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Navigating between “Amen” and “No” — The dilemma and promise of the Presbyterian Outlook

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Sometime in the early 1980s, when I was a recent graduate of Union Presbyterian Seminary, I had a conversation with an uncle. It was in the context of a family funeral, when we were all together. He has gone to glory now, but he – like my dad, and my brother and so many generations of ancestors before me – was a Presbyterian minister. We got to talking about the church, and he told me of an occasion that happened at a General Assembly when he was a commissioner from his presbytery in South Carolina. It was in 1968 at the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUS), which was held in Montreat, North Carolina. Those years were fraught with social issues like civil rights and Vietnam and the role of women in leadership, and even though such fraughtness is not unusual at Presbyterian General Assemblies, this particular assembly, said my uncle, fairly crackled at every moment with the tensions of the late 1960s. My uncle shared with me a story of such tension … [Read more...]

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What they heard: Special committee listens to Presbyterian leaders discuss concerns and hope for per capita

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LOUISVILLE – For seven months in 2019, the per capita work team of a special committee held listening sessions with leaders of synods and presbyteries across the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) — meeting either by conference call or in person with leaders of all 16 synods and of 108 presbyteries, with more than 200 people in all. The team – one of two work teams of the Special Committee on Per-Capita Based Funding and National Church Financial Sustainability – was probing for insights as to how Presbyterians at local and regional levels of the church think about per capita, the per-member fee (currently set at $8.95 per member) that the denomination asks congregations to pay to support the work of the national church. Here are some themes that emerged from those conversations. Understandings. Basic understandings of the role per capita plays in the PC(USA) system ranged from more positive – the idea of partnership in a connectional system of ministry – to unhappiness with what’s … [Read more...]

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The Courage to See: Daily Inspiration from Great Literature

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Greg Garrett and Sabrina Fountain WJK Press, 376 pages How I love this new book! Let me count the ways. I could be begin with the luminous essay by Sabrina Fountain in the foreword that sets the deep purpose for this collection. There she describes her own love for books that provide more than solace and more than inspiration. They are more like the ground on which we stand. Fountain says something I understand: “I have a deep reverence for books and still find them profoundly comforting as physical objects.” This book is about the content within great literature that sustains the mind and heart throughout a lifetime. That, too, is what I love. She and co-author Greg Garrett have gathered a wide array of voices from literature across the centuries. It’s obvious the care that has gone into the selection. The title itself comes from a line said by preacher John Ames in “Gilead,” the now classic by Marilynne Robinson. As if literature were not enough, the authors have … [Read more...]

Prayer for peace

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Lord of all nations, as we watch world events unfold, our anxiety about our life together grows. As tensions around the globe persist, we look to you for wisdom. You are just and merciful, abounding in steadfast love, relentlessly working for reconciliation. Send your Spirit into the halls of power and the hearts of leaders who make life and death decisions that will impact countless people. Remain close to those in harm’s way, be with members of the military who have chosen to serve despite the real and present risks. Strengthen and comfort the families and friends of those deployed to dangerous places. Surround with compassion those worried and fearful of what may happen next. Help us, God of all, to set aside partisan politics in order to seek the common good, work for the life-giving solutions and enact policies that lead to peace in every corner of your beloved creation. Grant us wisdom, grant us courage, grant us mercy, for the living of these complicated and chaotic days. … [Read more...]

Take Me

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Take my fervor, take my will. Make me silent, yielded, still; wounded, if these wounds may be windows to eternity. Take my talent. What’s it worth? Nothing, save Your humble birth lights the chamber of my heart, truth and meaning to impart. Take my ego. Take my pride. Let docility abide in the soul of who I am, kneeling by my brother Lamb. Take my intellect and find faith and trust and peace of mind, making me content to see mercy as a mystery. Take my dwelling. Take my land, offered to an Unseen Hand that will give them back to me, anchored in eternity. Take my future. Take my past. Both lie in the shadow cast by a rugged cross of wood raised on Friday, known as Good. Take my living. Take my death. Let the Spirit breathe Its breath into this dark lung of me, lit by Your nativity. DANIEL POTTS is a ruling elder at First Presbyterian Church in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.  He started writing poetry after his father began creating visual art in the … [Read more...]

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Preaching from the Old Testament

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Walter Brueggemann Fortress Press, 196 pages Reviewed by Paul Rowland Jr. “Have you ever seen workers in the street lift off a manhole cover?” asked a gifted preacher friend. They move around the cover with a prying tool, searching for a point of purchase that will enable them to lift the cover, and that, my friend said, “is what I do each week in writing a sermon.” The manhole he tries to access each week, as with many pastors, is frequently from the Gospels and rarely from the Old Testament. Like their congregants, many preachers find “Old” off-putting and “New” attractive. Some complain that they find the Old Testament “so judgmental” though, as Working Preacher’s Presbyterian contributor, Matt Skinner, has often pointed out: Anyone who doesn’t believe the New Testament doesn’t include judgment or that the Old Testament doesn’t include grace, hasn’t read either closely enough. Though the lectionary suggests both a psalm and another Old Testament text each Sunday, many … [Read more...]

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