Just about the first thing that “A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast” hosts the Rev. Lee Catoe and Simon Doong wanted to know from their guest, second-grade teacher Jamie Woods, as part of a recent podcast was: How have educators managed to remain resilient two years into the enormous educational challenges brought on by a global pandemic?
This isn’t the editorial I had planned for you. As I was about to email what I had written to my copy editor, the ding of the computer alerted me to a new message. It was from a friend whom I have been trying to go on a hike with for what has seemed forever — thanks, Covid — so I quickly opened it. I read the first line with confusion and trepidation.
When Covid struck in spring 2020 in the Czech Republic, it meant, above all, a radical reduction in contacts. This reduction was a reasonable response from the authorities to the pandemic, which was spreading through physical encounters between people. The schooling of children and young people as well as the work of many adults have moved to their households. When people outside the home had to meet others, such as on public transport or in shops, the obligation to wear a mask began to apply.
In preparation for the 11th Assembly of the World Council of Churches, Dr. Agnes Abuom, Moderator of the WCC Central Committee, couldn’t help but hearken back to the 10th Assembly, held in 2013 in Busan in the Republic of Korea.
This Sunday morning, members and friends at Second Presbyterian Church in Roanoke, Virginia, will celebrate an astonishing accomplishment during worship: the 1,200-member church has raised more than $1.7 million to support the capital campaigns of four of its long-term mission partners, an amount that exceeds the church’s annual budget by about $200,000.
The rooms we occupy — those places where breath is taken, words are spoken and memories are made — are often taken for granted. They have four walls and a ceiling, reflecting the personality of the occupant or the traditions of an organization. But can rooms be more?
Dr. Carolyn Chen, a sociologist at the University of California, Berkeley and co-director of the Berkeley Center for the Study of Religion, said during this week’s “A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast” that for many workers — her recent book “Work Pray Code: When Work Becomes Religion in Silicon Valley” focuses on the highly skilled ones toiling in the knowledge economy — workplaces are “the new faith communities in the new economy.”
“Seems like changes come faster and faster all the time!” My grandmother, who was born in 1904, told me this one day, as she described her youth without cars and then astronauts on the moon six decades later. Some of the changes over her 97 years were unwelcome. She never did buy a microwave. Other changes, like the “www” in her morning newspaper ads, intrigued her.
When I came on board as a co-host of the “Food and Faith” podcast, I suggested to my other hosts, Anna Woofenden and Sam Chamelin, that I would love to have more people on the show talk to us about cooking. I wanted to hear how people connected cooking to their values, how the act of cooking can be meditative or reflective, and how people connect or reconnect in the kitchen to deepen family histories or discuss even deeper issues of heritage and race.
When it came time to minister to the families of recent asylees from Central America, it turns out a global pandemic was no match for the 60 or so members and friends of Beechmont Presbyterian Church in Louisville.
