For the Rev. Dr. J. Herbert Nelson, seeing large numbers of homeless people in one city was eye-opening.
The genesis of the Hands and Feet initiative came from Nelson, stated clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), after his experience at the 222nd General Assembly (2016) in Portland. He had never seen so many homeless people in one place.
As the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) looks ahead to 2018, its ministry will include hosting delegates to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women and other work at the U.N.
Seventy-two years ago, the newly formed United Nations approved a charter that has been the foundation of its work ever since.
The 2017 International Peacemakers, who spent four weeks speaking across the U.S., have returned to their homes. But the impact of their visit is still being felt by presbyteries, churches and communities where they spoke.
Although many children grow up in an atmosphere of violence, poverty and other negative influences, a Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) initiative is working to counter that reality.
What began as a planned screening of Presbyterian Disaster Assistance’s newest documentaries in Dayton, Ohio, recently morphed into a communitywide event dedicated to peace.
The original idea was to simply schedule screenings of the most recent Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (PDA) documentaries on immigrant detention and refugee resettlement (Locked in a Box and To Breathe Free) at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Dayton. What Westminster member Sally Dyer didn’t realize, however, was that a number of organizations across the city were planning their own awareness events around these issues.
Mission co- worker Douglas Dicks has gone home. Not to his boyhood home in Virginia but to his spiritual home in Israel/Palestine.
Last month Dicks began serving as an associate for ecumenical partnerships at the invitation of St. Andrew’s Scots Memorial Church in Jerusalem, working with churches in Bethlehem, Jerusalem and elsewhere in the Holy Land. However, neither the job nor the region is new to him. He was commissioned by his home church, Buckton Presbyterian, to go to Jerusalem in September 1995 for two years. He stayed 18 years and finished his term in 2013 to return to Virginia to care for his aging mother.
In the first six months of a new program to fight hunger, Presbyterians nationwide have responded with commitment and action.
The Presbyterian Hunger Program (PHP) has announced that more than 70 Presbyterian churches have become Hunger Action Congregations since the initiative was announced last summer.
According to the Rev. Olivia Stewart, participating in the Christian Formation Symposium — a gathering of seasoned practitioners from across the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) — was “awesome.”
“It made my heart really big,” she said. “I’m more excited now than I’ve been in a long time.”
Today, the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights turns 69. This declaration outlines basic civil, political, cultural and economic rights to which all people are entitled. Though not a binding document, the declaration has provided a platform for the creation of over 60 human rights measures. These laws have helped protect many people, but there is still much work to be done to ensure the protection of all people’s human rights.
As an urban minister for more than 40 years, Bob Forsberg dedicated his willing hands, generous heart and sharp mind to serving people society had cast aside.
Recently, however, at age 91, the mental capacity that had served this Presbyterian minister so well began to fade. His memory loss became so debilitating that Forsberg, who had spent years focused on helping others, found himself in need of help.
