Presbyterian Mission Agency minute for misson Archives

minute for misson

Minute for Mission: Giving Tuesday

Posted October 25th, 2023

Giving Tuesday, which is being observed today in more than 150 countries, exists for one purpose: to celebrate and encourage giving. We Presbyterians have a strong history of giving, and we see examples of this all over the world: schools, hospitals, beautiful churches and exciting ministries of justice, peace and mercy with the name Presbyterian attached to them have enlivened a world more like God’s realm in almost every place in God’s Creation.

Minute for Mission: A Season of Peace begins

Posted August 23rd, 2021

Congregations of many denominations extend the peace of Christ with a blessing during their service. “The peace of Christ be with you (and also with you).” It is a blessing offered and a blessing returned in kind. Extending the peace of Christ is part of an active, engaged faith — a witness to what it means for us to be building the household of God.

Minute for Mission: Prayer for the Peaceful Reunification of the Korean Peninsula

Posted July 26th, 2021

I served as a Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) through the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in South Korea from 2016–17. During my time there, one of the major eye-opening revelations was learning about the role of the United States during the Korean War and in maintaining the current North-South divide on the Korean Peninsula. No one taught me about this in my history classes.

Minute for Mission: Celebrating Young Adult Volunteers

Posted July 23rd, 2020

“It was a very painful but meaningful time to think again about what it means to live as a Christian and as an American in this world.” This was a comment from Dia, one of the Young Adult Volunteers (YAVs) from 2016–17, after we visited No Gun Ri, the site of a massacre of Korean civilians committed by U.S. soldiers at the beginning of the Korean War. Believing the civilians to be communists, the U.S. military killed 250–300 people, mostly women and children, from July 26 to 29 in 1950, attacking them as they sought shelter under a railroad bridge. Visiting this site is always painful for me. As a site coordinator who is also a Korean, learning about my own history that is related to the U.S. along with YAVs is a powerful and meaningful experience. Stories like these are often ignored or well-hidden, even though there are people who are still suffering from the wounds of these incidents to this day. Learning stories like this may lead to discomfort as we come to face a distorted tragedy. Nevertheless, I believe that we must uncover and retell the stories like this. History can teach us not to repeat gruesome mistakes and it can also teach us how we can live our lives more responsibly in our present day.