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Responding pastorally to troubled churches

Used by permission

The Office of the General Assembly is grateful for presbyteries that are faithfully seeking to engage Presbyterians who are troubled by General Assembly actions. We recognize the enormous commitment presbyteries and staffs have made to reach out to these brothers and sisters in Christ and attempt to address their pain and distress. We are aware that several presbyteries have developed sensitive policies to guide them in engaging with sessions and congregations who feel estrangement with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). The Presbyteries of New Covenant and Wabash Valley consulted with our offices in developing such policies and we commend such models to presbyteries.

Voices

Open

From the graveyard of Gadara

and the well of Isaac's son,

sweeping Light and footsteps

the Kingdom Walking, comes.

 

With Word, touch and gesture;

            muscled arm and steady eye,

the Calling Love of heaven,

            brings Himself to die.

 

No give up in this moment

            but Consummated Plan

bound there by the nail and rope

            our Lover's Open hand.

 

Now Open --gates and tombstones

            Open -- hearts of men

              Open to the Love of God

                        And never shut again.

 

                       

@2006 A. Kirk Johnston

 

 

Kirk Johnston

First Presbyterian Church

Paola, Kansas

 

 

Voices

When Love Went Hiding: A hymn for Holy Saturday

In all the ancient storied script

Recited for our hungry ears

By priests and prophets in our tents

Rejected we the shock and awe

Of disappointment and of fears

 

A song of safety and of care

The strong and gentle parent sings

Reminder of what love will bear

To win the world from dark'ning sin

And carry it on eagle's wings

 

One feather at a time is plucked

One leaf that withers in the heat

One cloud the sun could cover up

One cross cross out eternal hope

One stone could love defeat

 

by Carol E. Bayma

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Presbyterians to Open “Project Homecoming” Recovery Center in Gentilly

 

New Orleans, LA -- On the heels of Easter celebrations, the Presbytery of South Louisiana will open a disaster recovery center in New Orleans.  The center is located in the education building of Gentilly Church.

"Project Homecoming" will serve those who are struggling financially to return home, giving priority for assistance to those who are low-income, uninsured, underinsured, disabled, and elderly. The plan is to assist at least 300 people with rebuilding their homes and their lives by the end of 2007. Volunteer groups, hosted by eight Presbyterian churches in the greater New Orleans area, will provide the labor to rebuild homes. 

Project Homecoming is the rebuilding initiative of the Presbytery of South Louisiana in partnership with Presbyterian Disaster Assistance and Catholic Charities Archdiocese of New Orleans. 

Catholic Charities Katrina Aid Today Case Managers will be on site to provide long-term case management to clients. KAT helps clients design and implement their own individual recovery plan and connects them to available resources in the community.

A dedication and ribbon-cutting ceremony, to celebrate the opening of this new disaster recovery center, is planned Tuesday at 12:00 noon. On hand for the dedication will be Susan Ryan, coordinator of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.); Alan Cutter, executive presbyter of the Presbytery of South Louisiana; and representatives of Catholic Charities Archdiocese of New Orleans. 

The public is invited to attend the dedication ceremony, as well as an open house from 11:00am - 2:00pm that day. 

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No world peace if no peace among religions, says theologian Kueng

Bogota 4 April (ENI-ALC)--If there is not peace among religions, there will be no peace in the world, Swiss-born theologian Hans Kueng has noted during an address during a week of ethics and world peace in the capital city of Colombia. 

 

'The great religions have the conditions necessary to mobilise people to support a planetary ethic: defining moral objectives, proposing instructions and criteria for action, motivating human beings both rationally and emotionally, so that the moral norms may be lived out in practice,' said Kueng. 

Voices

The Other Side of the Peace Debate

When Christ entered Jerusalem, he rode in upon a donkey.  He came as a king, but he came as a king of peace.  Of course, as soon as Jesus entered into Jerusalem, what is often ignored by many people is that fact that Jesus chases evil doers and thieves out of the temple (Matthew 21:12) , calls the Pharisees a brood of vipers (Matthew 23:33), and is quoted as saying that the temple in Jerusalem will one day be destroyed (Luke 19:43-44).  It should also be mentioned that, even as Jesus encountered Roman soldiers on numerous occasions, nowhere can it be found that he preached that either they or the Temple guards should not be doing what they do.  Yes, Jesus believed in peace, but as far as we know, he also believed that armed forces were needed, that stepping up against wrong-doing sometimes required confrontations, and that all people are equally accountable.  There are many times, it seems, that those who speak up for peace in speaking up against America's actions seem to have forgotten that aspect of Jesus' character.  John the Baptist would tell soldiers in Luke 3 not to take money by force or accuse people falsely.  He did not say that there were not times to fight.   Indeed, even as I have heard much about Guantanamo Bay and Abu-Ghraib (and rightly so), I have heard far less condemnation from church leaders concerning the beheadings of American citizens, the bombings and killings of our soldiers using illegal I.E.D's, (mines) and the fact that Al Queada terrorists (alongside Iranian and Syrian insurgents) are killing many more innocent Iraqis and other people than they are foreign soldiers.  It is my feeling that many Peace Fellowships would hold a great deal more credibility and would represent a true Christ-like spirit if they would treat all as equally accountable to God's call in loving one another as Jesus loves us.  "Turn the other cheek" has been twisted to mean that one should never respond when I believe its original intent was to say only that one should not respond to every insult with violence and hatred (Note especially that one is hit on the right cheek in Matthew 5:39. This would make it a back-handed slap, which is more of an insult than inflicted physical harm).

Voices

An Easter prayer

Dearest Jesus, The world is in darkness, the night lasting forever, so it seems. And You are  ...  dead.   I saw..

Voices

The work of Christ for our redemption

Editor's Note: The following essay is the eighth in a series dealing with topics of interest and importance to Presbyterians.  Author Johnson explains: "The report from the General Assembly Task Force on Peace, Unity, and Purity of the Church provides us both the occasion and the urgency for theological dialogue within the PC(USA). This and succeeding essays are offered as a constructive effort in that direction."

The work of Christ for our redemption (atonement) is another place where the current divisions within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) beg for a better way forward, for three reasons.  (1) The current Modernist-Pietist Church milieu has narrowed the work of Christ largely to the role of example. (2) Many people today put two atonement ideas into false and unnecessary competition with each other. (3) The "classical" view of atonement, neglected by both sides but deep within the Bible and the Reformed tradition, offers a powerful way to reconfigure the total work of Christ for our redemption. This essay explains these assertions.  

Voices

Procurator

Easter 8 Introduction

 

A lot was going on that first Easter morning. Bewilderment was an emotion shared not only by Jesus' friends, but also by his enemies. Pilate, who had seemed almost skeptical in granting the chief priests' request for a guard to be set on Jesus' tomb, Make it as secure as you can... now finds his ironic words ringing true after all. And what had appeared to be merely the regrettable, yet necessary execution of a rather enigmatic figure he had personally considered harmless, is now threatening to expand into a crisis, perhaps even a potential insurrection. Even as he ponders a plan of action, however, Pilate still finds himself drawn in a curious kind of sympathy toward that strangely dignified and self-possessed victim of whom, just two days before, he had thought he was washing his hands forever.

Book Reviews

The Seven Last Words from the Cross

by Fleming Rutledge. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2005. ISBN 0-8028-2786-1. Pb. 81 pp. $12.00.

 

One of the great traditions of the Christian Church is to take time, during Holy Week, to reflect upon the words Jesus spoke from the Cross. Sometimes this happens in a three- hour service on Good Friday, in which the combination of the crucifixion accounts in the four Gospels are read and interpreted in turn. Out of this tradition, Fleming Rutledge has created a series of mediations that are helpful for personal reading, reflection, and devotional use at any time of the year.

Voices

Paradigms and Jesus

The first time I heard the term paradigm, I thought something had come back to haunt me from my unsuccessful trigonometry past. Curious, I asked a seminary professor about the term and received a copy of David Bosch's Transforming Mission. I read this voluminous writing.  Bosch covered it all from the paradigms of the Enlightenment, the Medieval Church, the Protestant Reformation, the Ecumenical movement, Postmodernism and many more. Later I attended a church conference where the leader presented a paradigm that he believed Jesus initiated. He called it the "missional" church model.

Voices

Can baseball teach us something?

 

I grew up loving baseball. Although I played Little League, I was never really very good at it. But I loved the game. 

The season of Lent anticipates Easter, but almost as important for some of us is the anticipation of the baseball season during Lent. Everything is fresh and new. Fresh beginnings. New opportunities. 

Even today, as one in his mid-50s, my heart stirs through spring training as it prepares us for the new season.  What joy! What excitement! What anticipation that game engenders for some of us!

Voices

Listen, sisters! Listen, brothers!

  based on I Corinthians 15

 

Text: ©2006 Carolyn Winfrey Gillette.

Used by permission.

 

Tune: BEACH SPRING

(God Whose Giving Knows No Ending)

 

Listen, sisters! Listen, brothers

To the news that we proclaim;

Spread the word and tell your neighbors:

We have life in Jesus' name.

All because God loves us dearly,

Jesus died for all our sin.

On the third day, God showed clearly:

Love has conquered, death can't win.

 

Uncategorized

Churches, denomination face property issues like “a marriage gone bust”

   This is not a land for the faint-hearted.

As congregations involved with the New Wineskins Association prepare to leave the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) -- many of them bound for what they see as the promised land of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church -- first they will wade through the swamps of property disputes.

Already, roughly 10 lawsuits involving church departures and property are pending in courts across the country -- and, in other places, presbyteries and congregations are trying to negotiate their way towards some sort of amicable parting.

Editorials

Living in hope

   

Whether it be spouted by the Jesus Seminar scholars, the Da Vinci Code author or The Lost Tomb of Jesus producer, this is the season when magazines give undeserved attention to Jesus' detractors. In spite of their allegedly formidable arguments, confident Christians worldwide will gather in huge numbers on Easter morning chanting, "He is risen. He is risen. He is risen indeed."

Such affirmations continue undeterred, because the arguments supporting the resurrection and the legacy of Christ-changed lives far overwhelm lame claims about some Passover Plot. 

Uncategorized

Is Christ alive in your church?

 

This is a good question for church officers to consider, especially at Easter.  But what does it really mean?  If we preach Christ raised from the dead on the third day, do we have a concrete sense that he still exists and is vital in our midst?  Or are we thinking in symbolic terms, "He lives in our memories" or on a more pedestrian level that we encounter at funerals, "I just know that Uncle Fred is looking down at us right now"?

How alive is Christ in your congregation?

Uncategorized

“Season of Prayer” request by Montreat Conference Center Board over church’s request to leave PC(USA)

The board of directors of the Montreat Conference Center is asking for a six-month "season of prayer, study and dialogue" regarding the request that Montreat Church has made to be dismissed from the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

The historic North Carolina congregation -- where Billy Graham's wife, Ruth, has long been a member -- voted 311-27 on Jan. 21 to ask to be dismissed to the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.

Voices

Wounded Glory

Between Two Ribs

that spear was cast,

a deadly blow,

an icy blast.

The Warmth of life

came streaming forth

then, earth to mud,

            a Balm ....

Of endless worth.

 

Voices

Disciple

Lent 6 ¢ Introduction

This week's Face By the Wayside is an anonymous one. He is simply called a Disciple and represents all those nameless ones who took off and followed Jesus because there was something in the way he looked, something in the things he said, something in who he was, that made life richer, fuller, truer than it had even been before. Don't ask them what it was. Most of them, all of them really, didn't even begin to understand until much later, much much later. All they wanted to do was to be near him, to learn from him, to laugh and even weep with him, and maybe even to become just the tiniest bit more like he was, even if it came to walking on water!

 

Editorials

A faith of forgiveness

If you were going to invent a religion, what would you include?

Probably you'd begin with devotion: we humans have a need to worship, pray, and maybe offer expressions of sacrifice to the deity.

Probably you would add some kind of divine revelation. A seer, sage, or prophet can speak on behalf of the deity, offering words of wisdom to address the human condition.

No doubt you would incorporate teachings about morals and ethics. Any decent religion requires its adherents to love one another, to promote justice for all, and to live their lives in the light of high standards embodied by the deity.

Would you also include the notion of the deity becoming human? Most religionists would think it outlandish to profane the life of the spirit like that.

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