It's sort of like the mom trying to clean up the kids while they're still playing in the mud pile -- a task force created to study theological issues and lead the church in spiritual discernment, just getting started at a time when the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is talking openly about a possible split and preparing to vote on the divisive issue of ordaining gays and lesbians.
Charity Forbes suspects that, because she's 28, she gets away with some things, such as wearing jeans to the office or toe rings, that might be challenged if she were an older pastor. But she's also living out firsthand some of the difficulties of being a young, single minister in a denomination that's aging -- and in a culture where many of her peers don't view the ministry as a desirable or compelling line of work.
A connectional presbytery in this Internet culture is a wired presbytery. An underlying theological premise driving this concept is the realization that God has providentially placed us in a technologically advanced period. Not to use the communication media available to us for advancing the gospel would be like the Apostle Paul deciding not to write letters.
The congregation of Richmond (Va.) Third church celebrated on Oct. 14 the remodeling of their sanctuary, just a little emore than a year since the sanctuary ceiling fell.
ORLANDO, Fla. -- The Presbyterian Coalition is plowing at least $300,000 into its campaign to defeat Amendment A, a controversial proposal that would open the door to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s ordaining sexually active gays and lesbians.
The current moderator and two most recent past moderators of the General Assembly have selected the following 21 persons to serve on the Theological Task Force requested by the 213th General Assembly. Gary Demarest and Jean S. Stoner will serve as co-moderators.
ORLANDO -- More than 1,150 evangelical Presbyterians, meeting here at the Presbyterian Coalition's biggest gathering ever, made it clear Tuesday that they want to accomplish some kind of "new reformation" of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) --
In separate cases on opposite coasts of the country, presbyteries of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) are examining gay candidates for the ministry, assessing their suitability for ordination.
By Jack Haberer
Geneva. 2001. 192 pp. Pb. $19.95.
ISBN 0-664-50190-7
Reviewed by Brent Eelman of Houston, Texas
This book should be mandatory reading for all commissioners to this year's General Assembly. Jack Haberer, who is well-known as an evangelical leader in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), has written a thoughtful book that challenges the reader to rethink the easy categories that we often use to describe theological differences.
Six years ago the General Assembly elected me to a new class of the Assembly's Permanent Judicial Commission. Elections occur every two years. They create, if you will, three two-year sessions for each commissioner. Every two years this transition brings an interesting change of style and personality as the new class arrives. Each new class constitutes at least a third of the membership.
By Robert Thornton Henderson
Providence House. 2000. 160 pp. Pb. $16.95.
ISBN 1 57736 203 9
Reviewed by Richard Ray, Pittsburgh
Utopian, iconoclastic, broad-brushed and frequently irreverent about venerable PC(USA) ways, Robert Henderson's Blueprint 21 is a provocative book. If you like your theology cool, your sense of churchmanship poised, your rhetorical style silky and smooth, and your exegesis in harmony with the claims of the Enlightenment, you had better head for your aspirin bottle before you begin to turn these pages.
By Robert W. Herron
Thomas More. 2000. 188 pp. Pb. $15.95.
ISBN 0-88347-460-3
Reviewed by Margret Barnes Perry, a pastoral counselorin Asheville, N.C.
Yet another book on marriage? Yes, and this one is a worthwhile read in large part because it has a particular focus: making it through midlife with your spouse. In writing this book, Robert W. Herron claims his hope: that he will help couples "navigate this transitional period in life and marriage and feel better about themselves as they do."
By Dean E. Foose
Geneva. 2001. 114 pp. Pb. $9.95.
ISBN 0-664-50041-2
Reviewed by Freda Gardner, Princeton, N.J.
The subtitle of this book is "A Roadmap for Pastor Nominating Committees." It is well chosen and Dean Foose, director of alumni/ae relations and placement at Princeton Seminary, is well qualified to describe a way for congregations and pastors to discover their respective callings.
By Ronald P. Byars
Geneva. 2000. 96 pp. Pb. $11.95.
ISBN 0-664-50136-2
Reviewed by James G. Kirk, Glen Burnie, Md.
Much to the satisfaction of those of us who serve in parishes, Geneva Press, in conjunction with the Office of Theology and Worship, has initiated a new series of books called the Foundations of Christian Faith.
My mother's twin sister married a Methodist minister which, in those days, was not considered a serious disgrace. His first pastorate was in Calico Rock, Arkansas, and after a series of calls (or raises) to larger churches he was elected a bishop. Soon after this elevation, I told my uncle the only thing he could now aspire to become was any kind of Presbyterian.
By Jean Stairs
Fortress. 2000. 213 pp. Pb. $20.
ISBN 0-8006-3239-7
Reviewed by William V. Arnold, Bryn Mawr, Pa.
In clear language, with no appeals to academic jargon, Jean Stairs undertakes a balancing act that brings pastoral care and spiritual direction into collaboration with each other. She wisely makes no attempt to have one discipline subsume the other. Rather, she recognizes and describes the gifts of each and the need of each for the perspective of the other.
By Martin E. Marty
Jossey-Bass. 2000. 240 pp. Hb. $22.50.
ISBN 0-7879-5031-9
Reviewed by Edward A. White, Washington, D.C.
This is a refreshing and clear-thinking description and analysis of the place of religion in the public life of our nation. Martin Marty sets forth six theses:
1. Public religion can be dangerous. It should be handled with care.
2. Public religion can and does contribute to the common good.
By Martin E. Marty and Jonathan Moore
Jossey-Bass. 2000. 164 pp. Pb. $23.
ISBN 0-7879-5033-5
Reviewed by Allan E. Strand, Oxford, Miss.
The thrust of Martin Marty's work in this volume is captured most succinctly in this: "In the midst of global, national and local change affecting world views and public action, religion is too widespread and too deep a phenomenon not to be reckoned with in primary, or at least secondary, schools and thereafter, no matter under what aegis or auspices" (p. 139).
By Barbara Brown Taylor
Cowley. 2000. 104 pp. Pb. $10.95.
ISBN 1-56101-189-4
Reviewed by Scott Dalgarno, pastor, First church, Ashland, Ore.
"In the age just past, nationalism has brought us Hitler, science has brought us the atom bomb and religion has brought us some really awful television programming." So quips the inimitable Barbara Brown Taylor in a new book on a topic most of us think we've heard quite enough about already: sin.
TEMPE, Ariz. -- The General Assembly Council has affirmed and commended for churchwide use a paper, "Hope in the Lord Jesus Christ," written in answer to a request by the 213th General Assembly.
TEMPE, Ariz. - Members of the General Assembly Council are getting the word that Mary Holmes College, a two-year, historically African American school in Mississippi, is in big trouble and the problem is lack of money.
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is testing the waters to see what kind of support there might be for embarking on a proposed $39.5 million fundraising campaign to pay for the denomination's mission work internationally and also new church development and redevelopment in the U.S.
TEMPE, Ariz. -- The Congregational Ministries Division Committee is recommending that the PC(USA) discontinue further development of the third year of the church's Covenant People curriculum.
TEMPE, Ariz. --The uncertainty facing the world in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York City and the Pentagon was reflected in the opening of the General Assembly Council's Executive Committee meeting here Wednesday morning.
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