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The Global Partnership Task Group is planning a trip
November 15 – 22, 2010.
The task group has already identified four persons to travel and wants to invite 5-6 additional people within the Presbytery who would be interested in traveling to Medellin which is located in Urabá Presbytery.
Although we would very much like to bring several folks to Winnebago Presbytery, the difficulty in obtaining visas makes this nearly impossible. Therefore, Winnebago will send a delegation to meet with church leaders from the Presbyterian Church in Colombia for worship and study.
The funds to subsidize this gathering—including travel, housing and lodging for both delegations—come from the Presbytery Operating Budget, the Presbytery International Partnership Fund and a generous grant from the John N. Bergstrom Fund of First Presbyterian Church, Neenah.
The cost for individual participants is $500. If you are interested in this trip, contact the Presbytery Office – nancy at winnebago presbytery.org – by Wednesday, September 15, for more information.
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Posted ( admin) in Mission on May-20-2010 |
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Lives Transformed
Sophie Corporan
Paramus, NJ (May 20, 2010) – When Sophie Corporan completed her early registration for the 2010 Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference, she had no idea what life had in store for her.
On February 24, less than a month before the conference was to convene in Indianapolis, Corporan’s husband, Marcelino, died of complications from an aortic aneurysm. His sudden, unexpected death at the age of 59 found Corporan and her family not only in deep grief, but also making arrangements for Marcelino’s burial in his native Dominican Republic.
Upon returning to New Jersey just one short week before the conference’s March 15 opening session, Corporan prayerfully decided to follow through with her original commitment, traveling to Indiana the very next Sunday.
“The conference helped me to come out from where I was,” she explained. “I felt like God brought me there and I was open to that.”
The three-day conference, entitled “Funding Mission Today and Tomorrow,” was hosted by several presbyteries, synods and agencies of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). In addition to keynote and workshop presentations on the biblical, theological and spiritual foundations of stewardship, the conference also encouraged its participants to embrace new ideas for campaigns and to learn ways to infuse stewardship with joy and reverence. Corporan, who is currently the moderator of the Presbytery of the Palisades and was recently elected as one of its two elder commissioners to the 219th General Assembly (2010), found herself uplifted by the vibrant speakers and the concepts they enlightened.
“I fervently believe in being a steward and that stewardship should be a year-round movement,” she said. “Churches should be better trained in stewardship in order to have their members realize that when they’re helping their church financially, they’re helping themselves.”
Corporan, an elder at the First Presbyterian Church of Hackensack, N.J., has already shared her learnings with the church’s session, encouraging them to continue to reach and to educate the congregation. As one of three members of the presbytery’s Stewardship Committee who attended the Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference, she is also in the process of preparing a presentation for the benefit of the whole presbytery.
“When you have a good thing, you have to share it with everyone,” she said, “especially with those who weren’t there.”
The 2011 Stewardship Kaleidoscope Conference will be held in Phoenix, Ariz., February 28 – March 2, 2011. Learn more  |
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The Presbyterian Church in Cuba
A monthly column for the PC(USA) by the General Assembly stated clerk
by the Rev. Gradye Parsons
General Assembly stated clerk
LOUISVILLE — Yes, Virginia, there is a vital Presbyterian Church in Cuba. Read more.
I was invited to travel to the island last month with the presbytery and synod staffs of the Synod of the Sun. We spent time at the Matanzas Evangelical Theological Seminary talking about the mission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the Presbyterian Reformed Church in Cuba. We also toured churches in each of the three presbyteries.
We heard remarkable testimonies of faithfulness and hope in these Cuban congregations. Church members told us about the long time in their history immediately following the revolution when only one or two people would attend Sunday worship. Today, the sanctuaries of those same congregations are full for worship. We also met a group of young adults who were preparing for a mission trip to Canada.
Particularly striking to me was the story told by Dora Arce Valentin, a pastor in Havana. Dora is the daughter of a minister who led his church during the difficult time right after the revolution.
Dora’s grandmother lived with them, and it was her job to get Dora to Sunday school each week. Not only was Dora frequently the only child in the class, which her grandmother taught, but she was often the only young girl in the congregation. So, like preacher’s kids everywhere, Dora protested this solitary assignment.
Dora remembers what her grandmother told her every Sunday. “Dora, you have to go to Sunday school. It is important that people see you there. God will bring the other people.”
Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 13 that now we see in a mirror dimly. Now we wonder where the church is going and what will it look like when we get there. Now we question how our little faith and hope will keep our congregations vital and alive.
Cuba holds a lesson for us: God is ever more faithful that we can imagine. So, Presbyterians, go to church. It is important that people see you there. God will bring the other people.
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Posted ( admin) in Mission on February-17-2010 |
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Winnebago Presbytery supports a number of local partnerships between our congregations and local agencies and programs.
One answer to the question, “Where do our dollars go?” is:
The Emergency Shelter of the Fox Valley
The mission of the Emergency Shelter of the Fox Valley, Inc., is to provide temporary shelter to homeless individuals and families in a safe environment, while providing guidance to those both homeless and at-risk that promotes independence.
The Emergency Shelter of the Fox Valley was established in 1981 as a non-profit organization to provide homeless men, women, and children safe shelter. Our current facility currently can house adult men, adult women and families not to exceed 75 total residents.
The Emergency Shelter of the Fox Valley serves any homeless individuals regardless of their city, county or state of origin providing they adhere to our admission criteria. All residents fall below the federal poverty guidelines for income.
The Emergency Shelter of the Fox Valley celebrates its 30th Anniversary this year. We invite all interested community members to attend our Annual Report to the Community meeting on Tuesday, March 23, 2010. More details and registration information are available at under “Upcoming Events” on our website: www.emergencyshelterfoxvalley.org. You may also contact Jill Mitchler, the Emergency Shelter’s Fund Development and Volunteer Coordinator, at 734-9603 or jillmitchler@esfv.org. “It is in the shelter of each other that people live.” Irish proverb.
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Posted ( admin) in Mission on January-28-2010 |
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During the Presbytery meeting at DePere First United on February 13th, their Family Ministries Program is holding a Family Adventure Day in which they will be assembling hygiene kits.
Please consider bringing supplies to the Presbytery meeting so that even more kits can be assembled.
Collect items locally and bring them to the February 13th Presbytery Meeting in DePere. Let’s see how much we can gather.
ACCEPTING ONLY THESE ITEMS:
· Hand towels (approximately 16″ x 28″)
· Washcloths
· Wide-tooth combs
· Nail clippers (NO files or emery boards)
· Bath size bars of soap (in wrapper)
· Toothbrushes (in original packaging)
· Band Aid strips or other adhesive strips
· Monetary donations are always welcome
When the earthquake struck Haiti, a 40-foot container was immediately prepared with hygiene and baby kits and sent to the Dominican Republic for transport into Haiti. Kits have already been distributed.
When very large quantities of kits are sent, few to no kits are available for the next disaster. We understand that the shipment to Haiti completely depleted both warehouses of hygiene kits and baby kits. Therefore, the kits that are being prepared now will allow kits to be available for immediate shipment to other disasters and/or available for additional shipments to Haiti.
A recent report from Church World Service indicates delivery of the following number of kits for response to the Haiti earthquake:
January 22, 2010, air-freight shipment arrived in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, contained 1,125 baby kits, 10,595 hygiene kits, 500 lightweight CWS blankets.
Two shipments are scheduled to arrive in Santo Domingo on February 2, 2010. One shipment will contain 375 baby kits, 13,325 hygiene kits, 500 light-weight CWS blankets. The other shipment will contain 3,150 baby kits, 7,215 hygiene kits, 2,950 lightweight CWS blankets.
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