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Churches Uniting in Christ |
| COCU prepares to become CUIC
New incarnation of 40-year-old movement will focus
on racism
by Jerry L. Van Marter, Presbyterian News Service
[1-19-02]
MEMPHIS, Tenn. - 18-January-2002 - More than 300
leaders from nine denominations representing 22 million American
Christians are gathering here this weekend to celebrate a culmination of
40 years of unity talks.
By the end of their time together Monday at Noon, the
member churches of the Consultation on Church Union (COCU) will be known
as Churches Uniting in Christ (CUIC).
CUIC will be charged with further advancing Christian
unity in the United States, but in a far different way from the concept
of church merger that launched COCU in 1960.
Instead, the CUIC churches - including the
Presbyterian Church (USA) have agreed to officially recognize each
other's ministries and ministers and have pledged to work together
toward greater visible unity, both inside and outside the church. CUIC
will not involve structures or bureaucracies and no member church's
polity will have to change.
And in what will most surely be far greater challenge
than previous attempted agreements on doctrine and church structure,
CUIC's churches have agreed to work together to overcome the racism
which still divides American people and churches.
"Never before has a church unity effort
challenged the biggest divide, which is race," current COCU general
secretary Michael Kinnamon of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
told the Memphis Commercial Appeal. "It's one thing to
overcome the divisions of the Reformation, it's another thing to
overcome the divisions of racial separation."
It is that commitment to overcome racism that has
brought COCU/CUIC to Memphis on this Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend.
The weekend's events - worship, workshops and celebrations - will
culminate Monday morning with a march from Memphis City Hall to the
National Civil Rights Museum, which is located at the former Lorraine
Motel, where King was assassinated in 1968.
Robert Edgar, general secretary of the National
Council of Churches, will keynote the holiday rally at the museum,
standing in for former U.N. ambassador and civil rights leader Andrew
Young, who was with King here on the day he was killed.
Other events scheduled this weekend include an opening
worship service and celebration of COCU on Friday; workshops on a
variety of church unity topics all day Saturday; a special service
inaugurating CUIC on Sunday and the 1.2-mile march and rally on Monday.
The member denominations of COCU/CUIC include the
African Methodist Episcopal Church, the African American Episcopal Zion
Church, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), the Christian
Methodist Episcopal Church, the Episcopal Church, the International
Council of Community Churches, the PC(USA), the United Church of Christ
and the United Methodist Church.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Roman
Catholic Church, the Moravian Church and the American Baptist Churches,
while not members, have expressed support for CUIC and are expected to
have representatives present for the festivities. |
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GA actions
ratified (or not) by the presbyteries
A number of the most important actions of the 219th
General Assembly are now being sent to the presbyteries for their
action, to confirm or reject them as amendments to the PC(USA) Book
of Order.
We're providing resources to help inform the
reflection and debate, along with updates on the voting.
Our three areas of primary interest are:
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Amendment 10-A,
which would remove the current ban on
lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender persons being considered as
possible candidates for ordination as elder or ministers. |
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Amendment 10-2,
which would add the Belhar Confession to our Book of
Confessions. |
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Amendment
10-1, which would adopt the new Form of Government
that was approved by the Assembly. |
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If you like what
you find here,
we hope you'll help us keep Voices for Justice going ... and
growing!
Please consider making a special
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Click here to send a
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Or send your check, made
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Some blogs worth visiting |
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PVJ's
Facebook page
Mitch Trigger, PVJ's
Secretary/Communicator, has created a Facebook page where
Witherspoon members and others can gather to exchange news and
views. Mitch and a few others have posted bits of news, both
personal and organizational. But there’s room for more!
You can post your own news and views,
or initiate a conversation about a topic of interest to you. |
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Voices of Sophia blog
Heather Reichgott, who has created
this new blog for Voices of Sophia, introduces it:
After fifteen years of scholarship
and activism, Voices of Sophia presents a blog. Here, we present the
voices of feminist theologians of all stripes: scholars, clergy,
students, exiles, missionaries, workers, thinkers, artists, lovers
and devotees, from many parts of the world, all children of the God
in whose image women are made. .... This blog seeks to glorify God
through prayer, work, art, and intellectual reflection. Through
articles and ensuing discussion we hope to become an active and
thoughtful community. |
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John Harris’ Summit to
Shore blogspot
Theological and philosophical
reflections on everything between summit to shore, including
kayaking, climbing, religion, spirituality, philosophy, theology,
politics, culture, travel, The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), New
York City and the Queens neighborhood of Ridgewood by a progressive
New York City Presbyterian Pastor. John is a former member of the
Witherspoon board, and is designated pastor of North Presbyterian
Church in Flushing, NY. |
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John Shuck’s Shuck and Jive
A Presbyterian minister, currently
serving as pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Elizabethton,
Tenn., blogs about spirituality, culture, religion (both organized
and disorganized), life, evolution, literature, Jesus, and
lightening up. |
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Got more blogs to recommend?
Please
send a note, and we'll see what we can do! |
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