As June turned to July, Immanuel Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles needed a place to store food.
Its direct food service to people in need had skyrocketed from 120 households a week before the COVID-19 pandemic to more than 2,000 a week as the virus staged a resurgence in California that has resulted in it being the state with the most coronavirus infections in the country. Immanuel, in L.A.’s Mid-Wilshire/Koreatown area, was running out of space to keep food – at one point jerry-rigging cooling ducts in a hallway to create improvised, temporary cold storage. Then church leaders cast their eyes on its Westminster Chapel.
It’s a common sight from the window of Doug Marshall’s office at the Presbyterian Home for Children in Talladega, Alabama: A care worker accompanies a new girl from the administration building to the cottage that will be her new home.
As soon as a pair of interviewers completed their half-hour on Tuesday with Dr. Anthony Fauci regarding the pandemic and vaccine development and distribution, it was time to turn their attention on Boston Mayor Marty Walsh.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s preeminent voice on infectious diseases, paid a house call via Zoom Tuesday evening on Roxbury Presbyterian Church in Boston, dispensing 30 minutes of wisdom and encouragement to a crowd of up to 2,300 registered viewers.
A timely and sometimes painful discussion on the impact of COVID-19 and racism on Native Americans ended on a hopeful note recently, with a panelist invoking an image from nature.
Congregations striving to maintain their outward incarnational focus, one of the seven marks of congregational vitality, can thrive for at least two reasons: they’re ministering to others while at the same time being ministered to.
Like most organizations, PC(USA)- affiliated camp and retreat centers were blindsided by the COVID-19 pandemic. Stay-at-home and social distancing orders struck the very heart and infrastructure of summer camp and retreat resident ministries. But amid it all, associate for Christian Formation Brian Frick has continued to have hope.
The co-chairs of the Poor People’s Campaign delivered this post-election message during an online event Thursday: Now that voters have turned out in record numbers to cast their ballot, the real work of advocating and caring for the 140 million Americans who are poor and low income must begin in earnest, no matter who sits in the Oval Office or walks the halls of Congress and the nation’s 50 statehouses.
