Presbyterian (PCUSA) News

Quito’s Advent-St. Nicholas features ‘acceptance of diverse denominational and worship traditions’

April 3, 2013

Presbyterian News Service

Jerry L. Van Marter

QUITO, Ecuador

A global outlook requires a global search, so Advent-Saint Nicholas ― an English-language church here ― is advertising widely for candidates for its pastorate.

The congregation hopes to have its new pastor in place by August of this year. The position calls for an initial two-year commitment, which is renewable.

“We are looking for a pastor who will inspire us with a comprehensive vision for the church’s future,” says the congregation’s “call” for a pastor. “We are looking for a pastor who can work with people of various denominational, confessional and theological backgrounds, maintaining unity within our diversity and enabling us to help one another grow in faith.”

Advent-Saint Nicholas serves the international community in Quito, a fascinating city that is easily accessible to the Pacific Ocean beach, the high summits of the Andes mountains and the dense jungles of the Amazon.

The congregation includes both transient and permanent expatriate residents of Ecuador, as well as Ecuadorians who speak English.

That means, the “call” states: “We need a pastor who is willing to explore with the congregation their role in God’s world today, including their role as Christians living in Ecuador.”

The congregation identifies its “core values” as:

• Acceptance of diverse denominational and worship traditions;
• Being empowered by the Holy Spirit;
• Striving to make the church relevant in today’s world;
• Making Advent-Saint Nicholas an accepting and supportive community;
• Continuous learning about ourselves and our faith;
• Supporting one another in our respective journeys of faith.

Candidates should possess a Master of Divinity degree or its equivalent, ordination by a “recognized church body,” basic competence in Spanish, familiarity with South American and Latin American culture and/or other cross-cultural experience in congregational leadership and computer “competence.”

Advent-Saint Nicholas is a self-supporting congregation. The basic compensation package helps to defray such expenses as stipend, housing, health insurance, travel expenses and the like.

Additional information and the complete job description can be found on the Advent-Saint Nicholas website: www.asnquito.org.  Click on the Pastoral Search tab and then the Job Description link.

Information for this story furnished by the Rev. Geoffrey Reeson, pastor emeritus, Advent-Saint Nicholas church.

April 3, 2013

Religion News Service

Alessandro Speciale

VATICAN CITY

The Vatican on March 29 dismissed criticism of Pope Francis’ decision to wash the feet of two women during a Maundy Thursday Mass at a Rome youth prison.

The move has come under fire from Catholic traditionalists who say that the rite is a re-enactment of Jesus washing the feet of the 12 apostles before his death, and thus should be limited only to men.

Traditionally, popes have washed the feet of 12 priests during a solemn Mass in Rome’s St. John Lateran Basilica.

Edward Peters, a blogger and expert in church law at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit, wrote on his blog that Francis was setting a “questionable example.” A 1988 letter from the Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship states that only “chosen men” can be admitted to the foot-washing ceremony.

But including women in the rite is a widespread practice in the United States and elsewhere. As archbishop of Buenos Aires, then-Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio regularly included women in the rite.

The Vatican’s chief spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said the pope’s decision was “absolutely licit” for a rite that is not a church sacrament. Francis also took into account “the real situation, the community where one celebrates,” Lombardi added.

The Casal del Marmo prison where Francis celebrated houses both young men and women, “and it would have been strange if girls had been excluded,” Lombardi said.

“This community understands simple and essential things; they were not liturgy scholars,” Lombardi said. “Washing feet was important to present the Lord’s spirit of service and love.”

A document issued by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops says that the inclusion of women in the foot-washing rite is an “understandable way of accentuating the evangelical command of the Lord,’who came to serve and not to be served,’ that all members of the church must serve one another in love.”

The bishops’ document continues, “It has become customary in many places to invite both men and women to be participants in this rite in recognition of the service that should be given by all the faithful to the church and to the world.”

Since his election on March 13, Francis has shown a preference for a simple, humble approach to the papacy. He’s scaled back the elaborate rites and liturgical vestments his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, had reintroduced.

The moves have worried some conservatives.

The Rev. John Zuhlsdorf, a conservative blogger, said that Francis’ moves might be interpreted as a vindication of Catholic liberals that have been increasingly marginalized during the conservative papacies of Benedict and John Paul II.

“Liberals will find it far easier than conservatives to claim that Francis’ actions are endorsements of their liberal thing,” he wrote on his blog on March 28.

The inclusion of women in the Maundy Thursday rite, for example, could raise hopes that Francis will endorse women priests, Zulhsdorf wrote. “Liberals,” he said, “only care about the washing of the feet of women, because ultimately they want women to do the washing.”

But Bergoglio wrote in a 2011 book that women cannot accede to the priesthood because “the maximum of the priesthood is Jesus, a male.”

“According to tradition,” wrote the future pope, “all that pertains to the priesthood must happen through man.”

Presbyterian Church in Taiwan general secretary set to retire after 20 years

April 2, 2013

Te-Chien (Andrew) Chang

Special to Presbyterian News Service

Kristine Greenaway

TAIPEI

Te-Chien (Andrew) Chang is preparing to retire in July as general secretary of the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan (PCT) following 20 years of service in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s partner’s General Assembly office in the country’s capital, Taipei.

Chang’s service to the church has been marked by his deep commitment to Christian formation, protection of his country’s natural environment, advocacy for the economic and human rights of the country’s indigenous peoples, and global ecumenism.

Chang is a gifted story teller and his talents as a photographer enrich his daily posting of Bible text to his Facebook page. He is also a regular blogger. But it is perhaps his passion for growing food that is the most apt metaphor for his gifts as a practical theologian attuned to the needs of his country.

Chang’s face lights up when he talks of the benefits of communal gardening. He has seen computer scientists rediscover life in all its fullness when they take time to leave their pressure-filled offices and work with their families on small plots he has made available on land borrowed from a local farmer.

Concern for workers in the country’s science sector which has a hidden problem of suicides fuels his missionary zeal for offering its highly-educated, deeply stressed employees the possibility of sowing a new life while planting seeds. Some of those part-time gardeners grow into full-time Christians.

As Chang moves into his retirement years, his active involvement in his country’s life and challenges will continue.

He plans to develop model leadership and programs with indigenous peoples that will help them create and manage income-generating programs in local communities.

The objective is to create jobs in the agricultural and arts sectors that will bring young people home from the country’s urban centers where they are often exploited and led into addiction or prostitution.

This gardener continues to plant dreams, rooted in his deep Christian faith. The harvest will continue in the years to come.

Kristine Greenaway serves as head of the Office of Communications for the World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC) in Geneva, Switzerland. The PC(USA) is a WCRC member. church.

Water has become “source of power and division,” Indian theologian says

April 2, 2013

Ecumenical Water Network

Anderson Jeremiah

GENEVA

Editor’s note: the following reflection is part of the Ecumenical Water Network’s “Seven Weeks of Water” campaign to call attention to the importance of water to sustain life. ― Jerry L. Van Marter

“And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him..” (John 13.3-5) 

Jesus uses water as an effective and surprising channel to demonstrate the central aspect of his vision for the disciples' ministry. According to John’s gospel the Last Supper took place in an undisclosed and secret room, in order for Jesus to be alone with his disciples and loved ones. There were no slaves or helpers to break the bread or to pour the wine ― just the gathered few.

Jesus uses this last meal to show his disciples the fundamental principles of his kingdom. The disciples might be tempted to dream about power and authority and their place in the coming kingdom, rather than Jesus’ humble acts of service.

It was difficult for the disciples to humble themselves and serve each other, which is the central focus of Jesus’ message. In practical terms, they did not follow the local custom of washing their feet before having a Passover meal, so Jesus reminded them both of what is right and proper, as well as how to serve.

It is in this setting that Jesus uses water to demonstrate the essence of his teaching. Water is used for cleansing and purifying the dirty feet of the disciples and becomes the symbol of restoration and of new life! The everyday act of foot washing becomes the vehicle for divine revelation.

Jesus envisions a new community which is not defiled by power and greed for authority, but of humility and servitude. But today in our world water has become a source of power and division.

Those who unjustly control the sources of water make it into a commodity, owned and sold by powerful monopolies, while those who cannot afford this basic human necessity have to be content with polluted water, endangering themselves. It is sadly the case that in the majority of the world today water has become the cause of death and not of life.

Water ― “the source of life” ― has been privatized and exploited to such an extent that only certain human communities can have access to its benefits. The lack of clean water is causing millions to die of diseases every year and human greed has robbed water of its purifying and restoring nature.  

The challenge Jesus Christ sets for us by symbolically using water at his last meeting with his disciples says loud and clear that we have to learn to embody the message of love and service for the renewal and restoration of human communities. Jesus invites us to wash ourselves of our greed and desire for power.

Water must be restored to being a source of life and basic right of the whole of creation if the world is to carry on. We as Jesus Christ’s disciples, are once again invited to allow Christ’s love and challenge to wash over us, so that we may embody his message to others.

The Rev. Anderson Jeremiah is an ordained Anglican priest from the Church of South India and currently lectures in world Christianity at Lancaster University, United Kingdom.

April 2, 2013

Religion News Service

Caleb Bell

WASHINGTON

Is the New Testament missing a few books? In a move that may seem heretical to some Christians, a group of scholars and religious leaders has added 10 new texts to the Christian canon.

The work, “A New New Testament,” was released nationwide in March in an attempt to add a different historical and spiritual context to the Christian scripture.

Some of the 10 additional texts — which have come to light over the past century — date back to the earliest days of Christianity and include some works that were rejected by the early church.

The 19-member council that compiled the texts consisted of biblical scholars, leaders in several Christian denominations — Episcopal, Roman Catholic, United Methodist, United Church of Christ and Lutheran — two rabbis and an expert in Eastern religions and yoga.

“Jesus said,’Recognize what is in your sight, and that which is hidden from you will become plain to you. For there is nothing hidden which will not become manifest.” — The Gospel of Thomas (c. 60-175 A.D.)

“(The texts seem) so nurturing and inspiring to people’s spiritual journeys. It’s also important for the public to see a broader picture of early Christianity,” said Hal Taussig, a biblical scholar and pastor who chaired the council.

Taussig is a visiting professor of New Testament at Union Theological Seminary, professor of early Christianity at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College and co-pastor at Chestnut Hill United Church in Philadelphia.

Taussig, a fellow of the Jesus Seminar, which sought to piece together an accurate historical account of Jesus’ life that downplayed his divinity, said he hopes the project gives the ancient texts new life beyond the rarefied world of biblical scholarship.

Even though he’s not suggesting that people see the texts as authoritative theology, perhaps not surprisingly not everyone admires the project.

Timothy Paul Jones, a professor of leadership at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, said the texts Taussig used in “A New New Testament” don’t add real context to the original New Testament.

“Treating these 10 texts as historical context for the New Testament would be like studying ‘Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter’ to understand the historical context of the 13th Amendment,” Jones said.

“These texts that Taussig adds come from a different time period than any New Testament document, and they represent a fundamentally different worldview.”

“Then Mary stood up, greeted them all, and said to her brethren,’Do not weep and do not grieve nor be irresolute, for His grace will be entirely with you and will protect you.’” — The Gospel of Mary (c.80-180 A.D.)

New Testament scholars are divided on their understanding of early Christian texts in relation to what actually made it into the New Testament. Many disagree on the dates of different texts, the validity of such sources and the relevancy of noncanonical texts to biblical materials.

While Taussig said he doesn’t believe the New Testament is incomplete, he thinks that the new material “elucidates it and expands it.”

In the book’s preface, Taussig wrote that parts of the New Testament are “offensive and outmoded,” citing verses that tell slaves to obey their owners (1 Peter 2:18) or wives to submit to their husbands (Ephesians 5:22), or passages that refer negatively to Jews (John 8:44).

Jones said that although several of Taussig’s chosen texts bear the names of apostles, “none of them was widely thought to be an authentic text from any first century apostle.”

“He said to me, ‘John, John, why do you doubt, or why are you afraid? You are not unfamiliar with this image, are you? — that is, do not be timid! — I am the one who is with you always. I am the Father, I am the Mother, I am the Son. I am the undefiled and incorruptible one. Now I have come to teach you what is and what was and what will come to pass. ...’” — The Secret Revelation of John (c. 110-175 A.D.)

Texts included in “A New New Testament” are the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, the Acts of Paul and Thecla and others, along with pieces of poetry and prayers.

“I trust those writers who were closer to the events in Jesus’ life — that is, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John — to provide us with a more accurate look at what his life, death and resurrection were like,” said the Rev. James Martin, a Jesuit priest and author.

“If you read those other texts against the four Gospels, you can see pretty clearly why the church chose those four,” he said.

“When Thecla came to the cave, she found Paul upon his knees praying and saying,’O holy Father, O Lord Jesus Christ, grant that the fire may not touch Thecla; but be her helper, for she is thy servant.’ Thecla then standing behind him, cried out in the following words:’O sovereign Lord, Creator of heaven and earth, the Father of thy beloved and holy Son, I praise thee that thou hast preserved me from the fire, to see Paul again.’” — The Acts of Paul and Thecla (c. 85-160 A.D.)

Martin, however, said that there may be valuable information in the additional texts even if they never gained the church’s official stamp of approval.

Despite disagreement surrounding the early documents, there is interest in texts that lie outside of biblical canon.

“I see a lot of curiosity among people about documents that didn’t make it into the New Testament,” said Greg Carey, a New Testament professor at Lancaster Theological Seminary, which is affiliated with the United Church of Christ.

The revised New Testament “could serve people a way into exploring the texts,” he said.

Karen King, a respected scholar of early Christianity at Harvard University who worked with Taussig on the panel, said she thinks the new texts add historical depth to the New Testament.

“I think that this book will help people understand the rich diversity of early Christianity more than they have in the past,” she said. “You can see more of the richness of the debates by looking at more literature from that time.”

The council behind “A New New Testament:”

• Margaret Aymer — Associate professor of New Testament and area chair of biblical studies at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, Ga., and a minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA).
• Geoffrey Black — General minister and president of United Church of Christ.
• Sister Margaret Brennan — Member of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and former president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.
• Lisa Bridge — Program manager for children and youth ministries at Trinity Wall Street Episcopal Church in New York City and an expert in yogic and Buddhist traditions.
• John Dominic Crossan — Professor emeritus in religious studies at DePaul University and former co-chair of the Jesus Seminar.
• Rabbi Nancy Fuchs Kreimer — Editor of a forthcoming collection of spiritual essays by female Jewish scholars.
• Bishop Susan Wolfe Hassinger — Retired bishop of the United Methodist Church and the bishop-in-residence and a lecturer at Boston University School of Theology.
• Bishop Alfred Johnson — Retired bishop in the United Methodist Church and pastor of (United Methodist) Church of the Village in New York City.
• Chebon Kernell — Pastor of First American United Methodist Church in Norman, Okla.
• Karen L. King — Professor of divinity at Harvard University.
• Celene Lillie — Doctoral candidate in New Testament studies at Union Theological Seminary.
• Stephen D. Moore — Professor of New Testament at Drew University Theological School.
• J. Paul Rajashekar — Professor of systematic theology at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America).
• Bruce Reyes-Chow — Social media consultant and former moderator of the Presbyterian Church (USA).
• Mark Singleton — Professor at St. John’s College in Santa Fe, N.M., and an expect on yoga.
• Sister Nancy Sylvester — Member of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and former president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious.
• Barbara Brown Taylor — A professor of religion at Piedmont College, author and Episcopal priest.
• Rabbi Arthur Waskow — Director of the Shalom Center in Philadelphia and a leader in Jewish renewal and peace movements.

A Taiwanese aboriginal congregation’s success story

April 1, 2013

Pastor Shin Liang Chen (right) and Elder Li-Jhu Gu (left) have helped revitalize Juang San Presbyterian Church. —Kristine Greenaway

Special to Presbyterian News Service

Kristine Greenaway

TAICHUNG, Taiwan

Shin Liang Chen thought he had been assigned to the wilderness. 

He had just graduated from theological school in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, and been sent to serve a small, impoverished congregation in Taichung, a city in the central region of the country.  The members of Juang San Presbyterian Church came from ten different indigenous tribes. Chen is a member of the Han Chinese majority of the population.

The former engineer and business manager felt totally unprepared for the challenge of serving as the solo pastor of a struggling parish in a poor area of the city. Worse, he quickly learned the congregation had been talked into buying a church building it couldn’t afford.

Now the bank was pressuring the elder who had signed the loan to repay the $178,000 loan. Elder Li-Jhu Gu didn’t know what to do. Her new pastor did. The congregation had to get its financial house in order.

Chen went to the bank, took back the loan for which the parish was being charged an exorbitant interest rate and got a new loan from a credit union at a much lower rate.

The problem of meeting the monthly repayment schedule remained however. Most members of the congregation worked in low-paid, insecure jobs and were unable to contribute to servicing the debt. Quietly Chen raised funds among his family which he used to meet the $6,700 installments.

Nineteen years later, Gu laughs as she tells the story. The congregation didn’t know where their young pastor was getting the money. It wasn’t until Gu was invited to meet Chen’s family that she realized he came from wealth.

How was she to know? Chen had endeared himself to the congregation by eating lunch from a paper bag seated on the ground, aboriginal-style. They had no way of knowing he had spent six years climbing the ranks of an engineering company until he was working in its human resources and financial planning office.

Today Chen realizes that those six years in private industry proved to be vital to his ministry.

Using his systems analysis experience, he assessed the situation of the congregation and recognized it had two big assets: the church was located near a large and wealthy Christian hospital and the congregational members were a work force that could be trained to provide services to the hospital. 

Chen quickly hit upon the idea of forming a cleaning company for the hospital. It flourished and so did the congregation.

The hospital cleaning company now has 350 employees working in the main Changua Christian Hospital and its eight auxiliary hospitals. Company employees offer support to indigenous patients as well as ensuring a clean environment.

Church members hired to work for the company have financial stability and are able to buy homes in the neighbourhood and be more active in parish life. The congregation has grown from 25 members to 100 and has just met to consider expanding its facilities because it has outgrown the building.

Within five years, the loan was paid off. Now the elders meet once a month, not to discuss their own debt, but rather to receive requests from other indigenous churches that wish to expand their programming or buy property of their own. They approve $100,500 in grants per year.  

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When Chen arrived, Juang San Presbyterian Church was a “Category D” parish, the category used by the Presbyterian Church of Taiwan to designate the poorest of its congregations.

Today Juang San is one of three “Category A” parishes in Taichung with an annual budget of $166,000, of which 30 per cent comes from congregational giving and the rest from profits made by the cleaning company.

Elder Gu and her husband were among the founding members of the congregation. Originally from a Bunan tribal village in central Taiwan, they had come to Taichung in search of work. For ten years they had been active in an indigenous fellowship group that had been meeting in a Han church.

There are 1.3 million people in the greater Taichung area. Of these only 3,000 are indigenous. However, 60-70 per cent of aboriginal people are Christian, compared to one per cent of the Han majority.

Eventually the pastor of the church suggested it was time for them to set up their own church. He wasn’t pushing them out, says Gu. He was encouraging them to become independent. It was impossible to find an affordable rental property so the group was forced to buy a building and renovate it.

Of the original fifty fellowship members, only a handful made the move to the new church. Some had lost their jobs meanwhile. Others found it too far to travel to the new location in the neighborhood where land was cheap enough for the fledging congregation to buy.

Helping people in their own parish manage their household economy and helping other parishes meet their financial needs is a central aspect of the congregation’s ministry.

Gu makes the point by telling the story of how she took on the management of an aboriginal hospital cleaner’s salary and expenses when he ended up in intensive care from the stress of being chronically in debt. Under her firm guidance he now has a large savings account. Saving is not traditional in Indigenous communities Gu explains. Learning that skill however has now allowed the cleaner to eat regularly and live well within his means.

From the beginning, Chen’s message to the congregation was not to rely on others. He told members they had to “learn to fish and become self-reliant.”  In Taiwan’s Han-dominated society, aboriginal people can be put down, he says, so it was important they learn business skills and keep trying until they succeed. If they don’t, he says, they will be put down.

The strategy has worked. Today the congregation provides support and encouragement for indigenous students and offers classes in aboriginal culture and language. The congregation now has its house in order with doors open to the community around it.

Kristine Greenaway serves as head of the Office of Communications for the World Communion of Reformed Churches (WCRC) in Geneva, Switzerland. The PC(USA) is a WCRC member church.

‘Walk,’ created for Pittsburgh GA, scores at 46th annual Houston festival

April 1, 2013

Presbyterian News Service

Jerry L. Van Marter

LOUISVILLE

“Walk – A Presbyterian History,” a video created by the Presbyterian Media Mission (PMM) for the 220th General Assembly last summer in Pittsburgh, has been awarded a “Remi” award by WorldFest-Houston, the oldest film festival in North America.

“On the heels of receiving recognition two years ago with the ‘Come Walk With Us’ video invitation to Pittsburgh for the 2012 General Assembly, I thought it would be a long shot to receive another one for the ‘Walk’ opening GA meeting video,” PMM Director Gregg Hartung ― who directed and produced the video ― told Presbyterian News Service.

“It is a real honor to receive recognition from peers in the video/film production industry for something that is religious in nature and yet is both entertaining and informative."

Hartung will receive the award at the festival’s 46th annual Gala Remi Awards Dinner in Houston on April 20. Only four films are honored each year in each category. The festival runs April 12-21.

To view PMM’s award-winning video, go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ONsYUGo41oA

April 1, 2013

Religion News Service

Alessandro Speciale

VATICAN CITY

Pope Francis on Thursday (March 28) washed the feet of 12 young inmates, including two girls and two Muslims, during a Maundy Thursday Mass at a youth detention center in Rome.

The Argentine pontiff, who has shown an eagerness to break with tradition in the two weeks since his election to the papacy on March 13, chose to celebrate the rite in the Casal del Marmo prison in northwest Rome, rather than in the traditional venue of the St. John Lateran Basilica.

Francis has repeatedly stated his desire to bring the papacy and the church closer to the poor and the marginalized.

The inclusion of two women in the rite — which commemorates Jesus’ washing of the feet of the apostles on the night before his death — is also a first for a pope, but Francis had already done so as archbishop of Buenos Aires.

As all of Jesus’ apostles were men, popes usually washed the feet of 12 male priests. Outside the Vatican, many bishops will wash only the feet of men.

In a brief, unscripted homily, Francis explained that the foot-washing ceremony exemplifies Jesus’ message that men — including those in positions of power and authority — must be in service of each other.

“Among us, who is above must be in service of the others,” he said. “This doesn’t mean we have to wash each other’s feet every day, but we must help one another.”

Media access to the youth prison was limited since most inmates are minors, but the Vatican’s chief spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, reported that Francis knelt in front of the 12 youths and kissed their feet after having washed and dried them.

“It was an impressive gesture,” he said, adding that it was also “physically taxing.”

After the Mass, the pope personally greeted all the inmates as well as the prison’s staff and volunteers. “Do not let yourselves be robbed of hope,” he told the young offenders before leaving.

The Casal del Marmo youth prison houses 49 inmates aged 14-21, mostly coming from North Africa and Eastern Europe.

Earlier on Thursday, at a solemn Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica that marks the beginning of Easter celebrations for the Catholic Church, Francis called on priests to avoid becoming “managers” and “collectors of antiques or novelties.”

He urged them to “go out of themselves,” into the “outskirts where there is suffering, bloodshed, blindness that longs for sight, and prisoners in thrall to many evil masters.”

April 1, 2013

Office of the General Assembly

Neal D. Presa

Moderator of the 220th General Assembly (2012)

Louisville

Q.  What does it mean to eat the crucified body of Christ and to drink his poured-out blood?

A.  It means
        to accept with a believing heart
           the entire suffering and death of Christ
        and thereby
           to receive forgiveness of sins and eternal life.

     But it means more.
        Through the Holy Spirit, who lives both in Christ and in us,
        we are united more and more to Christ’s blessed body.
           And so, although he is in heaven and we are on earth,
           we are flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone.
           And we forever live on and are governed by one Spirit,
              as the members of our body are by one soul.

–Q/A 76 from the proposed new translation of the Heidelberg Catechism

I was born in the beautiful Pacific island of Guam. As a Filipino American—Pacific Islander—my family and I love to party, swim, dance, sing, and eat. But not just eat. We feast. Island life is about feasting. Whether neighbor, friend, or stranger, all come to the abundant table. We party until the early morning hours.

We always advise people before attending any of our feasts to prepare their stomachs as well as their mouths, because a lot of eating and talking happens. Life and soul happen. We approach life and living through a sense of abundance. While the party budget might indicate on paper that we can only afford to host 30 people, rarely do only 30 people show up. It’s more like 130, at the very least. When people leave the feast, they are expected to take food home, and to tell their friends and neighbors about the feast, so that they can join the feast the next time.

Although Lent and the Easter feast have now passed, we yet live and serve with the great News that Jesus Christ has risen and is ascended, and through Jesus, God has given the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Even as Christ is fully absent—being seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty—Christ is also fully present through the Holy Spirit. The Spirit unites us to the fullness of God and to the communion of saints—in all times and in all places—the living and the dead, whose hearts and souls forever praise God.

Having been transformed by the Spirit of Jesus Christ on this side of heaven, we are being apprenticed by the Holy Spirit into the ways, will, and work of our Lord. One major way in which this happens is when we feast at the Table of the Lord. It’s no wonder that when the Lord ate with his disciples, the Gospel according to Luke says, “Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him” (24:31a). And even after that feast, the Lord had an additional feast involving broiled fish. (No, Jesus wasn’t a Guamanian, nor a Filipino!). After all these feasts, Jesus says, “You are witnesses of these things. And see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised; so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high” (24:48–49).

That’s what the church has always been called to be and to do: The feasting, witnessing body of Christ.

Join us for a conversation on that subject—in person or by live web stream—at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, April 23–25. Visit the website for more information.

Presbyterians stand up to curb corruption

March 28, 2013

Presbyterian clergy join other supporters outside a DC appeals court after hearings during an anti-transparency lawsuit filed by the oil industry. —the Rev. Chuck Booker

Special to Presbyterian News Service

Alexa Smith

LOUISVILLE

Citizen groups packed a District of Columbia appeals court last Friday (March 22) to support a pillar transparency law in financial reporting opposed by oil industry lobbies and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) mounted its defense of regulations released Aug. 22, 2012, that grant no exemptions to oil, gas and mining companies, who are required to publish payments to foreign governments in annual reports to the SEC. 

The new regulations were drafted to implement the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama in 2010. The SEC is charged with regulating and enforcing federal securities laws and the oil industry quickly sued the SEC after the regulations were released last summer.

The lawsuit is led by the Chamber, the American Petroleum Institute (API), the International Petroleum Producers Association and other lobby organizations. They say the rule violates free speech by forcing companies to make now secret data public and accuse the SEC of failing to weigh the estimated $14 billion economic impact of implementing it.

The provision under dispute is known as the Cardin-Lugar Amendment, named after the bipartisan champions of the bill, Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md.) and former Senator Richard Lugar (R-Ind.).

“We commend the SEC for aggressively defending the Cardin-Lugar Amendment and the intent of Congress,” said Isabel Munilla, director of the Publish What You Pay campaign U.S. (PWYP), who has said since the suit’s inception that the oil industry’s claims are “flat wrong” and the lawsuit “frivolous.”

“In an era where tax dollars are scarce, this common-sense law shines a light on billions in financial flows to the U.S. and foreign governments and allows citizens to follow the money and make sure it’s put to good use,” Munilla said.

Most of the judges’ questions focused on the First Amendment challenge and whether the SEC could have narrowed the scope of the rule. Eugene Scalia, a lawyer arguing on behalf of the oil industry, said the SEC needed to allow some exemptions for disclosures that are prohibited by foreign governments or contracts.

Judge David Tatel said that the SEC does not accept the argument leveled by the industry that some foreign governments do not allow disclosure. Activists tied to the campaign say the SEC’s stance is accurate, according to researchers.

Another argument revolved around whether the appellate court even has jurisdiction in this matter under the Securities Exchange Act. The API filed an identical suit in U.S. District Court, also in the nation’s capital, but the suit is stayed until this appeals court rules.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was the first denomination to sign onto this international global transparency effort ― called Publish What You Pay ― in 2008 at the urging of RELUFA, a Cameroonian organization with ties to the Presbyterian Hunger Program’s (PHP) Joining Hands Initiative.

The decision was applauded by other partners in Africa and Latin America, as well as Presbyterians linked to churches in resource-rich countries where government leaders grow rich through corrupt practices and bribery while ordinary citizens live in abject poverty.

Presbyterians in more than 70 presbyteries witnessed to the moral importance of the provision, contending that charity is no solution for the 1.5 billion people who live on less than two dollars a day in the roughly 60 resource-rich countries.

Church leaders’ statements say that redirecting millions of accountable dollars through transparency efforts may well improve life for the poorest through infrastructure, health care and education upgrades, as well as curb corruption and human rights abuses tied to resource extraction.

More thorough reporting also gives investors access to information that enables ethical decision-making and assessment of risk, including project-level reporting. Oil companies typically release aggregate numbers for an entire country by year which makes it harder to assess projects.

Three clergy from National Capital Presbytery were among listeners in the court representing the PCUSA: The Rev. Chuck Booker of Bethesda Presbyterian Church in Bethesda, Md., the Rev. Carla Gorrell, associate general presbyter, and the Rev. Andrew Plocher of New Hope Presbyterian in Derwood, Md.

“There are two contrasting proverbs involving elephants that spring to mind. One comes from the Kikuyu people in Kenya: ‘When elephants fight, it’s the grass that suffers.’ The other, attributed to Desmond Tutu is Zulu in origin: ‘If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality,’” said Booker shortly after leaving the court. “This case is hardly one involving two elephants. And so I, as a Presbyterian cleric, can hardly remain neutral.”

Cardin and Lugar filed briefs claiming that the rule follows Congressional intent.

Mining companies are not party to the suit. Only the oil industry and the Chamber are litigants.

PC(USA) Stated Clerk the Rev. Gradye Parsons wrote to the API on Feb. 27 asking that the suit be dropped. He said that by opting for transparency, the oil industry could claim good corporate citizenship by helping to boost the GDP of fragile developing nations, assisting investors who do not want to do harm, encouraging stable and democratic government, and equipping citizens to hold their own governments accountable.

Similar transparency laws are now being put forward by the European Union, with strong support by Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron.  Regulatory proposals are under development in Canada and a campaign for disclosure is gaining traction in Australia.

There is no scheduled date for the court to issue its decision.

Alexa Smith is associate of Joining Hands Against Hunger, a ministry of the Presbyterian Hunger Program.

Presbyterian leaders gather to share goals, vision

March 28, 2013

Special to Presbyterian News Service

Hector Rodriguez

Associate for the Hispanic/Latino Congregational Support Office

LOUISVILLE

Last week, 20 leaders from Portuguese churches and ministries gathered here to reflect on the past, analyze the present and discern the future of Portuguese-language ministry in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

In accordance with the Presbyterian Mission Agency Mission Work Plan for 2013-16, participants discussed strategic goals while sharing a vision for Portuguese ministry and resources.

With more than a million Portuguese speakers in the United States, the Presbyterian leaders acknowledged that this is a new day for this specific language ministry. The Portuguese-speaking population represents a missiological challenge for the PC(USA), which serves a multicultural, multilingual and multiethnic society.

The March 18-20 event was coordinated in part by the Rev. Almir Dantas Dias, PMA’s new Portuguese-language field staff. The gathering was an excellent starting point, and more educational events are in the works, Dantas said.

March 28, 2013

Religion News Service

G. Jeffrey MacDonald

BEVERLY, Mass.

For Alcoholics Anonymous to continue helping addicts find freedom in sobriety, the 75-year-old organization has to reclaim its spiritual roots.

That’s the message coming from reformers who say the group has drifted from core principles and is failing addicts who can’t save themselves. But what constitutes the heart of AA spirituality is a matter of spirited debate.

Has AA become too God-focused and rigid? Or have groups watered down beliefs and methods so much that they’re now ineffective?

“Some think AA is not strict enough,” said Lee Ann Kaskutas, senior scientist at the Public Health Institute’s Alcohol Research Group in Emeryville, Calif. “Others think it’s too strict, so they want to change AA and make it get with the times.”

With more than 100,000 local meetings and an estimated two million members worldwide, AA is grappling with how much diversity it can handle. Over the past two years, umbrella organizations in Indianapolis and Toronto have delisted groups that replaced AA’s 12 steps to recovery with secular alternatives. More than 90 unofficial, self-described “agnostic AA” groups now meet regularly in the United States.

Faith language in AA goes back to the group’s founders, Bill Wilson and Robert Holbrook Smith. Six of the 12 steps, as prescribed in the original 1939 “Big Book,” refer to God either explicitly or implicitly. Step three, for example, cites “a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.”

Now some worry the founders’ efforts to be as inclusive as possible are being undermined by attempts to ensure, as one Indianapolis AA newsletter put it, that “AA remains undiluted.”

“In the past, there was a great deal of elasticity and tolerance in terms of different views,” said Roger C., a Toronto agnostic whose book “The Little Book: A Collection of Alternative 12 Steps” came out in January, and who doesn’t use his last name to protect his privacy. “But there’s been an increasingly rigidity from those who say, ‘It’s got to be this way and only this way.’ That has alienated a great number of people.”

But others argue that AA seldom offers the tough love that alcoholics need. Too many meetings ignore the 12 steps posted on their walls, said Charles Peabody, a 35-year-old former alcoholic and drug addict whose 2012 memoir, “The Privileged Addict,” has an entire chapter on “Watered Down AA.”

For Peabody and many addicts he’s sponsored, the key to becoming “a free man” has been rigorous and urgent application of the 12 steps, from taking fearless moral inventory to making painful amends. Yet mainstream AA meetings routinely do a “disservice,” he argues, by leading attendees to believe that meetings and sponsors — rather than God and concrete action steps — are what they need most in recovery.

“In mainstream AA, you hear either the war stories or the sob stories,” said Peabody, who lives in Beverly, Mass. “This is the solution? I just keep coming, drinking crappy coffee and listening to people bitch and moan? I knew that wasn’t going to work.”

Research suggests other factors can be more important than vigorous application of the 12 steps. Kaskutas says the strongest predictors of sustained sobriety through AA are whether a person has a sponsor, has a social network that consists of non-drinkers and is committed to service.

Spiritual practices aren’t always necessary for recovery, research suggests, but they can help.

“Prayer and meditation increase as a function of AA participation,” said John Kelly, associate director of the Center for Addiction Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. “That does lead to better outcomes for some.”

Men who’ve beaten addictions with Peabody’s guidance trace their healing to character reform via the original 12 steps. Twenty-three-year-old Pat Smith of Wakefield, Mass. battled heroin and crack cocaine in his teenage years, but nothing worked until he enrolled in a residential, intensive 12-step program. For addicts, he says, surrender to God is an indispensable step.

“People [at AA meetings] are like, ‘We don’t need God in here, leave God out of it,’” Smith said. “But the truth is, AA is a religious program ... It’s Christian principles, the whole book. So it’s like, if you guys want to go to meetings and leave God out of it, then go ahead. But don’t call it AA because it’s not.”

Roger C. brings a different concern. Those who insist on doing the original 12 steps, he says, are apt to alienate nonbelievers, who might never get the help they need.

Some get turned off “when someone comes up to you as a new member of AA and tells you,’if you don’t find God, you’re going to die a drunk’,” Roger C says. “That rigidity is very religious, very intolerant and very hurtful to a number of recovering alcoholics who are looking for an avenue to get sober.”

Offering multiple pathways to recovery bodes well for alcoholics, Kaskutas says, because what works for one person doesn’t always work for someone else.

“Because there’s this ethic of take what you need and leave the rest, it puts the attendee in a position of being able to form a program that is palatable to them,” Kaskutas says. “AA is doing just fine.”

March 27, 2013

Presbyterian News Service

Jerry L. Van Marter

PITTSBURGH ― Pittsburgh Theological Seminary has named the Rev. Johannes G.J. Swart as associate professor of world mission and evangelism. He will begin his service June 1, 2013.

“Jannie Swart provides a remarkable combination of international mission experience, new church development, pastoral leadership in both large and small churches, a Ph.D. at Luther Theological Seminary, and a unique ability to help students and congregations think theologically about ministry in the 21st century,” said the Rev. William J. Carl III, president and professor of homiletics at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.

Swart currently serves as pastor of Second Presbyterian Church in Oil City, Pa. He is a graduate of Luther Seminary (Ph.D. in Congregational Mission and Leadership) and University of Stellenbosch (B.Th., B.A. Philosophy, B.A.).

He previously served as pastor of Fontainebleau Community Church in Johannesburg, South Africa. There he led a Dutch Reformed mega-church during their post-apartheid attempt to become more multi-cultural, multi-racial, and multi-lingual. Before that, Swart led a new church development among college students in Cape Town while serving at Tafelberg Dutch Reformed Church there. Additionally, Swart worked as the national director of training and development for the Democratic Party in South Africa, a new, emerging political party (merger of three different political parties) in opposition of the apartheid policies of the National Party (prior to the release of Nelson Mandela, the unbanning of the African National Congress, and democracy).

In the U.S. Swart worked with St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church in St. Paul, Minn., as director of intergenerational faith formation; the Church Innovations Institute in St. Paul, as the director of partnership for missional church; and the Allelon Foundation in Boise, Idaho, as the research assistant for Allelon’s Mission in Western Culture Project.

PRINCETON, N.J. ― Princeton Theological Seminary will hold an Easter Octave Choral Service on Sunday, April 7 at 7:00 p.m. in Miller Chapel.

The service of worship will explore Easter through psalms, the Song of Solomon, the epistles, and the gospels with readings, anthems, and congregational singing led by the Princeton Seminary Choirs and a brass quartet. It will also feature an original composition by choral assistant Michael Gittens.

The Octave of Easter signifies the eighth day of Easter, the culmination of the High Holy Days. This is an opportunity for the public to join the Seminary community in celebrating the Festival of Easter. The service is free. 

SAN ANSELMO, Calif. ― For the third consecutive year, 18 San Francisco Theological Seminary women, students, staff, faculty, and community members performed The Vagina Monologues last month. Based upon Eve Ensler’s original production, The Vagina Monologues is a performance of different monologues delivered by a diverse group of women, with the goal to help women feel empowered and appreciative of their own bodies and to bring a public voice to women who are being abused and oppressed.

“Nearly one out of three women experiences some sort of violence in her lifetime. Pretty much every person on the globe knows someone who has been or is being abused,” says Melody Stanford, a first-year M.Div and MA student at SFTS. “It’s personal for all of us.”

This year’s performances took place in two locations: on the SFTS campus here  and at the Pacific School of Religion located on the Graduate Theological Union campus, in Berkeley, Calif.

New to The Vagina Monologues this year was the addition of a worship service held in Stewart Chapel on the SFTS campus, prior to the opening performance.

Proceeds from both performances of The Vagina Monologues benefited the Freedom House in San Francisco, a non-profit entity that seeks to bring hope, restoration, and a new life to survivors of human trafficking by providing a safe home and long-term aftercare.

RICHMOND, Va. ― Union Presbyterian Seminary has been awarded a $250,000 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. in support of the seminary’s new Church-Serve Initiative. The program is designed to address the economic challenges facing ministers who accept first calls in small churches with limited budgets.

When seminary graduates are called to serve a small church, they are sometimes offered salaries that are insufficient to cover living expenses, pension plan contributions, and student loan debts. As a result, some graduates take a detour from their ministry call in order to secure jobs that offer pay sufficient for meeting past and present financial needs.

The Church-Serve Initiative was developed to help relieve some of the financial burdens seminary graduates face and to provide additional training through the seminary’s Leadership Institute ― without additional costs to them ― so they are better prepared to accept calls to small churches. As the Church-Serve Initiative helps address the economic challenges facing future ministers, it also will enable more small churches to call pastors who are being equipped to revitalize those churches.

While students are enrolled in degree programs, Union Presbyterian’s Leadership Institute offers extracurricular sessions that will increase their financial literacy related to individuals, families, and congregations. Once a Union graduate accepts a call to a small church, the seminary will partner with the church for financial resources to help pay off existing student loans and to fund continuing leadership training.

The Endowment’s multi-year grant will generate start-up funding and provide an opportunity for the seminary to evaluate the effectiveness and impact of this initiative.

CHICAGO ― McCormick Theological Seminary has announced that its annual “McCormick Days” event will be Oct. 17-18 this year.

Based on feedback from previous attendees, some changes have been made. The event will fall on a Thursday and Friday instead of the previous Monday-Tuesday schedule.

Keynote speaker is the Rev. Reggie Williams, the seminary’s new ethics professor. The program will also include worship, panel discussions, workshops and affinity groups. It will conclude with a reunion banquet, with special recognition of milestone classes.

AUSTIN, Texas ― Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary second year students Annanda Barclay and Amy Wilson-Stayton were among a group of about 70 Presbyterians who took part in the annual session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) held in New York City March 4-15. The group played a vital role as the United Nations outlines its international approach to women’s issues ― specifically in efforts to eliminate and prevent all forms of violence against women and girls.

During this yearly meeting, representatives from member countries gather at U.N. headquarters to evaluate progress on gender equality, identify challenges, set global standards and formulate concrete policies to promote gender equality and women's empowerment worldwide. Through this dialog with Presbyterians and other attendees, the commission sets its global policy in regards to women’s issues under the United Nations Economic and Social Council.

“This commission is extremely important for the status of women everywhere. The Church has been silent in regards to violence against women for far too long. I look forward to applying the information I have learned about slavery, domestic violence, and systemic sexism in the practice of ministry in the Presbyterian Church USA,” said Barclay.

The majority of the Presbyterian delegation is made up of members of Presbyterian Women (PW), who have long been present at these meeting to share the concerns of women from around the world. This year, 13 young women participating in or leading Young Women’s Leadership Development programs within Racial Ethnic and Women’s Ministries/PW joined them.

Young Women’s Leadership Development is a national ministry of the Presbyterian Mission Agency within Women’s Ministries. The office of Young Women’s Leadership Development provides resources and programs for young adult women ages 18 – 35 who are considering leadership opportunities in the church.

Presbyterian Border Region Outreach will concentrate on poverty, violence

March 27, 2013

Special to Presbyterian News Service

John M. Nelsen

President, Presbyterian Border Region Outreach

SAN ANTONIO, Texas

Over the past year, representatives from the six Presbyterian Border Ministry sites, the six border presbyteries in the United States, and PC(USA) World Mission have met numerous times in person and by conference call to discern God’s future for ministry on the U.S.-Mexico border.  

After much prayer, discussion, and discernment we have decided on a new name, a concise mission, and are going to hire new staff to help all six sites in this ministry.

Our new name is Presbyterian Border Region Outreach (PBRO). 

Our purpose: “Living out the Gospel of Jesus Christ holistically on both sides of the US-Mexico Border, in partnership with other faith organizations and non-profits to reduce poverty and violence in the Border Region.”

PBRO will be an umbrella for ministry sites that help facilitate our holistic approach in addressing root causes of poverty and promoting reconciliation in cultures of violence.  In all of our work we are accountable first to our Lord Jesus Christ, and through His Spirit to one another, always responding to God’s image in our neighbor. 

To help PBRO and each of the six ministry sites, PBRO will utilize a new fulltime mission co-worker through PC(USA) World Mission.  This person will help to facilitate faithful and effective mission at each of the six border ministry sites.

While there are many other details to this renewed organization and staff, the central point is clear: ministry is alive and well on the border. We hope you will join us in spreading the word and supporting us with your prayers and financial gifts.

March 27, 2013

Religion News Service

Alessandro Speciale

VATICAN CITY

Pope Francis extended a hand to those who don’t belong to any religion, urging them March 20 to work with believers to build peace and protect the environment.

In his first ecumenical meeting, the new pope greeted representatives from Christian churches and other religions, including Jewish and Muslim leaders, who had come to Rome to attend his inaugural Mass on Tuesday.

Francis said that he intends to follow “on the path of ecumenical dialogue” set for the Roman Catholic Church by the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).

But he also reached out to those who don’t belong “to any religious tradition” but feel the “need to search for the truth, the goodness and the beauty of God.”

Francis echoed his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, saying that the “attempt to eliminate God and the divine from the horizon of humanity” has often led to catastrophic violence.

But Francis, who has set a humbler tone to the papacy since his election on March 13, added that atheists and believers can be “precious allies” in their efforts “to defend the dignity of man, in the building of a peaceful coexistence between peoples and in the careful protection of creation.”

Francis also stressed the “very special spiritual bond” between Catholics and Jews.

“There is no doubt that Catholic-Jewish relations will go from strength to even greater strength during Pope Francis’s pontificate,” said Rabbi David Rosen, International Director of Interreligious Affairs of the American Jewish Committee, after meeting with Francis.

Earlier on Wednesday, the pope met privately with the spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians, Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople.

According to the Patriarchate of Constantinople, Bartholomew and Francis are planning a joint visit to Jerusalem in 2014 to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1964 meeting between Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras.

That meeting led to the cancellation of the reciprocal excommunications between the leaders of western and eastern Christianity in 1054, otherwise known as the “Great Schism.”

Bartholomew attended Francis’ inauguration on Tuesday, the first Patriarch to do so in over 900 years.

March 27, 2013

Office of Immigration Issues

Melissa Davis

Co-manager, Office of Immigration Issues

Louisville

On April 10 religious and secular groups are coordinating efforts to call for immigration reform. Local events are being planned across the country to uplift and support those in Washington, D.C. On that same day who will be visiting with congressional representatives and other elected officials in their local offices. YOU can join this movement by attending an event or planning an event in your community.

Ideas for local action can include: a public demonstration with speakers, visiting the local offices of your congressional representatives, writing a letter to the editor of your local newspaper calling for reform, a prayer vigil and Bible study/discussion, etc. The possibilities are endless.

Standing on the Side of Love has materials available to help you organize your event and publicize it. Download their helpful resources at their website.

Download a copy of the Presbyterians for Just Immigration Logo (PDF) to use on your posters, t-shirts, or flyers. Then take photos and share on the FaceBook page for Presbyterians for Just Immigration.

Contact the office of immigration issues at 502-569-5007 or melissa.davis@pcusa.org for more information or support coordinating your event!

March 26, 2013

(Washington, D.C. April 5-8)   The weekend begins on April 5 with the 3rd Annual Compassion Peace and Justice (CPJ) Training Day followed by the Ecumenical Advocacy Days, April 5-8.   The CPJ Training Day offers participants an opportunity to learn how to advocate and organize around food justice issues. Ecumenical Advocacy Days will provide inspiring speakers that will offer a faith based vision for fair and humane food policies and practices, along with grassroots advocacy training, all culminating with Monday’s Lobby Day on Capitol Hill.  Learn More.

A PC(USA) mission letter from Russia

March 26, 2013

Along with others, Presbyterian mission workers Burkhard Paetzold and Ellen Smith met in Smolensk, Russia, for a conference on post-orphanage ministry. —courtesy of Ellen Smith

Special to Presbyterian News Service

Ellen Smith

PC(USA) regional liaison for Russia

SMOLENSK, Russia

I am home from Russia after a three-week journey that culminated with an extraordinary gathering outside this city at the Christian Retreat Center — Rodnik (“Spring of Water” or “The Source”). In partnership with the Baptist church in that region, we held a second conference on post-orphanage ministry.

The first gathering was in November 2010. It was a beginning, modest in plan and marred by the fall of Pastor Victor Ignatenkov from a scaffold the day before. As Victor lay in a hospital bed, specialists from Moscow and St. Petersburg and ministry teams from at least 13 churches gathered to listen and share.

It turned out that just gathering people made a difference. Churches recognized the importance of the ministry and engaged more deeply.

We tried to gather again in 2012, but schedules could not be coordinated. Determined to continue where we left off, we set a date for a new conference and then began looking for specialists.

In October, we still did not have anyone, and we were lifting prayers. In November, I was copied on an email exchange and knew that those prayers had been answered. However, the timing was so close I couldn’t imagine that ― only four months before the scheduled dates ― it would work for this year,.

But far away, in the state of Montana, Eamon Anderson had also been praying. She had lived and worked in a Roma village in Romania for four years and still felt a deep call to Roma ministry and to Eastern Europe. The answer to her prayer was on a tag on a Christmas “giving tree” at her church, First Presbyterian Church of Missoula.

The tag was for the ministry of Gary Payton, my predecessor as Russia liaison, and mentioned the Roma work in Russia. She wrote to Gary, and Gary copied us in his response.

Eamon Anderson is a Social Worker and Child Welfare Specialist from the University of Montana. She is engaged in social work and research on American Indian reservations in Montana, focusing on childhood trauma and child traumatic stress, training welfare workers, teachers and juvenile justice professionals.

Other broad experiences made it even clearer that we needed her experience for the upcoming conference in Russia, but how could it be possible to issue such an invitation on such a short notice?

We began an email exchange ― information from my side, questions from her side ―  and finally I mentioned the upcoming conference and an “if only.” Her response was immediate: she would check with her boss.

Four months later, she stood before our gathering and shared information that spoke to people where they were, turning on light bulbs throughout the room. Her deep cultural sensitivity and gentle delivery, modeling strategies for working with traumatized children and youth, added to the power of her words.

As she discussed trauma in children, the symptoms and the developmental issues for children and adolescents, people recognized not just the children that they worked with in the orphanages, but also people around them in society and adults in their congregations. 

The presentation brought forward the deep need for healing in Russian society, and the need for prevention, to stop the generational trauma that is the legacy of the Soviet Union and its collapse. It opened people’s eyes to looking at the orphans and those who struggle with similar trauma in a new way. 

The connections between multiple traumatic events in childhood and suicide, depression, alcoholism and drug abuse are startling. The need to look more deeply at root causes is undeniable.

After the presentation, many people approached us to see if Eamon could come to their churches to talk about parenting, to see if Eamon had any experience in drug and alcohol rehab, to see if she could come back to do more training.

Three of our colleagues, hearing about the plans for the conference, joined us in Smolensk ― Burkhard Paetzold (regional liaison for Central and Eastern Europe and facilitator of work with the Roma people there), Liz Searles (a PCUSA mission co-worker soon to be serving with orphans in Tulcea, Romania) and Carolyn Otterness, who is under appointment of the Reformed Church of America working with Roma out of Budapest, Hungary).

We spent hours after the conference talking about possibilities. The topic resonates across all of our areas of ministry. For instance, Russia struggles with issues of domestic violence and substance abuse. The need for reconciliation and healing is deep across this part of the world.

In addition to Eamon’s presentations on trauma, we were grateful to have two  presenters from Omaha, Neb. – Kathy Moore speaking on essential life skills and mentoring programs, and Geri Clanton sharing information on human trafficking ― all critical topics which added even more value to the program. We are grateful for their participation in making this a memorable conference.

People traveled to Smolensk from as far away as Perm (in the Ural mountains) and Volgadonsk (in the Rostov region, down by the Black Sea). We had 67 participants from 16 cities. It was a huge blessing to be able to use the new camp facilities. There was room for all. We are grateful for the support that made this conference possible and for gifts to orphanage ministry in Russia and Belarus.

Please pray for ongoing work with orphans and those that have “graduated.” They are extremely vulnerable in their brokenness. Please pray for the ministry teams working with them. I give thanks to God for the bounty of his blessings.

March 26, 2013

World Council of Churches Communications

GENEVA

The upcoming 10th Assembly of the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Busan, Republic of Korea, will present an opportunity for sustained ecumenical formation and theological education.

A special curriculum developed by the Ecumenical Theological Education program of the WCC will be used at the Global Ecumenical Theological Institute (GETI). The GETI will be held at the time of the WCC assembly in Seoul and Busan. Around 150 theology students will participate in the initiative.

The WCC assembly will take place from Oct. 30-Nov. 8, 2013 addressing the theme, “God of life, lead us to justice and peace.”

Texts selected for the curriculum cover a range of themes addressed by WCC programs for more than 10 years. The texts will be made available on a webpage within the Global Digital Library on Theology and Ecumenism (GlobeTheoLib).

GlobeTheoLib is a joint project of the WCC and Globethics.net, a Geneva-headquartered foundation promoting dialogue on ethical issues.

“The curriculum attempts to deepen intercultural perspectives in theological education and develop a sense of belonging on mutual concerns of dialogue, justice, mission and evangelism,” said the Rev. Dietrich Werner, WCC’s program coordinator for ecumenical theological education.

“Such knowledge is vital for the future of world Christianity,” said Werner, noting that theological education can greatly contribute to the formation of future pastors, catechists and religious teachers in the church.

While participation at the GETI will be limited to selected theology students, the online resources on “Ecumenism and World Christianity in the 21st Century” remain accessible to any theological institution in the world and will also be published as a printed volume by WCC Publications. 

Werner said that several events will create momentum for a renewed ecumenical focus in theological education. He mentioned the upcoming assemblies of the Conference of European Churches, Latin American Council of Churches and All Africa Conference of Churches.

In this context, he said, theological schools and Christian seminaries need to intensify their programs, forming ecumenical witness for justice, peace, holistic mission and dialogue with people of other faith traditions. 

“Several schools are currently developing special courses on the future of ecumenism amidst changing World Christianity, including Brite School of Divinity of Texas Christian University in  the United States,” he said.

Drawing a parallel to the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century, Werner said that such historical developments were essentially a revolution in education.

“Only if churches take up their mandate for higher education of their ministers and promote a strategic coalition between lived spirituality of Christian faith and education and critical reasoning, they will have a chance to counter religious fanaticism spreading around the world,” he added.

March 26, 2013

Religion News Service

Kimberly Winston

WASHINGTON

What would an “atheist Lent” look like? A group of young nonbelievers are finding out, observing the Christian practice minus its religious context.

They have given up alcohol, animal products, and various Internet and cell phone interactions. One has vowed to make a daily Lenten practice of telling those he encounters how important they are to him.

But their observance of the 40-day period in which many Christians abstain from worldly desires in a bid to come closer to God has upset some atheists who say borrowing religious traditions is antithetical to nontheism.

The exercise has also illustrated a divide in the nontheist community — between older atheists who see religion as inherently evil and younger atheists who are more open to interactions with religious belief.

“I really like the idea of Lent,” said Chelsea Link, 23, a Boston-based Humanist who is abstaining from alcohol. “It’s giving yourself a set amount of time to break a bad habit or form a new good one, and that seems like a really healthy practice. But we are not doing it because God told us to; we are doing it because there is a benefit to us.”

The idea of atheist Lent came from Vlad Chituc, a 23-year-old atheist blogger, who was inspired by the Swiss-born Humanist Alain de Botton, whose recent book, “Religion for Atheists,” suggests adapting religious rituals can create community and meaning among nonbelievers.

“Religions have been working on how to live as good human beings for thousands of years,” Chituc said. “So it made sense to me that they have figured out some stuff that those of us trying to live good secular lives can learn from.”

Chituc observed his first Lent last year by eating a vegan diet. His success was limited, but he was inspired by the mindfulness of the experience.

“Atheists love to talk about abstract intellectual values like logic and reason,” he said, “but I realized that there were other things I needed to think about and I started being more aware of them.”

This year, Chituc, a lab manager in Durham, N.C., invited several fellow atheist bloggers to join him in observing Lent. A half dozen agreed, and they are tracking the experience on the blog NonProphet Status. All but one are under the age of 25.

Their posts have upset some atheists, including Tom Flynn, executive director of the Council for Secular Humanism. He wrote an online column refuting the idea and calling Lent, “one of the most profoundly anti-humanistic features of Christianity.”

In a telephone interview, Flynn singled out Lent as dangerous because it suggests atonement can be gained by giving something up — like meat on Fridays — instead of by making amends to those who have been wronged. And because atheists are not bound to a liturgical calendar, they can practice abstention any time.

“More broadly, we have to be cautious in borrowing traditions and forms from the churches,” Flynn said. “There is an awful lot in congregational practices that hark back to an earlier pre-democratic, pre-Enlightenment time and that can bring a lot of baggage that is contrary to secular ideals.”

Chituc, meanwhile, is unimpressed with that argument. Instead, he is concerned he might offend religious observers of Lent.

“They might think it is trivializing to say all Lent is about is giving something up,” he said. “It is obviously more than that to them, so I am trying to say we are not trying to capture the meaning of your tradition, we are trying to make the most of our lives, and we have found something meaningful and useful in what you are doing.”

Virginia Kimball, a Catholic theologian at Assumption College in Worcester, Mass., who mentors people in Lenten practices, sees nothing wrong in atheists borrowing Lent. The desire to find meaning in ritual, she said, is a universal human desire.

“I give every credit to these young people who are humanists and atheists because they are sensing that human life is more than just animal processes and that is worthy of the great philosophers,” she said.

Chris Stedman, author of “Faitheist,” a memoir of his journey from evangelical Christianity to atheism, has joined Chituc in observing Lent. He thinks young atheists are more accepting of religious forms and believers than their older counterparts because they have grown up in a more diverse environment than previous generations.

“So it does not surprise (me) when I see people under 30 who identify as atheists and yet are curious about the religious beliefs and practices of their peers,” Stedman said. “I think this is a trend, that we are going to see more interactions between religious believers and atheists and I think we’ll also see more borrowing from the religious traditions.”

Link, the Boston Humanist who’s giving up alcohol, agrees. She said she is distancing herself from organized atheism because of the hostility she feels it exhibits towards religion.

“I think there is definitely a transition going on,” she said. “A lot of younger atheists are saying, ‘I don’t believe in God either, but I don’t understand why you are foaming at the mouth about it.’”