It is a prayer heard in almost every synagogue and church
throughout the world:
"May the Lord bless you and keep you; may the Lord
cause his face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you;
may the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and grant you peace."
The PC(USA) lost two outstanding leaders almost exactly a week apart with the deaths of C. Kenneth Hall on October 15 and Shirley Guthrie on October 23 (see obituaries in the November 8 and today’s issues of OUTLOOK). Both exercised extraordinary spiritual gifts in lives wholly committed to the gospel of Jesus Christ and to ministry in the Presbyterian Church (USA).
Ron Salfin in his film review of “The Village” (Sept.6) observes quite rightly that it is a parable, the moral of which is for the viewer to decide. Having viewed this provocative film and entered into the parable to allow its truth to speak to me, I am bold to share my own journey to and from “The Village.”
Editor’s Note: This article continues consideration of the need for renewal in preaching and the use of lectionaries aired in earlier Outlook issues this year: January 5, “Righteous Judgment” by James C. Goodloe IV; March 22, “Righteous Judgment and Biblical Preaching” by Arlo D. Duba; June 21, “Lectio Continua and the Lectionary” by Hughes Oliphant Old; and “Duba Overstates Benign Influence of Lectionary” by James C. Goodloe IV.)
The Assembly this year will go down in the annals of the Kirk, as the first time a woman occupied the Moderatorial Chair. Though press coverage concentrated on Dr. Elliot's gender, equally significant was the fact that for the first time for more than four hundred years, an elder was called to this high office. For some time now there has been ever increasing media pressure on the Church to elect a woman Moderator.
Loren Mead presented the challenge well: “In all the denominations, by whatever names we call it, we badly need a better functioning system by which local churches, clergy, and laity are strengthened and encouraged into their ministries. The old system of oversight approaches collapse”(Mead 1991. 55).
Due to the mid-August to early September publishing hiatus at the Outlook, the Uniform Lesson Helps for Sunday, September 5 were not printed. We are posting it on our web site for immediate use.
September 5 Bible Study (Uniform Lesson)
UNIT I “Created for a Purpose"
"From the Dust of the Ground"
Background Scripture and Lesson Focus: Genesis 2:4b-7, 15-24
Without doubt, the most heated plenary debate at the 216th General Assembly was the debate about whether to discard the Authoritative Interpretations on homosexuality. The tactic of the majority report, to abandon the A.I., was keenly designed to attract votes from the theological center. Instead of saying that this would make gay ordination a local option (although this was the claim of a Witherspoon Fellowship newsletter), the majority report sought more “moderate” grounds: that the language of A.I. was “antiquated” and “offensive,” thus it should be eliminated.
Every year I try to explain "Orwellian" to my students. I end up with something like "a systematic perversion of language to hide what is real and replace it with an illusion — an illusion that is often the exact opposite of the reality. Its long-term effects are, first, a sense of unreality, then, cynicism, and finally, apathy and despair." I might do better just to hand them The Presbyterian Outlook's annual Higher Education Issue.
The Office of the General Assembly has just completed the collation of the 2003 statistics for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A). While the numbers will be readily available to all, the figures themselves do not tell the whole story. Underneath these statistics are real live Presbyterians, who make up our churches and who are faithful disciples of Jesus Christ. The fact that there are fewer active members in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) than a year ago should call us to prayer and repentance.
In late 2003, a Messianic Jewish congregation, Avodat Yisrael, was approved within the PC(USA) by the presbytery of Philadelphia. In response to the possibility of Jews, who also believe in Jesus, evangelizing other Jews, a group of concerned Presbyterians organized. They were led by Cynthia Jarvis, also of the Philadelphia presbytery.
Part of what ails our denomination is rooted in confusion over how we are connected to one another. Over the past 20 years, our shared judicatory mission efforts increasingly have been replaced by congregationally based mission programs. Today, far more mission work is rooted in congregations than judicatories. This process has been enabled and empowered by affordable transportation to any part of the world as well as instant communication through the Internet and e-mail.
Recently, the daily lectionary readings have taken us into Genesis. In the 17th chapter there is an episode that may provide some help us to our ongoing struggle over ordination.
The 17th chapter is part of the larger narrative which begins when God first calls Abram in chapter 12. God promises to make for Abram a great nation and a great name so that Abram will become a blessing. Abram, Sarai and others begin to move in faithful response to God’s call and promise.
Thank God for people of faith who are here today. Our Faith Community is a giant. We’re in every city and town in America. But the Giant is asleep. The Giant also has a powerful, moral voice. But when it comes to fighting gun violence, the Giant is as quiet and timid as a church mouse.
If the U.S. is to reduce its unique level of gun deaths it will be because people of faith awaken their spiritual leaders and demand that they lead the fight from their pulpits and classrooms.
Margaret Flory is "one of the most outstanding leaders of the ecumenical movement of the 20th Century," Rubem Alves, Brazilian theologian and poet, wrote, "because her eyes had the power to see trees when they were only seeds." 
More than 150 people from around the world — not a few of them trees that first encountered Flory when they were seeds — gathered at New York's Riverside Church May 14-15 to honor Margaret Flory on the occasion of her 90th birthday.
It began with a small twinge in her mid section. It was enough to cause Bridget to cancel a couple of appointments for March 8 and decide to stay home. I got her the usual white chalky stuff one takes for such twinges and things seemed to be just fine.
Until the headache hit.
I walk over to the bookcase. The top shelf is crammed full of 49 volumes of a series with similar spines. The authors date from the third through the 17th century and include some of the most arcane and least-read material on earth. I have purchased them over the years, and I have had to fork over at least a thousand dollars for them.
I read with great interest the article by James Goodloe ("Righteous Judgment") and the endorsing letter by Eddie Soto. Though the term is never used, I assume that both are being critical of "Lectionary Preaching."
Both are correct when they say that lectio continua (preaching through a book of the Bible "in course," chapter by chapter) was used back to the earliest days of the church, and that the reformers, especially the Genevan reformers, urged pastors to preach through books of the Bible.
In some parts of the country we have endured a long, cold winter and the blizzards are still coming (after several weeks of sub-zero weather). Many people are sick of it and feel like they are caught in a frozen trap.
Some of this normal depression will pass, of course, when spring comes; when we get rid of the ice, the heavy coats and gloves, the constant aggravation of getting into a freezing car. Then we will feel better again.
In response to declining membership, a strategy report of a major presbytery several years ago emphasized new church development. Although anticipated, it was still rather disconcerting. How many commercial enterprises would respond to falling sales by opening new franchises? Instead, if they hoped to survive, they would concentrate on product improvement.
You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
— Exodus 20:4–6 (ESV)
Does your board have a line in the sand when it comes to personal, professional, ethical or administrative behavior of church members and officers? How long will you permit unruly or fractious actions by one or two individuals to disrupt the important work of the congregation? What do you do if one of the church's officers clearly violates his or her ordination vows?
On the Supreme Court's docket for the current session is a review of the Ninth Circuit Court's judgment of the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. If that phrase is removed, it would return to the version I memorized in public school. During World War II no one complained about a deficiency in the 29 words we voluntarily repeated during our daily flag raisings. Our generation swelled with patriotic pride and could hardly wait to enlist in our armed services to help topple those totalitarian regimes intent on conquering other European or Asian nations.
Surely by now it is clear that we are standing under the judgment of God. Nothing else could account for the precipitous and calamitous decline of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) over the last 40 years. And while we stand under the judgment of God, this indeed is our only hope: the judgment of God is righteous.
Mel Gibson's labor of faith is not a popcorn and candy movie. It's gruesome, it's brutal, it's bloody, and it's sobering. For the faithful, it's a stark reminder of just how much Jesus sacrificed, and at what great cost our redemption has been paid.
"The Passion of the Christ" depicts the last 12 hours of the life of Jesus of Nazareth (played by Jim Cavaziel), from the arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane to the tomb.
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