This is the gist of what 14 trips to Cuba have taught Bill McAtee, a retired presbytery executive from Kentucky. In Cuba, where for decades the practice of Christianity was discouraged, "they have done so much with so little. And we have done so little with so much."
Are you looking for something special to lift your spirits this Christmas? What about a gift that can't be purchased? Namely, the gift of enthusiasm. The seed of genuine enthusiasm is God-given, lying deep within the soul of everyone. The emergence of enthusiasm depends on the maturity of one's walk and talk with God. The nature of enthusiasm (see your dictionary) is to be God-possessed and infused with new energy.
The gospel is intended for all people. The church is to go to all nations. God's will is that every knee should bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
As the late Lefferts Loetscher of Princeton Seminary in a book titled The Broadening Church taught us, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has been a broadening church -- an inclusive church -- throughout its history, but becoming the people God wants us to be has not been easy.
Recently I watched on television as President Bush signed the Aviation and Transportation Security Act, making airport security a direct federal responsibility. A week earlier, Congress seemed to be deadlocked regarding airport security, with neither party willing to compromise on their own strongly held positions. But, within days, the Senate and House had both agreed to a bill which the Senate passed without opposition and the House passed by a vote of 410 to 9.
Among those efforts that can be undertaken by the denomination to address our current malaise and drift toward fragmentation, none is as important -- or as elusive -- as the need for a major overhaul of the Book of Order.
In their proper place, I have long, and roundly, maintained a lowdown admiration for nice, big Presbyterian buts. To close and appreciative observers like me the fundaments of Reformed dogmatics are both ample and shapely with lots of wiggle room. Being generously endowed (and with intelligence, too), Presbyterians are aware that many theological affirmations are so complex the only proper response to them is, "yes, but...."
1. A Third Way requires a new mode of thinking. At first glance it is bound to seem implausible.
2. Without a Third Way, our church is in danger of shattering.
There are several reasons why congregational visitation is no longer a priority; the difficulty of arranging it; members are busy; pastors are busy; and we are not sure what it accomplishes.
There are several reasons why congregational visitation should be a priority. It meets people where they are; it facilitates contact with members who seldom are seen; and it can renew the church.
Amendment A, overturning the "fidelity-chastity" requirement for ministers and church officers, must be defeated by those voting in the presbyteries in the coming months. There are several reasons why conscientious presbyters, who will be called to vote on this and other amendments approved by the 213th General Assembly (2001), should vote no.
"Resolutions acknowledging the Catholic Church as part of the body of Christ, and calling for continuing study of those practices which first divided us were approved, as was a resolution of invitation to invite the U. S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to join in studies leading to possible future affirmation of one another's baptisms."
-- 213th General Assembly News (June 13, 2001)
The 213th General Assembly (2001) directed the Office of Theology and Worship to develop materials to "help the church better understand the theological richness of the Lordship of Jesus Christ."
It's time to get serious. The intramural debates preoccupying the PC(USA) look rather trivial and self-defeating when compared to the all-too-real challenges now facing the world in the aftermath of Sept. 11. With commercial jetliners having been turned into weapons of mass destruction; with biological weapons having been directed, however crudely, at news agencies and government leaders;
Everything changed on Sept. 11, including world mission. Our staff in Worldwide Ministries in Louisville did a good job of immediately contacting all of our mission workers around the world.
We shared the joy and privilege of serving as co-chairs of the Joint Committee on Presbyterian Union, from 1969 to 1983. Like many of your regular readers we rejoiced in the breakdown of barriers which had stood for 122 years, and the creation of a newly reconciled church, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
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.
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.
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.
Commenting on the precarious state of relations between the Unionists and the IRA in Northern Ireland, commentator Andrew Sullivan of The New Republic recently stated in his weekly TRB column:
"You cannot negotiate peace with people [the Irish Republican Party] whose power is entirely dependent on the will to wage war.
Amendment A is the latest attempt to permit the ordination of practicing. homosexuals. Having failed to reinterpret the clear and consistent words of Scripture, and having failed to overthrow the church's traditional teaching on sexual behavior and marriage, proponents of homosexual ordination now turn to polity.
When you were a kid was the "True Church" the subject for a month of church school lessons? Did you hear lots of sermons on it; was there a "True Church Sunday" with a special bulletin cover and all? Did you sit around the Sunday dinner table discussing the "True Church" with Mom and Dad and perhaps Preacher Ned? Did you have the conviction as communicant class ended that soon you would be a member of the "True Church"?
In PC(USA) Polity Reflections Note 43, the stated clerk and the Constitutional Services Department answer questions that have been asked about the amendments to G-6.0106a and which the 213th General Assembly sent down to the presbyteries.
As the chair of the drafting committee that prepared the report adopted by the 1978 General Assembly (UPCUSA) on the issue of homosexual ordination, I was stunned by A. J. McKelway's claim that the definitive guidance it provided answered a question that was not asked, and thus "got us into this mess" (Outlook, June 18). Having reread the record, I beg to differ.
Many of us know that true peace often comes only after some kind of conflict. In the case of the wars that have made and kept this nation free and peaceful, a freedom and peace we celebrate this week, the conflict has been terrible. It has cost people their lives or the lives of those they loved; it has scarred others for life, physically and emotionally.
One of the most remarkable stories of the 213th General Assembly happened before commissioners arrived in Louisville. Advocates for 33 overtures, from 26 presbyteries, conferred among themselves in the weeks prior to the Assembly. I was one of them.
1. We have to get past the idea that we are the answer to the problems in the world, instead of Christ being the answer.
By letting go, we free ourselves to serve. Letting go of what? Fear, ego, pride, self-interest -- our own agendas. Empty yourself of these so you can receive God's gifts. We are not Christ, but we can be his hands and feet.
© Copyright 2025 The Presbyterian Outlook. All Rights Reserved. Privacy Statement. Website by Web Publisher PRO
