tours in Seattle’s Capitol Hill and Central District neighborhoods.
In this classic prayer of confession, we remember both the sins of commission (what we do) and the sins of omission (what we do not do), and we acknowledge that sins are both personal and corporate. Of course, when worship rolls around to the prayer of confession, it’s not unusual for pastors to hear, “I don’t come to church to feel bad about myself. Can’t we just skip the prayer of confession?”
Sounds like the same old same old, doesn’t it? God’s people, called the “chosen ones,” are somehow unable to live faithfully in gratitude to God in spite of God’s love, grace and care for them. The psalmist attempts to voice God’s bounty and God’s faithfulness as well as God’s frustration that they cannot seem to embrace the values of the One who gave them life and who has promised to sustain them. Over and over again they become a disappointment. They are tempted by the “gods” of the cultures in which they find themselves, forgetting the source of the true freedom they have been given as God’s own children.
Add the Presbytery of Milwaukee to the list of Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) mid councils and churches to help heal people by wiping away their medical debt.
Racial Equity & Women’s Intercultural Ministries (RE&WIM) announces the kickoff of its October Election-Fest. The month-long event is designed to help young adults of color navigate this difficult and critically important election year.
At Caldwell Presbyterian Church, the walls of our sanctuary talk. The voices are those of enslaved African Americans owned by the Caldwell family on a plantation north of our city of Charlotte, North Carolina. Before emancipation, their forced labor, blood, sweat and tears created the fortune that was later given to this church to build its sanctuary in 1922.
