The Youth Services Opportunities Project (YSOP), a short-term mission program founded nearly 40 years ago by Edward Doty, is continuing its mission — virtually — during the pandemic.
With the coronavirus continuing to infect scores of people daily worldwide, the number of people experiencing acute hunger is expected to skyrocket globally, and some partners of the Presbyterian Hunger Program say the economic ramifications of the pandemic already are hurting the ability of people around the globe to feed themselves and their families.
It was early March, and the daily routine at Atlanta’s Mercy Community Church had been thrown for a loop.
Every Monday through Thursday, the church is a gathering place for around 50 people who are experiencing homelessness or are marginally housed to do everything from talking and sharing a couple of meals to working on getting help with legal and medical issues, as well as other needs. But suddenly, with the rapid spread of the coronavirus, gathering wasn’t a great idea.
It’s been only a few months since Covenant Presbyterian Church in Fort Myers, Florida, worked with a professional beekeeper to relocate a couple of well-established bee colonies from an old rotten tree on the property. The bees were successfully moved to side-by-side hives in the church’s Together We Grow Mission Garden.
World Food Day — celebrated on October 16 every year — commemorates the founding in 1945 of the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The FAO was created to respond to famines and the tragedy of hunger in a world of God’s abundance. Despite the abundance of land, water, nutrients and sunlight on this precious planet, even in the 21st century, hundreds of millions of people go hungry on Oct. 16 and throughout the year.
A Presbyterian church in northern California is distributing locally-grown produce as part of Sunday worship to bring healthy food options to their community.
The bold vision and invitation of Matthew 25:31-46 to be the hands and feet of Jesus, serving people who are hungry, oppressed, imprisoned or poor, is awakening compassionate faith to new possibilities in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
It’s anything but business as usual for guests and staff at the Ladle Fellowship, the homeless outreach ministry of First Presbyterian Church in San Diego. As cases of COVID-19 increase across the nation, volunteers and church staff are continuing to serve their neighbors in need.
Throughout these times of quarantine, I have found myself singing more — children’s English and Spanish songs with our 2-year-old son, Leandro. These are songs I remember from high school and university choir, hymns, my mom’s songs or just humming random tunes. If I’m honest, my singing is not always an expression of joy.
