Guest commentary by Brett Webb-Mitchell Spread before us on a table in Colonial Heights Presbyterian Church’s fellowship hall were 50 white paper lunch bags, embellished with displays of red, pink and sparkling hearts. Our group, Community of Pilgrims Presbyterian Fellowship, met on a Sunday afternoon before Valentine’s Day for a combined time of worship and a service project. Into each bag we placed a decorated pencil, a large bright eraser, chocolate candy, a small bouncing ball and other odds and ends that young students would enjoy. After we stuffed each bag with fun materials, on red paper hearts pasted on white doilies we hand-wrote “Happy Valentine’s Day!” and placed one card into each bag. The festive bags went to students at Markham Elementary in Portland, Oregon, a school with children from many different races, ethnicities and nationalities. This was our way of letting the children know that they are loved. Weeks later, we heard from one of the school volunteers that the … [Read more...]

Guest commentary by Heath Rada Reality time!  I am a Virginian, born and bred.  Whereas I have adopted North Carolina as my home (and I love North Carolina), I cannot deny my Virginia heritage.  On my mother’s side of the family, our roots in Virginia go deep.  On the wall of our sunroom hangs a needlepoint sampler that my Virginia-born daughter made for me, and which hints at the arrogance we Virginians feel. It reads: “To be a Virginian, either by birth, marriage, adoption, or even on one’s mother’s side is an introduction to any state in the Union, a passport to any foreign country, and a benediction from Almighty God.” A Virginian’s pride is different from the so-called pride held by people from other states. It’s not as flashy as a Texan’s —with their two-step dancing, cowboy boots, blue bonnets and rodeos.  Nor is it similar to the pride of the Midwesterners —smugly affirming their self-sufficiency and their hard-nosed attitude that they are invulnerable to the weather.  … [Read more...]

Guest commentary by Charles Holmes The conjoined twins of racism and politics, connected via several points along their central nervous systems, have become the focus of our attention again. This poor misshapen conflicted creature exists only to cause pain and promote animus and irreparable damage to every facet of humanity. Not hyperbole. This time the twins have chosen a familiar form: blackface. I will not provide y’all with background information about the aberrant practice because I don’t want to, I don’t have to and if this is a brand-new subject for you then you are new to the planet. Please, allow me to escort you to our leader. But first I think I need to assay the line of accession for both federal and state governments. It shouldn’t take long. It is not possible for me as a marked minority to endure the twins and their pernicious impact on my life for long spans of time without experiencing noxious anger and hate for the white people who consciously and … [Read more...]

  Guest commentary by Dean K. Thompson  It is a privilege to be in the grateful company of many who are celebrating the fruitful ministry of James Hutchinson Smylie (1925-2019), teacher and scholar for the church in the field of church history. Specializing in American church history and American Presbyterianism, James Smylie served God by serving ministerial students, pastors, congregations, his denomination and his academic guild with remarkable effectiveness and energy. As I matriculated at Union Theological Seminary in Richmond, Virginia, in 1965, he soon became a loving and demanding mentor who abided with me from my early adulthood into my older adulthood. He liked to joke that we were providentially bonded by geography. He had been born in the manse of Second Presbyterian Church in Huntington, West Virginia, my hometown; I had gone under care for the ministry at a presbytery meeting held in his father’s old church. The home of Elizabeth and Jim Smylie was a place of … [Read more...]

Guest commentary by Aric Clark I raised two fingers as I prepared to offer what would be one of the most sacred benedictions of my ministry career. I was going to mangle the Spanish, spontaneous translation that was well outside my skill level, but hopefully I would make up for it with sincerity. The couple standing in front of me in sweatshirts and jeans had recently walked over 3,000 miles from El Salvador to the U.S.-Mexico border and were preparing to climb into a van that would take them into detention. Though they’d been a family for 13 years, married in the eyes of their village, they lacked any paperwork that might prove to Customs and Border Patrol that they should remain united. Fearing separation, they asked me at the last moment to marry them there on the sidewalk beside the iron fence that separates this chunk of land from that one. A lawyer stood nearby hastily filling out civil marriage paperwork while I made my way, scrolling on my phone, through a Spanish-language … [Read more...]