Introduction The Presbyterian Church (USA) has been engaged in a decade-long struggle to divest from companies that are profiting from the Israeli
Keep ReadingFossil Fuel Divestment at the 221st General Assembly Download this article as a PDF. On the bulletin board above my desk, I have an excerpt from the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s Book of Confessions: “God’s redeeming work in Jesus Christ embraces
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The call to live out our values in the world is nothing new to the members of The First Presbyterian Church in the City of New York. Our church was instrumental in the nomination of the first Black moderator of our General Assembly in 1960. Our members participated in protests
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An Outline of Twelve Overtures. In 2018, business before the Environmental Issues Committee of the PC(USA) General Assembly includes: engagement with vs. divestment from fossil fuel polluters, environmental racism, carbon pricing, reducing the use of polystyrene, and adopting the “precautionary principle” toward new technologies and strains of genetically engineered crops
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Originally published on October 27, 2016 at http://www.fossilfreepcusablog.org/blog/breaking-down-walls-a-collaborative-response-to-climate-change Environmental advocates on all sides of the PC(USA)’s divestment debate at June’s General Assembly meeting were dismayed, if not depressed, by the outcome. We entered the week with one widely supported overture from Fossil Free PCUSA and 31 presbyteries, three well supported
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“I didn’t know church could be like this,” said Sam, a teenager who had come to an event in Fellowship Hall. That Sunday after worship, we had Anna Baltzer speaking about why, as a Jewish-American, she had come to be an outspoken critic of Israeli policies, part of her national
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Working for Peace in the Middle East at the 222nd General Assembly About a month ago, I was sitting in a large ballroom adjacent to other commissioners and delegates to the 222nd General Assembly, anxiously waiting for the work of the Committee on Middle East Issues (Committee 8) to begin.
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The author would like to note that the opinions expressed here are the author’s alone. When I came to General Assembly, I’d already spent three years of my life working on divestment from fossil fuels. Fossil Free PCUSA was born in 2013, and in the last year we’ve worked with Presbyterians
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In Defense of “Israel-Palestine: For Human Values in the Absence of a Just Peace” In February of 2016, the Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy (ACSWP) released its report, Israel-Palestine: For Human Values in the Absence of a Just Peace, in fulfillment of the mandate given it by the 221st
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Creating Criteria for Corporate Engagement and Environmental Responsibility From the earliest days of the Reformed Tradition, we have understood ourselves to be political. As God is active in all spheres of life, so are we called to be engaged in the social polis. This is one of the most difficult
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For more than a hundred years now, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and its antecedent organizations have called for the use of economic pressures to challenge injustice, oppression, and other situations which they viewed as morally wrong. Examples include a call to the people of the church to “keep themselves financially
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A Perspective from Fossil Free PC(USA) In the shadow of the Paris Accords, rising global temperatures, and changing climates, we are thankful for the many voices discussing climate change in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). We recognize that our denomination has suffered and survived turmoil in the wake of the last
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