As a mission co-worker and cultural worker in the Philippines, sometimes I am utterly exhausted. There are periods that require quite a bit of travel related to meetings and theater-based trainings for children, youth, church workers, teachers, women and others. When I am in Dumaguete, days sometimes stretch into late evenings for rehearsals with our youth theater group or with Silliman University Divinity School students preparing for the annual church workers convocation. So a few years ago, when asked by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) program if my husband, Cobbie, and I would consider reopening the Philippines YAV service site, we pondered, could we? Should we? Could we say no?
As a mission co-worker and cultural worker in the Philippines, sometimes I am utterly exhausted. There are periods that require quite a bit of travel related to meetings and theater-based trainings for children, youth, church workers, teachers, women and others. When I am in Dumaguete, days sometimes stretch into late evenings for rehearsals with our youth theater group or with Silliman University Divinity School students preparing for the annual church workers convocation. So a few years ago, when asked by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) program if my husband, Cobbie, and I would consider reopening the Philippines YAV service site, we pondered, could we? Should we? Could we say no?
A year of service, a lifetime of deeper questions. One of the many ways the Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) program hopes to challenge participants is through the forming and continual reshaping of the program’s own concepts about service. This is done best when young volunteers and local people of faith walk together to encourage, challenge and inspire one another.
I am a Korean-American Presbyterian, but that does not define all I am.” Those were the opening lines of my seminary application essays, ordination process paperwork and grant applications. The lines came at a turning point after serving as a Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) in Egypt in 2003. Those applications helped me re-evaluate my 20-something years of life, and I sensed the stirrings of ministry that might look more multicultural than the boundaries of my familiar upbringing.
The meeting room at Laws Lodge on the campus of the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary was buzzing with groups clustered together, debriefing on the past three weeks. Most of the 15 international peacemakers gathered here for a day of conversation before heading back to their homes, an opportunity to talk about their experiences and interactions with U.S. congregations, students and communities.
Cathy Chang and her husband, Juan Lopez, are mission co-workers in Manila, Philippines. They help global partners such as churches and non-governmental organizations address issues of migration and human trafficking. During her visit to Grace Presbytery, Cathy spent time with members of several churches to help spread awareness of her mission work.
Jerome Canales Baris is an ordained minister with the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP). For more than 28 years, he has focused on human rights violations, poverty and corruption. This fall, he will be speaking to congregations and organizations in the U.S. as part of the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program’s 2017 International Peacemakers.
If there is a revered profession in my family, it is a life given to the ministry of the Presbyterian Church. In 1884, my great-grandfather J. Vernon Bell began his ministry as pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Dubois, Pennsylvania, almost 100 years to the day that I entered Union Theological Seminary in New York City.
The United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP), a long-time Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) global partner, joined the National Council of Churches in the Philippines (NCCP) requesting prayers for an end to the ongoing violence in Marawi City, on the island of Mindanao.
It was November 8, 2013 when one of the strongest tropical cyclones ever recorded slammed Southeast Asia, doing damage in particular to Philippines. The result: more than 6,000 dead, towns and communities were destroyed and millions of people were left homeless, with no food and little hope.
