The Presbyterian Church USA Office of the Public Witness seeks your help in supporting the interests of social justice. Please contact your Representative today and ask him or her to Vote 'No' to Stop Fast Track for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

Voting "No" on Fast Track will stop the TPP from offshoring more jobs, raising medicine prices, and allowing corporations to sue us in international tribunals for enforcing standards for wages, job safety, and protection of our land, water and air that we've fought for in America for a century. Congress must assert its constitutional authority over trade agreements to stop the TPP from becoming a reality.  

This issue is pressing because Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.) just introduced legislation in the House to revive the Fast Track trade authority. If the Fast Track bill passes, the TPP could be signed before Congress votes. Then the agreement could be pushed through Congress with no amendments and limited debate.

The best hope is that trade functions as a means of grace to create dignified work that support people's lives, puts food on the table and undergirds the creation of a just society. The moral test is whether our increasingly globalizing economies support the human enterprise and the larger creation, according to the PCUSA Resolution on Just Globalization, released in 2006. If trade further impoverishes segments of the world's population, its purpose is distorted and such injustice calls for reshaping global structures that cause economic oppression and creates wealth for only a few at the expense of the many. Such a world is a parody of the biblical vision for just community.

First Presbyterian Church in San Anselmo is sponsoring a "Green Chautaqua" speaker series on climate change.  At the first event of the year, come hear Dr. Melanie Fitzpatrick speak about the latest research on climate change and what actions we can take now that will make the biggest difference. 

Dr. Fitzpatrick is a climate scientist with the Climate and Energy Change Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists (U.C.S.). Her work encompasses basic climate research, the local and global consequences of climate change, and communicating scientific findings to policy makers, the media and citizens. Dr. Fitzpatrick has been cited by the New York Times, USA Today, the Associated Press, and Reuters. To learn more about the Union of Concerned Scientists, click here. To learn more about Dr. Fitzpatrick and follow her blog, click here. First Presbyterian Church of San Anselmo is located at 72 Kensington Road in San Anselmo. A suggested donation of $10 is payable at the door but all are welcome regardless of donation. 

Meditating on the Miracles is the theme of the next retreat by Companions on the Inner Way. If the miracle stories in the Gospels were few in number and limited in spectrum, they could be dismissed as pre-rational accounts of explicable phenomena.  But there are 32 of them, and some take up whole chapters.  What if their purpose were to offer profound insights into the nature of God and humanity?  What if they provided a mirror for the soul?   What if we moved from marveling at to engaging with? Consider joining this event, which will be led by John Bell, an ordained minister of the Church of Scotland and a member of the Iona Community in Scotland. For more information and to register click here, call 510.484.3078 or email companions@seventhavenuechurch.org. Hope to see you there! 

Ann Pope