This coming week presbymergent friends will be tossing out several hundred of these 5” mini flyers into the multitude of Presbyterians coming to the 218th General Assembly. Our main goal for participating in GA is to help other Presbyterian organizations, leaders, and members know that we exist. The secondary goal is to help network people who a looking to be connected with presbymergent.
If you know of anyone going to General Assembly who needs to know more about presbymergent, let them know they should stop by the booth and come to the events. If you would like one of our limited supply, 100% recycled plastic, mini flyers – let them know they should pick one up for you before they’re all tossed out.
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Exhibit Hall Booth (#409), Friday – Wednesday
Along with the mini flyers, the cheerful booth staff will be handing out a beautiful brochure (“an invitation to presbymergent conversations” designed and color printed by Carol Howard Merritt), and small invites to the two presbymergent events happening at GA. We hope to make new friends and have good conversations about Emergent, being loyal radicals, …
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Friday Night Event, 7:00-9:00 pm
a presbymergent event with Emergent Village voices
donations accepted (suggestion $10) Facebook event page
The Church Basement Roadshow
In a high-energy, meaningful and light-hearted show three friends from varied backgrounds (Tony Jones, Doug Pagitt and Mark Scandrette) join forces as a team of revivalists in the tradition of the late 19th and early 20th century. Drawing on material from their most recent books, they will use skits, group sing-alongs, spoken word poetry, video and old-timey style preaching to invite audiences into a serious encounter with the exciting possibilities of lived Christian faith in our day.
First Presbyterian Church of San Jose
49 North 4th Street, San Jose
(a ten minute walk from the convention center)
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Tuesday Night Event, 8:00-10:00 pm
a presbymergent evening of friendship, film, food and conversations
free appetizers will be provided by our co-host, the Office of Theology and Worship, and beverages will be available for purchase
Most of the evening will be informal conversations.
From 8:30-9:00 there will be a 15 minute preview screening of “A Church Emerging,” followed by a Q&A with the producer and director. This documentary follows the story of a traditional Presbyterian Church in the San Jose presbytery that joins with an emerging church, interspersed with interviews exploring Emergent’s impact on a national scale.
Tied House Brewing Company
65 North San Pedro Street, San Jose
(a ten minute walk from the convention center)
About Karen Sloan
I wish I could be there!
But for those of you who aren’t, Adam Walker Cleaveland’s going to be blogging through the GA here: http://www.pres-outlook.com/blog.html.
I look forward to seeing you all at some of these events, the booth or just around. As Carol mentioned, I will be blogging for the Presbyterian Outlook at the above link. You can follow my experiences at my first GA there.
Karen – Many prayers headed to GA. Looking forward to all the updates.
KAren, snag me one of those cool mini fliers will ya! See you in July!! wish I could be there as well–David
And to top off the ongoing events so far at the GA, the delegates voted to have Bruce Reyes-Chow as the Moderator or the next two years. Bruce is a true friend and leader of emerging thoughts in the Presbyterian Church and it is a wonderful tribute to the delegates that they saw his leadership and future vision. Read more about it at http://www.pcusa.org/ga218/news/ga08021.htm
God golly do they know what they’ve done?!?!?!?
Haha bruce… probably not. at least not yet
jk
I enjoied meeting the folks at the booth and look forward to being part of the conversations. It was good to reconnect with Brian sorry you couldn’t be there too Carol.
Jim Barker APTS 97-01
1st Pres Junction, TX
http://junctionbarkers.blogspot.com/
i don’t know if they know what they’ve done, but it is definitely time.
my self described “conservative” GA roommate came into plenary ahead of the mod vote (having attended the Outlook dinner), saying “1 candidate is much stronger than the others.” I, wincing slightly, asked, “which one?” “Well, Bruce Reyes-Chow.” Way to go Bruce!
I loved the transformational moments I witnessed as hearts were softened and eyes opened. G-d is good!
Susan – Would be interesting to see what they thought about the GA experience post-event.
Hi Presbymergent people!
Thanks for the good conversations at GA. Hope we get to have more conversations about stuff. And thanks Karen for your presence in prayer (and that fast but furious introduction to Southern New England pby.)
cheers
Heather W. Reichgott
Hey Bruce,
Actually, i spent an hour chatting at the airport on sat morning with a 50-something gordon-conwell grad from the theo issues committee with whom i disagreed on most things. we were each able to affirm that we disagree over heart-felt, scripture-informed, reformed theo-based concerns. we were also able to share our belief that G-d is at work reconciling us as the body of Christ, that we don’t know what that will look like or how it will happen. we were able to affirm our sense of blessing to have one another as sister / brother in faith. it was good. i felt the Spirit at work, binding us together.
i’m sure lots of folks don’t feel that way. the syrian-american clp i talked to on the plane out of san jose said she cried for 2 days after the G-6 vote. as she talked about peacemaking in the middle east and kept saying, “they’re just people — talk to them — make peace.” after lengthy quiet faithful concerned conversation about our church, and while she spoke on needing to call a special Session meeting to convey the “bad” news, i suggested that maybe opposing sides in our denomination needed to consider that “they’re just people — talk to them — make peace.”
may we be patient as G-d works out our redemption and reconciliation and teaches us how to love each other. of course it is easier to be patient when it feels like things are going your way. lots of folks have been patient with the PCUSA for years as we try to follow the holy call on our consciences.
may we in the mean time remember that we all cherish scripture, we all live in G-d’s mercy, we all try to be disciples of Jesus, we all are accompanied by the Spirit.
sorry it’s so long, but you asked.
deep peace,
Susan
Susan – GREAT response and good to keep at the center. If we can find a way forward together it certainly will only be through the Spirit. Good thing. And so much of that will be because folks are willing to sit down and actually hear one another. Good stuff. Bruce
Bruce, the purpose of PUP was to attempt a forum for dialogue. I’m not certain that it works, since interestingly as soon as the GAPJC upheld the constitutional standard with respect to ordination one of the key authors of PUP in John Knox Presbytery immediately tried to go around the process and worked instead to bring a proposal to GA this year to undo the limitation.
In light of this and other discussions I hear on blogs and saw at GA and have with my accountability group, the philosophical question I ask is this: Can people with distinct ideologies regarding authority dialogue across their ideologies? I think you discovered in GA218 that at best its difficult. Can a denomination sustain unity with two widely disparate ideologies about authority present? If so, how? Are we two houses under one roof, at least from an ideological perspective? I think these are the question that PFR is going to be asking itself now, and it should be interesting to see the outcome at GA219.
So, that’s a question I’m proposing for blogs, who knows if it will go anywhere.
Tom – Yep, and in some places PUP dialogue took place. There were, of course, varying levels of success. I think you are asking the questions that many of us are asking, on the issue of biblical interpretation and homosexuality, can we agree to disagree.
I posted something about this on my mod blog during the “campaign” if you want to check out the comments.
http://www.mod.reyes-chow.com/2008/05/can-we-agree-to.html
Tom is onto something serious regarding differing views of authority.
We can only “agree to disagree” if no one is trying to control anyone else. Agreeing to disagree requires letting go of control over whether others will do what you want, or not.
But the conservative side of the debate over sexuality IS trying to control what people do with their sexuality–whereas the liberal side cares more about teaching people to make their own wise and faithful decisions.
Sometimes I wonder if this is more about control than about sexuality itself.
Heather, wherever there is anger there is fear over, among other things, the lack of control or the loss of it. In that regard, there is control on either side of the debate. One side asserts that control comes from the authority of ancient text. Another side asserts that control comes from the authority of western postmodern relativity. Which side is correct? Perhaps in some ways both are…now isn’t that a postmodern notion? Hermeneutics of suspicion (Schüsler Fiorenza, Segovia) dominates the current debate, and I don’t see an end to it in the short term; certainly not by GA219! What this means is simple: all things are suspect, all things receive their due challenge in the debate of idea and ideology, which this most certainly is.
Do you really want to make headway? Begin this way: ask simply what someone means by their use of a word. Perhaps a question, “Can you explain what you mean by ‘discipleship?’” or “evangelism?” or “liberal?” or “conservative?” may help. This was one of the goals of PUP, and it’s rather interesting to me how quickly that critical aspect of dialogue has disappeared: mutual understanding of terms.
Then, once you have the definition, their context, that will help you articulate your point, and me mine, in a way that is both respectful and conscientious. Sure, it’s a helluva lotta work, but we’ve gone so far down the path of destructive disunity that it’s going to require so much work to get back on track and really do the John 17 thing.
Peace all…Tom
Bruce, I just logged into this blog string (or however it is defined) so I wasn’t aware of your thoughts expressed earlier. Thanks for sharing the link.
I speak as a pastor and scholar, single-again, caucasian, father of an 18-year old daughter, good looking, physically fit, ragamuffin in his early forties who has at last calmed down from my early rantings. I admit that at one time I despised people in our denomination who were ripping it apart (my “then” language) over the issue of sexuality. Of course, now I’m single-again, and have been for ten years. It’s not only homosexual and lesbian people who struggle with our ordination standard, good ole’ 6b. That reminds me of a joke I learned while doing my Ph.D. among the great Jesuits at Loyola, but that’s for another time.
To me the issue isn’t about sex. It’s about my personal submission and obedience to scripture’s call to holiness. I don’t say this as a liberal or evangelical, since I navigate both worlds. Sure it quite frankly sucks at times, and it’s VERY difficult, but you know what? It’s the path I trust that in God’s wisdom the Holy Spirit inspired someone to write. Even when I blow it, I still maintain that God’s way is the way and I say I’m wrong. If it is on that issue we’re disagreeing can we agree to disagree? There’s the rub, Bruce, and while I can do that in an academic setting (in fact I encourage it among my graduate students) the evidence tells me it doesn’t work in the church over foundational philosophies.
Bruce, I hope you visit Shepards & Lapsley (oh you now you have to come to the Deep South). Now it’s off to bed. Tomorrow’s sermon time! By the way, Bruce, I do what you do in one of our services. The dialogue style is great for some, not for all, but it has been great to do.