One is set in modern-day England, the other among the ancient Mayans, just prior to the time the Spaniards arrived. Both are about 'nice' people who encounter outlaws. In both, the characters' ordeal is such that nothing will be the same for them afterwards. In both, a startling revelation alters the whole paradigm. In both, at the end, the main characters are desperately clinging to a love fiercely tested.
What was it like in Berlin, in the summer of 1945? In "The Good German," we get a surreal glimpse, and the picture isn't pretty.
There's rubble everywhere. Bombed-out buildings are part of the landscape, as are the gaunt faces, the food lines, and the palpable smell of despair. The Allies have already partitioned the defeated city, and the rifts between them are already swelling to the surface, even as the Potsdam Conference decides how the victors will divide the spoils.
COLUMBUS -- It's been 50 years since Life magazine photographer Alfred Eisenstadt showed up for Margaret Towner's ordination service in Syracuse, N.Y.
Her mother borrowed a pastor's robe and some women hemmed it up so she wouldn't trip over it.
Earlier, some of the male pastors from Cayuga-Syracuse presbytery, believing that it was time for the Presbyterian church to finally ordain a woman, had taken some of their skeptical colleagues out to play golf. They let the skeptics win. Then they started talking about the possibility of ordaining Towner.
She was ordained on October 24, 1956 -- to her amazement, the first woman to become a minister in the Presbyterian church.
COLUMBUS -- Joan Gray, a dedicated gardener and the moderator of the 217th General Assembly, calls this an "out of season time for the Presbyterian church."
It's not a definite time for sowing, for pruning, for reaping the fruit. It's an "out-of-season season," Gray said -- a time of uncertainty.
And the Covenant Network of Presbyterians, which drew about 350 people to its recent national meeting, reflected that uncertainty -- much of it centering around how the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) should respond to the Theological Task Force on the Peace, Unity, and Purity of the PC(USA).
Here's the short version. Many evangelicals in the church are churned up about the task force report -- talking about withholding funds, making lists of essential tenets, possibly leaving the denomination. The task force report emphasizes that decisions about ordination are made at the local level -- and conservatives are pushing measures in many presbyteries to make it clear that sexually active gays and lesbians won't be ordained, at least not there.
Progressives, on the other hand, tend to be happier with the task force report -- but not with the PC(USA)'s constitution, which limits ordination to those who practice fidelity if they're married or chastity if they're single.
So how hard do they push to try to change the constitution?
Editor's Note: On November 26, the film, "The Nativity Story", will become the first feature film ever to premiere at the Vatican, in Vatican City (Rome), Italy, reports Religion News Service. It is scheduled for a December 1 release in the United States. The premiere will be held at the Vatican's Aulo Paolo VI (Pope Paul VI Hall) with 7,000 invited guests. The event is a benefit, with contributions going toward construction of a school in the village of Mughar, Israel, located approximately 40 kilometers from Nazareth, which has a diverse population of Christians, Muslims, and Druze.
Ron Salfen, Texas pastor and OUTLOOK film reviewer, had a chance to attend an advance showing of the film and interview the film's director, Catherine Hardwicke. His review is posted along with this report. Here is the interview:
Outlook: First, let me be a non-typical critic, and tell you that I really liked your movie. I thought it was fantastic.
CH: Thanks very much. You know, I grew up Presbyterian. ... I grew up in First Church in McAllen, Texas. Now my parents have moved to Bend, Ore., but they go to the First Presbyterian Church there, and my Dad still sings in the choir.
Outlook: You've chosen to combine the accounts of Matthew and Luke, and at the end, the manger scene looked like a lot of Nativity sets, with all the characters huddled around the cradle.
CH: Yes, that was our nod to popular imagination, and what we knew people would expect.
It's not easy to make a movie about the birth of Christ. If you're too literal, it feels like an awkward bathrobe play, and even the Gospels themselves contain commentary. Besides, what to do about the different ways the Bible itself presents the story, and how about the prophecies leading up to the birth of the Messiah? Which to utilize? And how about the background music? Is it going to be "authentic indigenous," or Gregorian chant, or traditional hymnody, or contemporary "soft rock"? And how about the biblical characters? Are they going to be stentorian; stiff and awkward, and perhaps somewhat filled with a sense of self-importance? Or are they just going to be "ordinary people," and how do you manage that with a Hollywood cast?
Advent 3: Luke 3:7-18
Commanding stages across the land, and even a few pulpits, including the chapel at our Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) headquarters, the National Prayer Breakfast, and the Willow Creek Association, he laments the global wildfire of AIDS consuming 8,000 lives every day. One person every 10 seconds. Describing the horror of seeing African refugees "queuing up to die, three to a bed," he delivers a stinging rebuke: "We can get cold fizzy drinks to the farthest reaches of Africa, but we can't get lifesaving medicines to the people who need it" most? The lead singer of the rock band U2, Bono, confesses: "I don't have any letters after my name ... I don't even have a name after my name ... but I am determined to turn around this supertanker of indifference."
It has long been the job description of prophets, including John, who came preaching a baptism of repentance. He, too, was intent upon turning around a supertanker of human indifference -- indifference to the Living God.
Advent 4: Luke 1:46-55
I didn't grow up in the church. As a teenager my faith was incubated in the Jesus movement of the early 70s, culminating in several trips down the aisle to follow Christ. It took me awhile to learn that the gospel is bigger than personal salvation. And yet if this passage is any indication, it is certainly not less. In the first stanza of the Magnificat Mary sings: "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my Spirit rejoices in God my Savior ... all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me ..." The use of the first person singular pronoun indicates a very personal experience of salvation.
Entering a world remarkably like our own, marked by political upheaval, economic uncertainty, and religious conflict, the God who acts in Jesus Christ, notes Charles Talbert, "did not go to the top (to Caesar or Pilate) to get things changed; nor ... to the left (to the Zealots)," much less to the religious right (to the Pharisees, or the Sadducees). No, God made a beeline for the bottom. God went to the poor, to the oppressed, to the outcasts, beginning with a teenage peasant slave-girl from the boondocks of Nazareth, a nobody from Nowheresville we know simply as Mary. But Mary is also evidence that God goes to the center, straight to the heart, offering forgiveness and deliverance, and seeking to reign there as Savior and Lord. Blessed are you, Mary, and blessed are you and I, for responding personally.
Another sign of the holidays--the Outlook book editor compiles a sampling of books that make both good gifts for Christmas and good books to get and read for yourself. Here is the 2006 list:
Resources for Year C
Luke for Everyone, by Tom Wright. WJKP, 2004. ISBN 0-664-22784-8. Pb., 320 pp. $14.95.
Wright's popular for Everyone series combines the diligence of his New Testament scholarship with his passion for preaching and teaching in the life of the church. Here Wright offers constructive expositions and useful illustrations for each section of Luke's Gospel, along with his own translation of each text.
New Proclamation Commentary on the Gospels, by Andrew Gregory, David Bartlett, Morna Hooker, and Henry Wansbrough. Fortress, 2006. ISBN 0-8006-3752-6. b., 320 pp. $35.
A one-volume commentary on the four Gospels as they are represented in the Revised Common Lectionary. The authors represent Anglican, American Baptist, Methodist, and Roman Catholic traditions.
When one of our pastors, speaking at a denomination-sponsored peacemaking conference, asked the rhetorical question, "What's the big deal about Jesus?" shock waves vibrated around the church.
Dirk Ficca, the executive director of the Parliament of the World's Religions, wasn't intending to sound dismissive when he asked that question on July 29, 2000. He was pressing folks to see Jesus as a revelation of God's will for the world--downplaying the claim that Jesus is the only instrument of salvation--in the hope of building better interfaith relationships.
Ficca's proposal generated wide outcry. For good reason. Presbyterians cry foul when anyone minimizes Jesus' work of redemption. The next two meetings of the General Assembly Council wrestled over it. The following GA struggled clumsily with it. The one thing that GA did get right was to direct the Louisville Office of Theology and Worship to prepare a response for a subsequent GA to consider.
Editor's note: As Presbyterians continue their quest to promote peace and justice in Israel-Palestine, we offer for our Outlook readers' reflections both this letter prepared by the Advisory Committee on Racial-Ethnic Concerns and the essay by John Wimberly that follows. The letter was sent to leaders of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in mid-August when the Lebanon-Israel conflict of last summer was front-page news.
The Rev. Joan Gray, Moderator of the 217th General Assembly
The Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, Stated Clerk
The Rev. Allison Seed, Chairperson, General Assembly Council
Ms. Linda Valentine, Executive Director, General Assembly Council
Dear Friends and Colleagues in the Mission and Ministries of Christ's Church;
Sadly and painfully we are all very aware of the seemingly endless cycles of vengeance, violence, destruction and death among the peoples in the Middle East. Time and time again we have called ourselves in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) family to pray and work for the peace and justice of God-in-Christ among all peoples. We write to call for a stronger witness now for justice for all peoples in the Middle East, in the interest of long-term peace and the restoration of fairness and balance to U.S. foreign policy. We urge you as leaders of the Church to share the following letter with the full Council and the church as a whole as a contribution to that witness.
The 2006 General Assembly has, hopefully, put the divestment argument to rest. It replaced the controversial divestment instructions passed by the 2004 General Assembly with instructions to our committees and staff to pursue a strategy of investing in those who work for peace in the Middle East. The GA affirmed the Mission Responsibility Through Investment (MRTI) process, which has been so successful for decades, as one appropriate means to this end. Given that the Middle East has witnessed a new round of death and destruction in Lebanon, Israel, and Palestine, the GA resolution seems even more prophetic today than it did at the end of June.
I think the GA was able to reach a consensus resolution on divestment for a variety of reasons. First, both pro- and anti- divestment advocates have spent the past two years discussing/debating/dialoguing about the best strategy for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in the Middle East. As a result, we were a much more informed denomination in 2006 than we were in 2004. Second, the GA acted with remarkable independence. Anyone who thinks that lobbyists for one party or another prevailed in Birmingham wasn't there. Third, the table for a balanced outcome in Birmingham was set by an excellent forum held on Israel/Palestine the day prior to the GA convening. The speakers were reasoned and reasonable. Denominational staff and committee members who created the forum deserve praise.
Editor's Note: As Presbyterians discuss and study church policies and the TTFPUP report, we offer for our Outlook readers' reflections both this article by Ted A. Smith, and the following article by Michael D. Bush and Christopher A. Yim.
Our Presbyterian system places great demands on the governing bodies of the church. We believe that presbyteries and sessions should examine officers in light of essential tenets of the Reformed faith. We also believe that governing bodies should apply all the standards set by the whole church, rather than requiring subscription to partial and local lists of essentials. And so we ask elders and ministers to know the Reformed tradition well enough to discern the movement of the Holy Spirit in individual cases. A range of groups -- most notably the Presbyteries of Santa Barbara and San Diego -- have put forward guidelines to help sessions and presbyteries in this demanding work. But while the texts of these guidelines profess fidelity to Scripture and confessions, the practice of using them promises to displace the very authorities they celebrate.
(Editor's Note: This article is written in response to "When departures relate to practice," a commentary by Douglas Nave in the Oct. 16 issue of The Presbyterian Outlook.)
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) may appropriately permit officers freedom of conscience while requiring compliance with the ordination standards in the Form of Government. The historical and judicial examples Douglas Nave offers to support his claim that such would be unchristian or unpresbyterian are either mistaken or irrelevant.
Consider Jesus. We read that Jesus did not "reject the sanctity of the Lord's Day."
While Lord's Day observance developed to honor his resurrection, after the fact, Jesus did honor the Sabbath, even as he transformed it in light of his own presence in the world. He worked this transformation, in part, by healing on the Sabbath. These healings were not ethical expressions of faith, as Mr. Nave suggests, but rather were acts through which Jesus taught. This is a different matter, unrelated to Mr. Nave's point.
Jessie Woodrow McElroy Junkin McCall, 87, of Black Mountain, N.C., longtime Presbyterian missionary to Asia, died November 8. A memorial service in celebration of her life was held November 12 at Montreat (N.C.) Church, where she had been an active member since 1981.
She was born June 24, 1919, daughter to Presbyterian pastor, I. Stuart McElroy Jr., and Alice Wilson McElroy, missionaries to Japan. In June 1939, she graduated from the University of Richmond and married William (Bill) F. Junkin Jr.
The Presbytery of New Covenant, based in Houston, Texas, has uncovered three years of mishandling funds, effectively redirecting restricted funds (contributed to particular causes) to the presbytery's own mission efforts. In a letter sent November 9 to all member churches, General Presbyter Mike Cole and Moderator Rupert Turner announced the dismissal of Phillips Lacy, the director of business affairs. They state that Lacy does not appear to have benefited from the inappropriate actions. However, his handling of such funds was hidden well enough to avoid discovery by either their internal checks and balances or their annual, external professional audits.
The presbytery's leadership is studying options for paying back the funds, which will be explored at length at the stated presbytery meeting scheduled on November 18.
Scott Anderson, an openly gay member of the Theological Task Force on the Peace, Unity, and Purity of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), is seeking to be ordained once again as a PC(USA) minister.
Anderson, executive director of the Wisconsin Council of Churches and a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary, set aside his ordination in 1990 after two members of the congregation he then served in California publicly revealed that Anderson is gay.
But Anderson said in an interview that he is asking John Knox Presbytery in Wisconsin to approve him as an inquirer seeking ordination. If the presbytery accepts him as an inquirer, he intends to declare a "scruple" or an objection to the part of the PC(USA)'s constitution that limits ordination to those who practice fidelity if they are married or chastity if they are single.
Anderson met with John Knox's Committee on Preparation for Ministry on Nov. 2, receiving the committee's support. The presbytery will consider his request on Nov. 14.
COLUMBUS -- John Buchanan is pastor of Fourth Church in Chicago and editor of The Christian Century magazine, also is a co-founder of the Covenant Network of Presbyterians, which for the past decade has tried to convince the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) to ordain gays and lesbians.
He was moderator of the General Assembly in Albuquerque in 1996 -- the assembly that passed the rule limiting ordination in the denomination to those who practice fidelity if they are married or chastity if they are single.
And on the opening day of the Covenant Network's 2006 conference, Buchanan said the denomination is now in a new place -- a place where the report of the Theological Task Force on the Peace, Unity, and Purity of the PC(USA) provides "a precious opportunity to try to live together as if the gospel makes a difference," as the Covenant Network's executive director, Pamela Byers, has said.
People aren't exactly holding their breath, waiting for Denver businessman Stanley Anderson to come up with the $150 million he promised in June to give to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
But the denomination is close to realizing more than $9 million in unrestricted funding -- the result of a bequest made by a Colorado family more than 40 years ago, which has been held in trust since then and is just now becoming available.
Basically, church officials have heard little since Anderson stood up before the General Assembly in Birmingham and promised a massive unrestricted gift -- the day before the news broke that Anderson had financial difficulties.
He said then he'd give the money by November 2006, but so far nothing has materialized. "He's given several different dates," said Joey Bailey, the PC(USA)'s chief financial officer. "If it comes in by the end of the year, we're going to be really happy."
We voted. Congress changed hands. Some of us crowed over the victory. Some of us grieved the loss. Let's think twice about that.
It wasn't too long ago that mainline Protestants dominated American politics. Our churches were expanding with the baby boom. A nation recovering from war was finding our message reassuring. Our children's Sunday school classes were informing. Our fellowship was welcoming. What's more, the Hitler-Stalin legacy reinforced our determination to be a church-transforming-culture, or as Jesus put it, the salt of the earth.
It wasn't too long ago that the Anabaptist vision of church--a city set apart--shaped the culture of the non-mainline Protestant churches. Worshiping mostly in tiny sanctuaries on the edge of town, they followed a pietistic approach to ministry, aimed at saving souls, not cultures.
How important are the stories we carry in our hearts! They guide our lives and nurture our growth. Evelyn Fulton, a lifelong advocate for women and the first woman to graduate from Pittsburgh-Xenia Seminary in 1949, recalled: "My mother, and my father, too, always said 'You can do anything you want in this world.'"
For the past two years--2005 and 2006--we women have been telling our stories. We have laughed, cried, and been amazed again at what God has called us to do. In our stories is the history of the Presbyterian Church opening its ministries to women.
On the DVD, "Women's Ordination: Past, Present & Future," thirteen of these wonderful women tell their stories. They all eventually became successful as pastors, executives, community leaders, moderators, and theologians, but it was not easy. The DVD was produced by the Women's Ordination Mission Team of Chicago Presbytery to be sure these women's stories can be an inspiration to a new generation of women and men.
Editor's Note: The following essay is the fifth 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."
Like the preceding essays, this one aims to break open a conversation between two adversaries locked onto one another. I am respectfully looking for fresh--and faithful--avenues through the current impasse of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) while giving voice to the center in the current theological discussion.
The focus for this essay is the difference between two primary ways to articulate the Gospel, one using the phrase Christ in me/us and the other using the phrase me/us in Christ. Both phrases belong to the Bible, especially Paul and John, but Western Christianity over the last 350 years has stressed Christ in me/us almost to the exclusion of the other phrase. With this emphasis Christianity grew in huge numbers during the 18th-19th centuries.
Advent 2: Luke 1:68-79
Behind this text is a life-long struggle with infertility, and then the announcement comes: "Your prayers have been answered!" What? Zechariah is not quite speechless; doubt escapes his lips: Are you sure? We're getting up there in years, you know ... I guess the angelic messenger hoped for better from the priest: "Behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day these things come to pass..." He's speechless now.
Nine months later Elizabeth gives birth to a bouncing baby boy, and only when a still-mute Zechariah scribbles down the instructions, "Name him John," does he go from silence to sound. But the proud father doesn't merely sing the praises of his own newborn son. In this passage Zechariah is singing in the reign.
Recently, a church in Appomattox, Virginia, advanced an overture to the Presbytery of the Peaks with the intent of ensuring uniformity as to the interpretation of ordination standards, particularly as they relate to Amendment B. Amendment B is the only (for now) specification of what it means that those ordained are to live "a life in obedience to scripture and in conformity to the historic confessional standards of the Church." Among all the things that biblical and theological obedience could mean, Amendment B and the Appomattox church want it clear that it means "fidelity within the covenant of marriage of a man and a woman or chastity in singleness."
The overture will not be considered until the March 2007 presbytery meeting. Still, that a church in Appomattox, Va., would champion such an overture is a symbolic indication that the north truly has won the ideological debate in the Presbyterian Church. I offer as explanation the following story of democracy in America and in the American Presbyterian Church.
c. 2006 Religion News Service
RICHMOND, Va. -- 'Your generation will have to die before we can move on,' a 20-something told a 60-something at a national church convention last summer.
'He could be right,' the 60-something said last week, but maybe not.
Veterans of religious wars are highly invested in seeking control of the Titanic, rather than rethinking the Christian enterprise for challenging, post-modern times.
While the same old warriors fight the same old battles over sexuality, church property, denominational leadership, control of seminaries, doctrine, and who's to blame for shrinking membership, more and more believers gravitate to the margins.
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