More than 400 participants logged in to watch the first in a scheduled series of webinars devoted to the ongoing crisis in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank. Rabbi Alissa Wise, the lead organizer of Rabbis for Ceasefire, and the Rev. Fursan Zu’mot from the Arabic-speaking Congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan & the Holy Land (ELCJHL), led participants through an hour-long discussion that touched on humanitarian issues, differences between Christian Zionism and antisemitism, and the school of hatred seemingly being perpetuated from the ongoing conflict.
Raquel Willis, a transgender woman who wrote “The Risk it Takes to Bloom: On Life and Liberation,” quoted for a crowd gathered online and in person for the Westminster Town Hall Forum last week this snippet from Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye”: “I even think now that the land of the entire country was hostile to marigolds that year. This soil is bad for certain kinds of flowers. Certain seeds it will not nurture, certain fruit it will not bear, and when the land kills of its own volition, we acquiesce and say the victim had no right to live.”
David French, a decorated military veteran and former litigator who’s now a New York Times columnist and, last week, the McClendon Scholar at New York Avenue Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., borrows from the prophet Micah for his three commandments for Christians in politics.
The Rev. Jimmie Hawkins, advocacy director for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), was among a handful of faith leaders who met in the White House Wednesday with the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships and other administration staff.
“If we get killed, tell your communities that Palestinians are peaceful humans struggling only for peace …”
These are the words of Presbyterian Hunger Program partner Rajeh Abbas, founder and director of the Palestinian nonprofit Improvement and Development for Communities Center (IDCO) based in Gaza.
The Presbyterian Mission Agency’s World Mission ministry, in collaboration with the Office of Public Witness and the Presbyterian Ministry at the United Nations, is launching a webinar series dedicated to the current crisis unfolding in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank. The first webinar, scheduled for 12:30 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, Dec. 12, is titled “Jewish and Christian Voices for Peace.”
U.S. Senator Chris Coons of Delaware, one of 11 Presbyterians in the Senate, spent an hour with the Rev. Jim Wallis Tuesday talking about how his faith has helped carry him this far. Listen to his conversation with Wallis, director of Georgetown University’s Center on Faith + Justice, by going here. Coons appeared as part of the Center of Faith + Justice’s “Higher Calling” series.
How to be the post-pandemic church is a theme familiar to most these days and for the Assembly VII of Hispanic/Latino Presbyterian Men, meeting in October for the first time in person since 2019, it was no different.
There are varieties of gifts, but the same Holy Spirit gives them. There are varieties of services, but the same Jesus Christ who is followed in service. There are varieties of activities, but the same God activates all of them in everyone. (1 Corinthians 12:4-6, paraphrased)
