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| | Dries with his friend Christo and Driesie |
This coming Sunday Beth and I will not be in worship, as we will be at the baptism of Dries' namesake, Andries Francis Claassens, born January 11, 2015 to Christo Claassens and Karin Oleri in Pennsylvania. We will have a wonderful time celebrating Driesie's baptism, but we will miss being at the first 3rd Sunday Intergenerational Conversations; however, we feel fortunate that Alazar and Endalkachew will be there (hopefully!) engaging in conversation with their faith community and representing our family.
"... At its core, progressive Christianity maintains that there are no easy answers to the questions of faith simply because our understanding of God and Jesus evolves and changes (i.e., "progresses") enormously over a lifetime. As we move through life, and as our experiences and knowledge shape and alter our view of faith, we come to see that we only have a piece of the truth and that we must be in conversation with others who themselves possess part of that spiritual truth.
I was reminded of this fact in recent weeks as my own congregation participated in a church-wide study of four major questions related to Christianity. We covenanted to meet on Sunday mornings in small groups to talk about these questions and discover more about who we are as a church. The groups were intergenerational and included a mix of teens, young adults, and older adults. The questions we pondered together included:
- What is the heart of the gospel message?
- Who or what is God for us?
- What does it mean to affirm Jesus as Christ?
- What is the mission of the Church?
This list of questions by themselves might be the very same posed to members of any conservative evangelical congregation. Those churches might even post them on their website under the heading "What do we believe?" followed by concise and concrete answers ready to be memorized and shared with any non-Christians seeking to know more about the faith. In contrast, the purpose of these conversations in my church was not to arrive at any final conclusive answers at all. Nor was it to try to urge our congregation to embrace the orthodox Christian responses to these questions. Rather, we were encouraging young and old alike to wrestle with scripture, to share from their experiences of living a life of faith, to question their assumptions, and to own up to their doubts.
Through these conversations, we discovered that we are a far more diverse congregation than many of us had suspected. Our views on the reality of God were all over the theological map. Some saw God as "out there" while others experienced God as part of their most intimate relationships and experiences. Our understanding of the identity of Jesus ranged from seeing him as a gifted rabbi to understanding Christ as at one with the nature of God. Our thoughts on the core Gospel message included both those who affirmed the notion of God's universal love and others who subscribed to a theology of atonement. Some argued the mission of the Church was to live out the gospel through acts of justice and peace while others maintained we were primarily called to evangelize non-Christians.
What a gift it was to have our youth right there in the middle of this conversation, sharing their own insights and witnessing the adults of the church admitting that none of us has a corner on theological truth. In the end, we were unwilling to define just exactly what a Christian must believe even as we celebrated our covenant to continue exploring our faith together in community. The only conclusion we reached for which there was true consensus was an affirmation that our diversity is a strength, not a weakness. Our willingness to resist putting God and our faith in a box encourages a humility that admits we will never understand God fully because that understanding continues to evolve and change over the course of our lives.
From the perspective of ministry with youth, a progressive theology challenges us to help teens embrace that theological uncertainty and to see faith not as a destination but as a journey. Teens need to be free to ask difficult questions, challenge traditional beliefs, and reevaluate their understanding of Christianity without fear of being labeled "unfaithful."
Please support our members and friends who will be leading worship on Sunday as we celebrate International Day of Peace!
Mooi loop, (*Dries is getting his Afrikaans warmed up for the weekend),
Dries
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Affordable Housing in Wooster, Ohio
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The Wooster Friends have made arrangements to have two speakers on September 20 from noon to 1:00-1:30. They will speak about the challenges of affordable housing in the Wooster area: availability, affordability, and oversight of absentee landlords.
- Stan Popp, Executive Director of Wayne Metropolitan Housing Authority
- Krista Kidney, Supportive Services Coordinator at Liberty Center Connections We would love to welcome members of Westminster Presbyterian to this program! Best wishes, Sharon Shelly
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Lunch after worship on Sunday, September 27
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Westminster and UKirk invite students and their families to join us for lunch after worship for The College of Wooster Black & Gold Weekend (Homecoming and Family Weekend combined). Here at Westminster we always feel honored and blessed when students bring their families to worship and share the precious time they have together with us. Not only does this speak to the priorities of the students and their families, but also to the connection they have made with our community of faith. RSVP Here!
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Peacemaking Lunch Monday, September 28
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Peacemaking Lunch with the Rev. Berthe Kalombo Nzeba, September 29 at 12:00pm in The Meeting Place, Westminster Church House.
Join us for a luncheon with with International Peacemakers Rev. Berthe Nzeba & her colleague and translator, Christi Boyd. RSVP here!
Rev. Nzeba is a Christian leader in the Democratic Republic of Congo who oversees efforts in support of war orphans and survivors of rape. She is an active interlocutor in ecumenical platforms for peace and security in the Great Lakes Region and will be speaking about addressing sexual violence, advocating peace in the larger Region, and the need to transform the exploitation and trade of Congo's mineral wealth.
Rev. Nzeba, or Maman Nzeba as she is more popularly known among Congolese church women, is the General Secretary of the Women and Families Department of the Protestant umbrella organization, the Church of Christ in Congo (ECC). A Presbyterian minister ordained in 1978, she is believe to be the first female Protestant clergy in the Democratic Republic of Congo. For the last ten years, she has coordinated national and international Church efforts in support of women and children impacted by the protracted conflict in Eastern Congo. As General Secretary of the ECC Department of Families, Rev. Nzeba oversees collaborative efforts by women's groups from ECC denominations in support of war orphans and survivors of rape. She also doubles as the Women's President for the West Kinshasa Synod of the Presbyterian Church of Kinshasa (CPK) and pastors the CPK Brikin parish in Kinshasa.
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Gifts of the Heart Update
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With generous donations of time, energy and financial resources, Westminster is sending 133 school kits and 44 hygiene kits to Church World Service (a Presbyterian disaster assistance partner) to provide aid both nationally and internationally. The value of this effort is $2,835.
Our 17-year contributions include 1,988 school kits, 1,433 hygiene kits and a total value of $48,228! Thank you for your continued support of this hands-on demonstration of God's love to our suffering siblings.
Submitted by Linda Barbu
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 Through our Benevolences Committee, Westminster made a donation of $200 to Presbyterian Disaster Assistance to help Syrian Refugees. Read here how PDA is supporting our European partners as they minister to the needs of these refugees. You can also make an electronic donation here, or make out a check to WPC indicating in the memo line that the donation is for the Refugee Crisis.
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Emily Stevens, 2015 College of Wooster graduate, begins a year as a Young Adult Volunteer
Emily, who attended Westminster throughout her senior year, has embarked on a year of service through the Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) program, funded through the Presbyterian Church (USA). Westminster is pleased to help sponsor Emily's year of faith-based service, prayerfully as well as financially. She says this about her assignment, "I am excited to be working with Habitat for Humanity and to learn more about their mission and their work in Asheville throughout the year. I will be sure to let you know if I am coming back to Wooster; I would love to speak about the YAV program!"
YAV serves to help communities in need around the country and the world. For young people like Emily, the YAV program serves as a year of reflection for individual to learn more about themselves, mentally and spiritually, and how they wish to integrate themselves into the world during this time of transition in their lives. You can read about Emily's experiences in her blog here.
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International Day of Peace
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In the spirit of the upcoming International Day of Peace, Don Gordon has submitted the following blog post by Kathy Kelly, who visited Westminster several years ago, for our Weekly News. Don says, "After serving in a Federal prison for 3 months she remains undeterred in her opposition to the wars our country wages and she continues to speak for the victims of our wars. May we do likewise!"
Which Side Are We On?
By Kathy Kelly "On the one side, powerful military bureaucracies, influential and richly financed weapons industries, their lobbies, their captive legislators, those for whom paranoia or past wars are a way of life," he wrote. "On the other side, only reason, the will to survive, the inarticulate poor" -John Kenneth Galbraith, forward to the 1978 edition of Ruth Sivard's World Military and Social Expenditures, quoted in the NYT obituary for Ruth Sivard Kabul - Here at the Afghan Peace Volunteers' Borderfree Center, between morning and afternoon Street Kids School sessions, I asked several of the volunteer teachers how they felt about organizing the school and teaching weekly language, math and nonviolence classes. ...>>>
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Central American Medical Outreach
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 Join Westminster on Wednesday, September 30 as we travel to the Central American Medical Outreach warehouse in Orrville. We sort and pack all kinds of donated laundry to be used in the hospital in Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras. As we pack the boxes to be shipped, we truly feel connected to the patients who will be cared for in those hospital gowns, comforted in those sheets, treated by staff dressed in those scrubs. If you are interested please contact Beth Coetzee for more information.
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What's happening at Westminster this week?
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9:30am - Choir Rehearsal in Mackey Hall
9:45am - 3rd Sunday Intergenerational Conversations in The Meeting Place
10:45am - Worship in Mackey Hall, celebrating International Day of Peace
12:00pm - Fellowship in Mackey Hall
12:00pm - Join the Wooster Friends for speakers Stan Popp, Executive Director of Wayne Metropolitan Housing Authority and Krista Kidney, Supportive Services Coordinator at Liberty Center Connections regarding the challenges of low-income housing in the Wooster area.
7:00pm - Garden volunteer time at GreenPoint Garden
7:00pm - Student-led Bible Study in The Lounge
8:30am - Agape Latte in the Old Main Caf� fishbowl
7:00pm - Session Meeting in The Lounge
7:00pm - Choir Rehearsal in Mackey Hall
6:30pm - Dance Group in Mackey Hall
9:30am - Choir Rehearsal in Mackey Hall
10:45am - Worship in Mackey Hall, Pastor Dries preaching
12:00pm - The College of Wooster Black & Gold Weekend Lunch
7:00pm - Garden volunteer time at GreenPoint Garden
For the latest and most up-to-date information visit Westminster's calendar here.
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