She said she doesn't want to allow the continuing backlash to the legendarily controversial Re-Imagining God conference of 1993 to continue silencing feminist theologians in the denomination. That conference, which marked the mid-point of the World Council of Churches' "Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women," generated intense debate within the church after $30,000 in Bicentennial Fund money was used to help defray the expenses of women theologians attending it. The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was the only Re-Imagining sponsor to fire a staff person as a result of the controversy. "Re-Imagining was a turning point for women in the church, a flash point," Smith told the Presbyterian News Service in an interview after speaking to women ministers at an event preceding the annual Montreat Women's Conference. "My goal is not to create another flash point, but to give women an opportunity to come together as women theologians around the world Š to (contribute to) the wisdom of the … [Read more...]

For most of its life, the magazine was underwritten by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), which sent free subscriptions to every pastor and co-pastor. But Monday Morning lost its subsidy in a round of cost-cutting in the mid-1990s and was forced to try to support itself through advertising revenue and subscription sales. Its readership was aging -- in recent years, its strongest support came mostly from retired pastors and their spouses. For a generation or two, Monday Morning was taken for granted, just part of the Presbyterian landscape. It was named for "the off-day for preachers, after their hard work was done . . . a day to react, reflect, to gab, to chat with other preachers about what was going on behind the scenes in the Presbyterian Church," said Houston Hodges, who edited the magazine for a few years in the late 1990s. The magazine "came free; everybody expected it. It was like breathing out and breathing in." But "in the end, Monday Morning, like many publications, was a … [Read more...]

That doesn't necessarily represent a decision to pull back permanently or fully from producing the Covenant People curriculum. Despite disappointing sales, "there's still a strong feeling that the church wants something from the denomination" -- that many Presbyterian congregations do want a Sunday school curriculum specifically written for Presbyterians, said Lynn Shurley Jr., a Kentucky pastor who's chair of the General Assembly Council's Congregational Ministries Division Committee. So curriculum development leaders are reluctant simply to pull the plug on Covenant People -- in which about $6 million has already been invested, and which is the first denominationally-based curriculum the Presbyterian church has produced in 30 years. But they also recognize that without improved sales, this curriculum -- now five years in the making -- cannot succeed. Sandra Moak Sorem, publisher of Congregational Ministries Publishing, is preparing recommendations regarding the long-term future of … [Read more...]