I arrived at Ferncliff late at night, eager to hear of the camp and conference center’s new exploits but exhausted from the journey. I settled down to sleep not knowing that the comfortable mattress was my first introduction to Ferncliff’s Sharing the Goods ministry partnership with Good360.
For diehard fans of acronyms—of which Presbyterians surely have more than their fair share—the Rev. David Gill has mined something of a GEM. Gill, who will retire on January 31 as executive director of Ferncliff Camp and Conference Center, says that throughout his 20-year tenure at the PC(USA)-related camp he has always “looked for things that can be financially self-sustaining for the long haul.”
As Christy Foster stood on a hillside overlooking the Guadalupe River at the Presbyterian Mo-Ranch Assembly, she remembered all at once just how much—and for how long—she had wanted to be in camp and conference ministry.
Rocking peacefully on a porch at Ferncliff Camp and Conference Center—a broad smile across his face—it is impossible to imagine Peter Newbury as the “angry kid” who says that he went to camp at his parents’ insistence against his will.
As a new class of PC(USA) seminary students matriculates this fall, many find themselves entering graduate school not only with great anticipation and an unwavering commitment to serve Christ’s church, but also with unprecedented student loan debt.
When the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board unanimously approved a change in name for the Financial Aid for Studies office to Financial Aid for Service in the fall of 2012, the action signaled an intentional shift in the PC(USA) from an emphasis on education purely for the sake of education to education for a life of discernment and service.
Thanks to partnership with PDA, Ferncliff expands its “healing camp” ministry for survivors of school gun violence By Paul Seebeck Since 1998, after a mass shooting occurred in their community at… Read more »
