The Lived Theology in Asian America Conference on race, justice and politics already has over 560 people registered. It is scheduled to take place on April 23-24. Dr. David C. Chao, who directs the Asian American Program at Princeton Theological Seminary, believes this is a timely and important conference.
Dr. Love Sechrest, Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Faculty at Columbia Theological Seminary, has announced the appointment of Dr. Chanequa Walker-Barnes by the seminary’s Board of Trustees as Professor of Practical Theology and Pastoral Counseling.
More than 894 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in 155 countries, about 5.9% of the global population, including 209 million doses in the U.S., according to Bloomberg News. But the availability of vaccine varies greatly around the world, with smaller countries finding themselves a distant priority.
We do not celebrate, nor do we gloat at this verdict, for there is no joy in what has happened here. But we do hope this means a new beginning and a movement that begins to dismantle the structures of racism that have festered for far too long. The reality is George Floyd should still be among us. Instead, he has become a symbol of the need for change in the process of policing. It is my prayer that this verdict is the first step.
President Joe Biden’s $2 trillion infrastructure, jobs and green energy plan served as a backdrop Monday for an Ecumenical Advocacy Days workshop led by Interfaith Power & Light (IPL), a partner of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
Why should people of faith get involved in climate justice? “A lot of approaches to climate change have been secular, and they have failed in the Pacific,” said the Rev. James Bhagwan, General Secretary of the Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC), a group of more than 40 churches and Christian faith organizations across the Pacific Ocean. “And the question has always been asked why the climate projects there that are secular do not have the impact that people expect to have on paper?”
“Well, here I am, filled with amazement and gratitude, and standing in need of prayer.”
Ruling Elder Lois Harkrider Stair spoke those words right after her election as the first woman General Assembly moderator of a U.S. Presbyterian denomination. The year was 1971, the place Rochester, New York, and Stair was at the very beginning of a year where her every public move would be scrutinized and analyzed, applauded and criticized — both within the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. and beyond.
“If you reach out to people and provide a way for them to use their gifts, God will use that to build community.” That is what the Rev. Debbie Bronkema has learned the past two years.
When the Apostle Paul quoted what may well be Christianity’s first creed in his letter to the Galatians, he boldly proclaimed that all baptized believers are God’s children: “For you are all children of God in the Spirit There is no Jew or Greek; There is no slave or free; There is no male or female. For you are all one in the Spirit.”
When a 12-year-old Jesus escaped his parents’ watchful eye during the family’s annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem, the anxious couple returned to find him at long last in the temple, “sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.”