Co-Moderator Candidate Marian McClure Taylor meets attendees at the Welcome Reception hosted by the Presbytery of Utah on Saturday. Photo by Rich Copley
Co-Moderator candidate Daniel Morales meets attendees at the Welcome Reception hosted by the Presbytery of Utah on Saturday. Photo by Rich Copley
On Saturday evening, the Rev. Dr. Marian McClure Taylor and the Rev. Daniel Morales greeted a steady stream of commissioners during a reception with the co-moderator and stated clerk candidates in the ballroom of the Marriot hotel. With wide smiles and friendly handshakes, McClure Taylor and Morales spent time getting to know the concerns of their fellow commissioners and sharing their own faith and commitments. These experiences comprise what McClure Taylor and Morales call their “Theology of Hope,” the theme for their campaign represented by the image of rivers in the desert, drawing on Isaiah 43:18-19.
McClure Taylor and Morales pointed to different experiences of hope in their many decades of service to the church. McClure Taylor talked about hope as courage in the ways the PC(USA) has taken inclusive action for persons who identify as LGBTQIA+, efforts towards truth and reconciliation, and courageous partnerships in the approach to addressing the conflict in Israel and Palestine. When McClure Taylor saw “the kinds of risk taking that we engage in when we really are faithful to our friends and partners,” she asked herself, “how can I keep encouraging people to stay on this path courageously?” She realized that one way was to be a co-moderator.
Morales spoke intimately and locally to his experience in pastoring a small church on the brink of closure in the Presbytery of Tropical Florida and the ways his optimism helped the congregation turn their situation around and make moves to financial stability. Morales desires to bring hope to other small churches in the denomination.
“We’re living in a time of a lot of anxiety,” said Morales. “I think the best way to calm anxiety is to give people assurance and to give people a voice.” He called the 226th General Assembly theme, “Live into Hope,” perfect for now.
“Ultimately our hope is in God,” added McClure Taylor.
McClure Taylor and Morales are prepared for the moderating duties should they be elected. Along with serving as moderators of their respective presbyteries (Morales for a year and McClure Taylor as moderator pro-temp last month), both took notes on best practices while serving this week as commissioners in committees.
“One of the things I learned from just being a commissioner is dealing with the questions first,” said McClure Taylor, who served on the International Engagement Committee and found value in addressing questions first to avoid lengthy amendment processes. Morales said it’s important to keep the meeting going. “You want the people engaged,” he said, noting that it can be easy to lose people when questions aren’t cleared early on.
Rochelle Shaw, ruling elder from San Francisco Presbytery, moderated the International Engagement committee on which McClure Taylor participated as a commissioner earlier this week. Shaw was impressed by McClure Taylor’s wise and discerning nature. At critical points in the proceedings when the committee lost its way, McClure Taylor spoke up to remind the committee what work was theirs to do and what work had already been done by the General Assembly and thereby did not need repeating. Shaw was grateful for how McClure Taylor kept the conversation moving forward.
Before seeing McClure Taylor’s conduct in her committee, Shaw had already been swayed towards the McClure Taylor and Morales partnership after listening to interviews conducted by Presbyterian Outlook. “To me, they are wise,” said Shaw. “There was trust and respect,” she said of the co-moderator candidate team. “That’s what I am looking for.”
While talking with a group of commissioners, McClure Taylor revealed that this was the fiftieth anniversary of her own experience as a YAAD at General Assembly.
Morales served on the Mid Councils Committee with Christian Kasten, Young Adult Advisory Delegate from the Presbytery of Arkansas. Kasten said the YAADs met over lunch to discuss what they are looking for in a co-moderator and then met with each of the candidate pairs. “We’re looking for somebody who speaks about the importance of the youth and our importance in the church as not just the future but the present,” said Kasten. “That’s something Danny talks about.”
McClure Taylor and Morales have most appreciated finding wider support through their campaign. They were helped along the way through talented friends. Morales’ partner, Ebert Ceballa, decorated their campaign table in rich fabrics and set out blue and teal bookmarks designed by the candidates’ friends.
Long swaths of blue and teal hand-dyed cotton cascade over a sandy velvet tablecloth and swirl into pools on the floor representing the candidates’ primary image of hope: “rivers in the desert.”
If they are elected on Sunday, the co-moderator candidates will bring rivers of hope to those who long for it. A promise they want to begin in this week’s gathering.