Including actions taken during the 222nd General Assembly (2016), which adjourned Saturday, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) per capita apportionment for 2017 will be $7.50 and $7.73 for 2018.

The rate for 2016 is $7.12. Assembly actions accounted for 17 cents of the 38-cent increase for next year and 18 cents for 2018.

In addition, assembly actions added $282,744 in 2017 and $162,500 in 2018 to the Presbyterian Mission Agency budget, over and above the proposed budgets of $63,530,297 in 2017 and $63,450,591 in 2018.

Noting that the increase to the PMA budget of $445,244 was “the amount you, as the church, have approved for the mandates of the PMA for the next two years,” Tony De La Rosa, interim executive director of PMA appealed to commissioners to help fund these allocated expenses.

He urged commissioners to text PMA to 41411 in order to receive a link at which to donate “to allow you to fund the work you feel the Holy Spirit is leading you to. It gives you skin in the game to go back to your churches and presbyteries and tell them about the work you have approved.”

Addressing the additions to the budgets presented for approval at the beginning of the assembly by the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board, De La Rosa said, “If we are unable to identify additional revenue, the PMA will have to revisit its programs and staffing in order to fulfill the mandates of the agency. That may involve some staffing realignments to achieve those mandates.”

De La Rosa also announced the PMA’s new web site, presbyterianmission.org. “On that website you will have opportunity to see the various programs we have, opportunities to give and support those programs and you can follow along with the directives the work you have asked the agency to do,” he said.

Calling Co-Moderators Jan Edmiston and Denise Anderson their “co-moms” and Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons their “grand-yaad,” the Young Adult Advisor Delegates presented gifts of thanks for their guidance and help during the assembly.

Additional recognition went to the Portland Committee On Local Arrangements. “We may be able to have a meeting without a Committee On Local Arrangements, but we wouldn’t have an assembly … Much of what you will remember fondly is the result of the countless hours of work by the Committee on Local Arrangements,” said Tom Hay, director of assembly operations.

The Presbytery of Giddings-Lovejoy presented a video welcome to St. Louis for 223rd General Assembly (2018) in St. Louis, Missouri, June 16-23, 2018. The 224th General Assembly (2020) will be held in Baltimore June 20-27 and the 224th General Assembly (2022) will be held in Columbus, Ohio, June 25-July 2.

“St. Louis has a special place in our hearts,” said Denise Anderson of her and Edmiston’s meeting in St. Louis and beginning to think about running as co-moderators of the PC(USA).

Parsons recognized the historic changes made at assembly, including the adoption of the Confession of Belhar, “the first confession of our church not written by white European men;” the election of the first pair of co-moderators; and the election of J. Herbert Nelson as Stated Clerk, before saying, “It is my privilege, and with a grateful, heart that I turn over this chair to the next Stated Clerk of the General Assembly, J. Herbet Nelson.”

Upon delivering the charge to the General Assembly to dismiss following worship and reconvene in St. Louis in two years, Anderson told Edmiston, “Bang that gavel, girl.”