Throughout all storms and devastation, God remains faithful and present. While the forces of nature are beyond our control, they are not beyond God’s control. Most recently, tropical storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, pandemics, and all forms of injustice have ravaged the world. The work in which CANAAC, PC(USA), and all of the partners of the WCRC remain focused upon all that we have in common and upon the use of our gifts and talents for the common good. The areas in which we are committed include: justice, peace, physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being, worship, and prayer. We unite our hearts and souls in prayer for all who have been affected in any way by all areas of devastation; we join in prayer with and for all who have been rendered homeless, without food and water, in hospitals, and who are in danger of any kind. By God’s grace and the hope that is in God, we continue in faithful service and commitment, knowing that throughout all of the catastrophes of life, God is present and will strengthen us for all that we face. Our lives are in God’s hands. God of Grace and God of Hope, relieve all who suffer in any way; continue to be present with everyone who has been affected by the recent earthquakes, storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, and any event that has brought suffering. In your love, heal all who suffer from COVID-19, whose lives have been threatened by illness or injustice, and grant us your peace for health, economic strength, and holistic well-being. In your Holy Name we pray. AMEN. —Rev. Mary Newbern-Williams
Covenant Pastor First United Presbyterian Church Richmond, Virginia, USA
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The fateful news of the deaths of four people in Mayagüez, others in a state of care, allegedly influenced by a religious leader not to vaccinate against COVID-19, is a critical matter that has social, ethical and religious consequences. Jesus summed up his teaching in two practices: Loving God and others. The Christian leadership has a responsibility to instruct those two facets that conducive to life and pursue the common good. COVID-19 is deadly, leaves unemployed communities, increases domestic violence, delays education. Ethical response from faith cannot be based on our individualism, but on the common good. The quality and degree of care we have with others is a direct reflection of Christian values. The alternatives that have saved lives and restored livelihood in the past are the choice when it comes to human beings in the face of an unexpected pandemic. The exercise of religious freedom does not include the right to imply or encourage harmful activities such as spreading contagious diseases. Any religious leader who suggests an action that affects his life, freedom or dignity is misrepresenting the principles and lessons of faith to which he claims to belong. We seldom stop to think about community health problems, self-absorbed in our individual evil. But from the Christian faith “my” health can only be understood as part of “our” health. This pandemic is a reminder that health care is not a private good. It must stop and question us how far our ethical responsibility as religious leaders goes with the lives or death of our communities. Our responsibility is also to the lives of those who refuse to take the necessary medical precautions or receive the vaccine, as well as to those who are denied a bed or a fan, even when they risk their health and others. As believers we understand that divine grace is mediated through the reality of our life experience. Every time we share bread and wine as a community at the table, we affirm the value of life. As a society, we must keep in mind that no religious leader owns an absolute truth to which no criticism or reflection can be made. This is how war conflicts are justified, forcible offal of territories, genocides, murders, acts of terror and collective suicides occurred in Jonestown, Guyana, and Waco, Texas. Any religious leader who suggests an action that affects his life, freedom or dignity is misrepresenting the principles and lessons of faith to which he claims to belong. Our ethical duty requires us actions to ensure that the most vulnerable people have access to this health care and to raise awareness that the destruction of nature and consequent loss of biodiversity are causes that are at the root of this and any another potential pandemic. Speaking on behalf of the one who said, “I am Life,” gives us the opportunity to use our influence to counteract the misinformation, denialism, and fake news they kill. Let's promote the common good and remember those who congregate in our temples that loving others includes protecting their health and their life by promoting social justice. —Agustina Luvis Núñez Theologian and Teacher Evangelical Seminary in Puerto Rico “Has not God chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him?” – James 2:5 I used to interpret those words as follows: God has given faith to the poor as a gift. Because their life is hard and they need some extra help to endure their struggles, God has provided an extra dose of faith to those who need it most. God promised that their life would be better in the hereafter. As a seminarian and potential pastor, I could help those poor people by teaching them faith. It sounded kind, but now I wonder if it’s misguided. “Just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” – Matthew 25:40 I went to seminary in a time when “missional church” and “reign of God” were popular phrases in theological discussions about the church. These words of Jesus were a favorite of my classmates and mine. We debated whether or not “members of my family” were limited to those who called themselves Christian, but we never debated the role of “the least.” They were always there to be served, but now I wonder if they are the source of my salvation. As I learn about the way that Christian colonists encountered a world new to them and identified those they met as non-religious or sub-human, as they stole land and broke down bodies, I wonder how much of my thinking was in them. Was faith a gift that they had to impart to others rather than one they could receive from them? Were “the least” those who were deficient and in need of service rather than those who might impart salvation? James, not only recognizing the gift that belongs to the poor, questions the favoritism shown to the rich. He has astounded by the deference shown to those “with gold rings and fine clothes” even though it is “the rich who oppress you” and “drag you into court.” Likewise, Jesus knows that it will be easier for a camel to go through the eye of the needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God. And yet, we know who walks through the halls of power and who sit on the seats of privilege. Latin American theologian Jon Sobrino considered the world of the poor to be “a mediation of the truth and absoluteness of God” and sees a “partiality of divine revelation” among the least of these. Carroll Watkins Ali wrote in Survival & Liberation, “Faith articulated in the womanist tradition speaks in terms of God as identified with the ‘least,’ as a divine cosufferer, and ‘God is able.’" Gustavo Gutierrez asks, “How is it possible to tell the poor, who are forced to live in conditions that embody a denial of love, that God loves them?” Maybe the church doesn’t need to tell the poor anything. Maybe the church needs to listen. Isn’t the mission of the church, then, to learn from the poor? Isn’t the reign of God revealed by “the least of these who are members of my family” because they know best how to bring the earth into alignment with heaven? Doesn’t all of this mean that the poor are not deficient but rather possess something of God that we do not? As I continue to wonder what it might mean to decolonize Reformed theology and practice, these are the sorts of questions that roll through my heart and mind. James W. Perkinson wrote in White Theology: Outing Supremacy in Modernity, “Christian superiority reinforced by metaphysical supremacy was re-reinforced by Calvinist indelibility. In this kind of ‘sign economy,’ white supremacy achieved its most virulent ideological articulation, as the inheritor of an absolute essence with absolute destiny…a Calvinist notion of predestination that sought eternal confirmations in surface significations (like success in business or skin-color in race).” Those of us who have inherited this theological tradition have a special responsibility to repair the harm done in its name. To be clear, it’s not about serving the poor or even empowering the poor to take positions of leadership. It’s about recognizing the wealth that God has already given to the poor and the way that Jesus identifies with the least of these and seeking to receive our salvation from them. As Joseph Drexler-Dreis writes in Decolonial Love, “Decolonizing is thus a fundamentally different project than ‘opening’ particular disciplines or ‘diversifying’ Western thought systems; the goal in projects of decolonization is to transcend Western thought systems. This requires a different eschatological imagination. Decolonization, rather than inclusion, becomes the desired end.” Who better to teach the world a different eschatological imagination than those who are rich in faith? —Peter TeWinkle Pastor St. Croix Reformed Church US Virgin Islands Peter is currently pursuing a Doctor of Ministry at Claremont School of Theology and exploring what it might mean to decolonize Reformed theology and practice. The work of transformation continues to challenge all that we do as churches. This involves the work of seeking justice and working for abundant life for all. The Cambridge online dictionary defines transformation as ‘a complete change in the appearance or character of something or someone, especially so that that thing or person is improved’. There are many nuances to the term transformation. These range from biological, linguistics, mathematical to physics. It is not the purpose of this short reflection to dive into all those nuances. I would like to stick to a simple definition of improving something for the better. In this case, transformation that will ensure dignity for all the created and that includes the environment or nature. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) says, ‘The world is undergoing important social transformations driven by the impact of globalization, global environmental change and economic and financial crises, resulting in growing inequalities, extreme poverty, exclusion and the denial of basic human rights. These transformations demonstrate the urge for innovative solutions conducive to universal values of peace, human dignity, gender equality and non-violence and non-discrimination’. Solutions that also call for environmental protection or climate justice. Jesus Christ announced his mission statement as having come to preach the good news to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to the captives, recovery to the blind and set at liberty those who are oppressed (Luke 4:18). This in short is what he termed as having come so that ‘they may have life and have it abundantly’ (John 10:10). Just before the ascension, Jesus commissioned his followers to continue this mission of spreading goods news and setting the captives free. The Church of Jesus Christ has therefore existed in different expressions to continue the mission of Jesus. The mission however has not been easy. The past has been blurred with histories of the unholy marriage between slavery, colonialism and other vices. For example, one would not understand how the Church in Canada was found complicit in a genocide of Indigenous people. Here genocide is the intentional destruction of a particular group through killing, serious physical or mental harm, preventing births and/or forcibly transferring children to another group. The term has been applied to the experiences of Indigenous peoples in Canada, particularly in the final reports of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Children were forcibly taken to church-run residential schools in order to kill the Indian out of the child. Furthermore, there are sad stories of the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. The situation is made even more complex with recent discoveries in Canada of unmarked graves of children near the sites where residential schools were operated by church institutions. Several injustices continue in this world and the church cannot afford to be silent or inactive. The Church should be in dialogue with affected communities to seek ways and means of working towards transformation. These will include issues like racism, not being able to seek refuge, gender discrimination, poverty, war, basic access to education, human rights abuses, police brutality and other aspects of neocolonialism and imperialism. Working for transformation towards peace, justice, reconciliation, dignity and abundant life for all is very much the call of the Church. If the Church has to live up to its saltiness, it has no choice but to participate in God’s mission of justice, peace and transformation in the world, through its various ministries and partners in their contextual response to God’s invitation of partnership. “It is not that the Church of God has a mission in the world, but that the God of mission has a church, and people’s movements, non-governmental organizations and temples that can facilitate appropriate transformation. How is your Church community living out this call? —Rev. Dr. Japhet Ndhlovu Executive Minister for the Church in Mission Unit United Church of Canada Rev. Dr. Japhet Ndhlovu got his Phd in Practical Theology from the University of Stellenbosch in South Africa.
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