The General Assembly planning team has announced the theme of next summer’s 227th General Assembly, which will take place online and at the Baird Center in Milwaukee from June 22 through July 2. The theme is “Persevering Toward Wholeness.” The guiding Scripture for the gathering will be Revelation 22:2, "and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations."
According to Kate Trigger Duffert, the director of General Assembly Planning and an associate stated clerk, the theme for each General Assembly is chosen by the Stated Clerk of the General Assembly through a discernment process that includes consultation with other church leaders, including in this case the Moderators of the 226th General Assembly, the Rev. CeCe Armstrong and the Rev. Tony Larson. The theme selection is also informed by the Stated Clerk’s relationships with mid councils, ecumenical partners, and others throughout the church and how those relationships shape the Stated Clerk’s perception of where the PC(USA) and where it is called to be.
Reflecting on this, the Rev. Jihyun Oh, Stated Clerk of the General Assembly and Executive Director of the Interim Unified Agency, said, “Since the last General Assembly, in conversations about the work the church is called to in this time, peace or wholeness in the fullest sense of the word continued to emerge as a way to hold all of the ways the broader denomination has been discerning our call.”
The theme of each General Assembly is intended to offer guidance to those tasked with organizing various components of the gathering, including members of the worship planning team as they develop meaning and reflective worship services, as well as Assembly planners charged with developing resources and messaging around the Assembly, including prayer guides, newsletters and online resources.
The theme will be present throughout the Assembly for consideration, reflection and discernment by participants as they engage in the business of the church. It also offers an opportunity for the larger denomination to participate in the Assembly by embracing the theme in their own contexts.
The theme reflects a desire to bring together the work of the church at large. Oh specifically lifted up racial justice, economic justice, gender justice and climate justice as crucial work to which the church is called.
Oh also highlighted the call to reflect on what it means to seek wholeness as a covenant community and to seek wholeness for the world as the church moves toward a fuller understanding of discipleship and Christian witness.
Duffert said part of the theme-selection process also involved recognizing the larger political and social context for the church and the need for encouragement. With fraught national and global politics and the rise of white Christian nationalism, Duffert said the theme offers reminders of the church’s need to persevere and stand in opposition to narratives of hate and isolation, and for communities to persevere in the face of brokenness, trusting in the promise that “we are in this together as the body of Christ.”
Finally, the theme and accompanying Scripture intentionally center nature imagery and the wholeness of God’s diverse Creation, recognizing that the complex realities of our time require all the components of ecological cultivation and health, including growth, pruning, healthy soil and controlled burning. This component of the theme was inspired by conversations with the Presbytery of Milwaukee, where seeking wholeness includes using land held by rural congregations to grow fresh food to support those in human-made food deserts.
“The Assembly theme provides a broad framework that undergirds the Assembly, inviting all those in the PC(USA) to consider what it means to be the church in this time and place,” Duffert said. “As the theme continues to be woven into the worship and practice of the Assembly, we will all be challenged to reflect on how the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is particularly called to persevere towards wholeness amidst a world that often feels fractured.”
Duffert added she is “grateful for the Clerk’s discernment and the input of the Moderators of the 226th General Assembly, as well as the witness of the larger church body, in influencing a theme which will provide a platform for being empowered in our ongoing reformation.”
Layton Williams Berkes, Communications Strategist, Interim Unified Agency (Click here to read original PNS Story)
Let us join in prayer for:
Amanda Craft, Manager, Immigration Advocacy, Mid Council Ministries, Interim Unified Agency
Octavia Craig, Treasury Assistant, Treasury Office & Central Receiving Services, Administrative Services Group
Let us pray:
Lord Jesus, thank you for answered prayer! Continue to provide for and bless us as we grow in faith. Amen.
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