With two members in dissent, the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board voted Friday to appoint a three-member task force to study equitable unified clergy compensation by exploring “innovative models to increase the number of churches that can engage pastoral leadership.”
Having read Matthew Desmond’s book “Poverty, by America” together, members of the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board meeting online Thursday discussed what they might do to help eradicate systemic poverty, as called for by the PC(USA)’s Matthew 25 invitation.
Wednesday, the first of three days of online meetings for the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board, began with worship and ended with a devotion. In between, board members heard reports, held fearless dialogues with the Rev. Dr. Gregory Ellison and team, and celebrated the work and ministry of James Rissler, the president and CEO of the Presbyterian Investment and Loan Program (PILP), who is retiring at the end of the year.
The Matthew 25 Team, created by the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board to help do the work of the Matthew 25 movement, turned its attention Monday to giving mid councils and congregations tools to minister to people living in the growing number of states passing anti-transgender and anti-LGBTQ+ legislation.
Each year as May 5 approaches, which is the National Day of Awareness & Action for Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls & Two-Spirit People, Madison McKinney feels what she called on Wednesday “a heavy burden in my heart.”
The Rev. Jeromey Howard, who serves First Presbyterian Church in Montgomery, New York, started the third and final day of Presbyterian Mission Agency Board meetings Friday with a brief devotion taken from Micah 6:8.
Thursday was mostly a teach-in day for the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board as members took in Matthew 25 presentations on militarism from mission co-workers in Colombia and Guatemala and climate change from Jessica Maudlin, Associate for Sustainable Living and Earth Care concerns in the Presbyterian Hunger Program.
Sandwiched between two brief but effective worship services, the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board met via Zoom Thursday to learn more about the work of innovation, repair, Matthew 25, the grant process and professional development and diversity training that’s ongoing among PMA staff.
The three recipients of this year’s Women of Faith Awards were honored Thursday in a virtual ceremony hosted by Racial Equity and Women’s Intercultural Ministries and Presbyterian Women. Watch the 44-minute ceremony here.
In addition to approving the Women of Faith awards for 2022 (see that story here) the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board concluded its three-day meeting at Stony Point Center Friday by hearing reports by corresponding members, approving reports from its three newly formed teams and, as it always does, worshiping the God who guides the work.
