Nearly 500 people from 13 countries gathered online Thursday night for a screening and discussion of the documentary film “The Ants & the Grasshopper.” The Presbyterian Hunger Program and Office of Public Witness organized the gathering and led a panel discussion following the screening.
The Rev. Mark Adams, a mission co-worker at the U.S.-Mexico border, tells an unsettling story about Jaciel, a 6-year-old boy at Frontera de Cristo’s New Hope Community Center.
Working for a just peace in Israel-Palestine can’t be left only to the governments, or even the diplomats. Sindyanna of Galilee, a Presbyterian Mission Agency global partner and grassroots group of Arab and Jewish women, is working together to share its vision of peaceful co-existence in the region.
Agriculture is the main source of livelihood for farmers in the Anglophone regions of Cameroon (English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions). About 75% of the population earns their livelihood through farming. Many of these farmers are women who produce the bulk of food eaten in most households across the regions and beyond. Farmers in these regions are faced with many challenges from the impacts of climate change and the current Anglophone crisis.
When Dan Turk gazes at tangerine trees in Antanetibe, Madagascar, he sees more than an agricultural success story.
He sees a path out of poverty for the families who tend the crop. It’s a route that traces its beginnings to Turk and his partners at the Church of Jesus Christ in Madagascar (FJKM). In 2010, Turk’s colleagues from the FJKM visited Antanetibe and trained about 70 people in tangerine production. The church’s entire Development Department traveled to the town, stayed in the homes of the future tangerine farmers and helped them plant the trees.
Workers were busy recently at the Sandy Beach Women’s Cooperative in Hopkins Village, a coastal community in southeastern Belize. This was a big day, not only for the women-owned and operated restaurant, but for the country’s Departments of Agriculture and Cooperatives. The top official was paying a visit to meet with members of the Presbyterian Committee on the Self-Development of People.
Despite the Trump administration’s anti-environmental policies, delegates to a recent climate convention in Bonn, Germany, are prepared to continue their fight for environmental protection, says a Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) delegate to that convention.
An international task force from the Presbyterian Committee on the Self-Development of People (SDOP) recently returned from a visit to Belize, where it met with groups that have received funding to become more self-sustaining. SDOP selected Belize as a focus country in 2010 because of its continued struggle with extreme poverty.
The agricultural metaphor was one of Jesus’ favorites. Speaking to a people of the land, Jesus used the imagery of the land often in his parables and sermons. A sower who went out to sow. A lamp and a bushel basket. Growing seed. Mustard seed. And that is just one chapter (Mark 4). Throughout his ministry, Jesus connected God’s work to the growth from the land. The nourishment and sustenance of the earth became metaphors for the care and support of God’s in-breaking Reign.
Delegations from the World Council of Churches (WCC) attended the 12th World Social Forum (WSF) in Montreal, Canada, which concluded on August 14. More than 30,000 participants from around the world gathered to discuss global issues based on their local experiences, network with others working on similar problems, and create new joint initiatives advancing a progressive path forward.
