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pandemic
Commissioned Ruling Elder Lisa Allgood, a trained immunocytochemist and transitional executive presbyter for the Presbytery of Cincinnati, will present an update on Zoom about the most recent findings on COVID-19 and its impact on the human body.
I have sat down to write this blog almost a hundred times. Each time I have given up after a couple of minutes.
A virtual ‘trip’ to Guatemala with World Mission’s long-time partner, the Protestant Center for Pastoral Studies in Central America (CEDEPCA), may help you break free from pandemic isolation — at least in your mind and heart.
As a pastor, I am fielding calls now about getting back into our sanctuary for worship. It seems this desire to get back to “normal” is becoming the new virus sweeping the nation. In a way I can understand the longing to return to worship in a sanctuary. I have a rural congregation with older members who have not been all that quick to embrace virtual worship. I’ll admit, though, I’m in no hurry to return to traditional church. I find something exciting in what God is doing with video devotionals and sermons.
Though in-person classes are suspended at Forman Christian College in Lahore, Pakistan, faculty are doing all they can to ensure that the university’s more than 5,000 students are still receiving an education.
The coronavirus has inflicted any number of health crises on Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) congregations — but in some tangible ways it’s also enhanced their ecclesial health.
When asked how the current pandemic changes the way he interprets Scripture, the Rev. Dr. Brian K. Blount speaks of hope in the midst of struggle.
The question of theodicy — divine goodness in the presence of evil — comes to mind, he said, citing the Old Testament trials of Job.
This spring, Presbyterian churches, large and small, scrambled to get online using technology that they had either heard of, dabbled in or had been wanting to use in their own ministries.
By mid-March, COVID-19 began changing the way the world interacts, and the church was not immune to those changes. Amid social distancing and shelter-in-place orders, many churches either canceled worship or moved to a virtual form of worship. Pastors and sessions looked for creative ways to worship and to care for the most vulnerable church members in a quickly changing landscape. But what about financial stewardship during such a time as a pandemic – or any other event that would interrupt traditional modes of being the church?
The Rev. Sharon Stewart of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and the Rev. Dr. Melodie Jones Pointon, senior pastor and head of staff at Eastridge Presbyterian Church in Lincoln, Nebraska, recently served as co-conveners of one of the first virtual mission network meetings.
