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Holy Week resources and reflections

The Cross in Our Context: Jesus and the Suffering World

By Douglas John Hall
Augsburg Fortress. 2003. 2243 pp. Pb. $17.

— Review by Edwin W. Stock, Raleigh, N.C.

The author is a Canadian Lutheran scholar whose book was first delivered in 2002 as 10 lectures at Trinity Lutheran Seminary, Columbus, Ohio. It is easy to read because it has an oral style. Yet, it is scholarly as it addresses Martin Luther's "thin tradition," a theology of the cross (theologia crucis) not well known or appreciated in Reformed Calvinistic branches, whose theology begins with the foundational pillar of the Sovereignty of God.

216th GA will consider overtures on Jewish-Presbyterian relations

The question of how the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) should relate to people of other faiths — how to be Christian in a pluralistic world — will definitely be before this year’s General Assembly in Richmond.

In part, that’s fallout from the controversial new Messianic congregation in Philadelphia — Avodat Yisrael, started with $145,000 in financial support from Philadelphia Presbytery, plus $40,000 from Trinity Synod and $75,000 from a General Assembly Council committee.

Outlook reporter, art director honored by Associated Church Press

TORONTO — Leslie Scanlon, The Outlook's national reporter, and Stann Bailey, its art director, received honors from the Associated Church Press during the organization’s annual meeting here April 18-21.

Scanlon, who has been with The Outlook for four years, received a second-place award in magazine newswriting for her coverage of the Cincinnati Presbytery meeting at which minister Stephen Van Kuiken lost his ordination last summer. (That decision was later overturned by the Covenant Synod PJC.)

Pastor Dean Thompson named president of Louisville Seminary

LOUISVILLE – Emphasizing his new role as a "pastor-president," a minister from West Virginia — Dean K. Thompson, pastor of First church, Charleston — has been named the eighth president of Louisville Seminary.

With Dorothy Ridings, chair of the seminary’s board of trustees, saying that the seminary needs pastoral leadership at a difficult time, Thompson told a crowd gathered Thursday in the seminary’s chapel that he and his wife, Rebecca, feel led by the Holy Spirit to come to Louisville. "We’ve been nurtured by the Spirit, comforted, taught and guided towards you," Thompson told the crowd.

Princeton Seminary names Iain Torrance as its sixth president

Princeton Seminary's board of trustees has named Iain R. Torrance as the institution’s sixth president. Torrance is moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, dean of the Faculty of Arts and Divinity at the University of Aberdeen, and master of Christ’s College, Aberdeen, where he is professor in patristics and Christian ethics.

  In assuming the presidency on July 1, Torrance will succeed Thomas W. Gillespie, who served from 1983 to 2004.

Presbytery cannot base financial support for churches on per capita participation, says synod PJC

Heartland Presbytery cannot require congregations to make per capita payments and mission pledges to be considered for loans or other financial support from the presbytery, the Permanent Judicial Commission of the Mid-America Synod has ruled.

The synod judicial commission ruled April 3 that the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) provides "that the session (of a congregation) has sole responsibility to distribute the gifts of the people" and that Heartland’s policy, adopted in June 2003, had a "coercive force" that was not acceptable.

Stop gun violence

Nothing could be more timely, or more in the spirit of an Easter faith than the Moderator’s and Stated Clerk’s March 24th letter to the denomination. They deplore the gun violence in this country and its tragic toll in human lives (28,000-35,000 deaths per year since the 1960s). They call attention to the federal ban on assault weapons that will expire this September on the watch of an apathetic, fearful Congress. Since Congress is not expected to act, those million moms, bless their hearts, are on the march again, on Mother’s Day in our nation’s capital.

Trusting that which we don’t control

In previous years this magazine has sponsored what I thought was a wearying debate between those who took a rather relaxed view of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and those who insisted that belief in the resurrection of the body was essential. Without it we were all doomed to the theological and moral wasteland of Christian thought.

To be vital, congregations need to make a difference, says researcher

Nancy Ammerman recognizes Lake Wobegon Lutheran Church when she sees it — the congregation where the families have all been there for generations, where everybody knows everybody and there’s no question at all about which hymns will be sung or what food will show up at the potluck: tuna noodle casserole and Jell-O with fruit. Every time.

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