Presbyterian Mission Agency management meets in New York

Working group continues conversations on sustainability of Ghost Ranch Education & Retreat Center

by Emily Enders Odom

LOUISVILLE – Several members of Presbyterian Mission Agency management convened yesterday in New York City to continue to develop a proposal to move the Ghost Ranch Education & Retreat Center toward eventual operational and financial sustainability.

The meeting resulted in an agreement in principle, details of which are expected to be presented at the Sept. 13–16 meeting of the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board (PMAB) in Louisville.

Also attending the meeting in New York City were several members of the PMAB, representatives from the PMAB’s Ghost Ranch task force, staff and board representatives from the Presbyterian Foundation, management leadership from Ghost Ranch, and representatives of the National Ghost Ranch Foundation, a separate body established in 1972 exclusively to support Ghost Ranch. The meeting was convened in accordance with a directive from the PMAB Executive Committee at its annual retreat in Chicago, July 27–29.

Open year-round, Ghost Ranch is one of three national conference centers of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). It was donated to the PC(USA) in 1955. Since that time—although owned by the Board of Christian Education of the PC(USA), which became one of the Presbyterian Foundation’s related entities upon the merger of the former United Presbyterian Church U.S.A. and the Presbyterian Church U.S. in 1983—it has been operated directly by the Presbyterian Mission Agency or its predecessor agencies. The landscape of Ghost Ranch encompasses 21,000 acres in northern New Mexico.