Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect. For by the grace given to me I say to
everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. Romans 12:2-3

General Assembly starts this week, with a brief opening plenary session which can be viewed online tomorrow (Tuesday), at 8 am Mountain Time—that means 7 am Pacific Time. Because this year’s format has committee meetings on Zoom, the beginning of GA seems kind of quiet, so I ask that you take a moment to pray for our commissioners, Melinda Forbes and Deidra Goulding, and for all the people participating in the decision-making of the GA. Melinda, Deidra, and I will be going to Salt Lake City this coming Saturday, and will return on the 4^th of July, but they are doing the hard work! You can follow the GA, and watch the online meetings, at https://ga-pcusa.org/.

GA gives folks a glimpse into the essence of the Presbyterian Church (USA). It is, of course, the gathering of individuals from across the denomination, chosen by the Holy Spirit through the voice of the presbyteries to discern together the will of God for this church. For many, it is the first time they see the breadth and depth of the PC(USA)’s commitments to action in the world. It has been the most dramatic demonstration of our rules of governance, used at times to guide us, or distorted by the adversarial intentions of those seeking power in the church. And, it is a big family reunion.

I am astounded at how many hours are put into this event every other year, especially by volunteers. The Committee on the Office of the General Assembly (COGA), Advisory Committee on the Constitution (ACC), and the host presbytery are among volunteers who put in countless hours planning, reviewing, advising, and taking care of an infinite number of details to ensure that those who participate in GA are taken care of. This is topped by the huge number of hours each GA commissioner and advisory delegate puts into their work—not only the long hours of meetings for almost two weeks, but the many hours of preparation, reading all the overtures and reports presented to each GA, and learning whatever technology platform will be used at GA to interact and vote.

One of the most important tenets of GA is the role of the commissioners—those ruling and teaching elders who are elected by every presbytery to come and vote on the various issues that need to be considered. The commissioners are being entrusted to discern the will of God for the whole church, so they are not representing the concerns of their presbytery, or their own personal views. As with every level of the PC(USA), we believe that the best way to discern the will of God is for the people of God to gather with prayer and humility, seeking to hear God’s wisdom through each other’s voices. We believe in corporate discernment—that is, we all have a bit of God’s wisdom, so as we are gathered, we have a better chance of hearing more of that wisdom as a body. That is perhaps thebiggest challenge for leaders new to the PC(USA), that we do not consider any individual to have all the wisdom, so we consult with others for nearly any decision.

And people take this responsibility incredibly seriously. I was blessed to help coordinate a prayer room for the 218^th General Assembly, held in San Jose, California, in 2008. For those who remember his presence with us, this was the GA when Bruce Reyes-Chow was elected Moderator of the denomination. (Another more familiar name is Ruth Santana-Grace, my predecessor as Executive Presbyter of San Gabriel Presbytery—Ruth is current Co-Moderator.)

The 2008 GA was marked with great conflict. While we don’t have the same overt conflict nowadays, we are always at risk of creating new conflict—or going too far because those who might have given needed constraint have felt marginalized enough to be afraid to speak. But I believe that the conflict arises not out of malice but different understandings of how to follow God’s direction.

Back to 2008. I was on staff of San Francisco Theological Seminary, used to set up a prayer room for every GA. At San Jose, we set up quiet spaces for people to pray and meditate, and there was a wall where people could write prayers on index cards and post. Because I dismantled the prayer wall, I ended up with the prayer cards, and it was so moving to read the prayers of so many folks:

• prayers for loved ones they had to leave at home,
• prayers for healing for friends needing peace,
• prayers of confession,
• prayers of thanksgiving,
• prayers for the openness to accept the Holy Spirit’s work through the GA,
• prayers for grace for each other as they discuss challenging

See the next pages for a handful of the almost 150 prayer cards that were written at that GA.

I have no doubt that this year’s commissioners are just as prayerful as they begin their deliberations. So again, I ask that you pray for Deidra and Melinda and all the commissioners, advisory delegates, and all who work at GA and those who will be impacted by the decisions they make.

Peace,

Wendy

The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it,
the world, and those who live in it. Psalm 24:1

This last Saturday was our June Presbytery meeting and annual Day of Service, and I thought I’d share a few highlights.

The meeting lasted almost exactly one hour as planned, but several important actions and updates were included. As I mentioned last week, we have lost several Presbytery members in recent weeks; we were saddened to learn that Rev. John Najarian, former pastor of Claremont Presbyterian Church, had died on April 11. As we said farewell to several beloved friends and colleagues, we also saw several new faces at the meeting and Day of Service, including several folks from Interwoven New Worshiping Community.

At the meeting, we voted to receive Rev. Trina Zelle, who has settled in Pasadena in her retirement. Trina has had extensive and varied experience in ministry, including pastoral ministry and community justice work. She has volunteered to help wherever the Presbytery needs her, and she has much to offer! The Administrative Commission for St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church completed their work, with thanks from the Presbytery. Rev. Ally Lee is transferring to Greater Atlanta Presbytery, where she is serving as Interim Pastor of Fayette Presbyterian Church in Fayetteville, Georgia. Sam Bang has resigned as CRE Co-Pastor for Northminster, and Rev. Charlie Campbell is continuing as half-time Pastor focusing on worship. And Rev. Elizabeth Wang’s installation as Pastor of First Presbyterian Church, Altadena, was approved for Sunday, July 21, at 2 pm.

Arcadia Community Church, whose corporation name is Arcadia Presbyterian Church, has taken on a new name for their ministry, Journey Community Church, reflecting both their mission statement “Welcoming people on a spiritual journey to become fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ,” and the regional reach of their ministry.

San Gabriel Presbytery and San Fernando Presbytery are co-hosting an International Peacemaker, Frances Namoumou from Fiji. She will be in Southern California September 19-25, 2024, and comes with expertise in Climate Justice and Ecological Stewardship, and Disaster and Displacement Management. She speaks English, so does not need a translator. She is open to meet with folks to do Bible Study and education on the impacts of climate change. If you are interested in having her speak, contact Wendy Gist at gist.wendy@gmail.com.

We heard an excellent presentation by Carmella France of Door of Hope, recipient of this meeting’s offering. Door of Hope is one of the few shelters that can house full families in private apartments, and they are preparing to open a fifth shelter soon. They also have done excellent work in helping people stay in their homes. Carmella reported that they invest on average $5,000 to help a family keep their home with back rent and access to community resources; this is a bargain compared to the cost of over $100,000 to reestablish a family if they are already homeless. If you would still like to give, you can do so at https://sangabpres.org/donate/ until the end of June.

Mona Morales Recalde gave some encouraging updates from the Gabrieleno Tongva San Gabriel Band of Mission Indians, including the quick trip to the White House for the signing of the expansion of the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument. Mona acknowledged the relationship between San Gabriel Presbytery and the tribe that has continued since 1940, and offered the first verse of Psalm 24 to reflect our oneness as God’s children on God’s land.

Rev. Harlan Redmond shared a brief update on the partnership with Habitat for Humanity at Baldwin Park; the hope is that major construction will begin this fall. And he reported that the Eagle Rock/Interwoven Administrative Commission approved the first phase of renovation work, to totally renovate the preschool building at Eagle Rock. The theme of restoration continued after the meeting at Huhuugna, the site that is the first sovereign land for the Tongva people since Westerners moved in. About a dozen workers from Knox, Claremont, San Marino, Westminster Pasadena, and Interwoven helped to clear the land of invasive species, and learned a great deal from tribal members with extensive knowledge, both native and Western, on botany, fire management, and care of the land. It was a blessing to visit the land, which has many well-established oak trees, a building that will be used for meetings and education of Native culture, and space for ceremonies and celebrations of the tribe. It was moving to hear the coordinator say how important it is that for the first time in centuries, they can gather as a people without having to rent space or ask permission from someone else to meet. A young man from Interwoven was greatly honored when he realized that he was contributing to the restoration of the land that he had learned about in school, the first land given back to the first people of Los Angeles.

Many folks from El Monte Community, West Covina Community Fellowship, Emmanuel Hispanic, Praise, Calvary, Westminster Pasadena, Pasadena, Trinity, Live Oak, and throughout the Presbytery put together hygiene kits, including encouraging notes, for LA General Medical Center, and went through several boxes of memorabilia for Trinity Presbyterian Church, finding some important documents and photos!

As it happens, I preached at La Verne Heights Presbyterian Church yesterday, and got to see the progress they are making on a major renovation of their fellowship hall and office building. La Verne Heights is also the church who counts among their members Mona Recalde and other members of the Tongva tribe, and Samantha Johnson, the Tongva land coordinator, expressed appreciation for being in the Presbyterian church. It is good to witness forms of restoration on their campus.

This Wednesday, June 19^th, is Juneteenth. Juneteenth marks the eventual end of slavery in the United States, in 1865. And June is Pride Month for the LGBTQIA community. Days like Juneteenth and Father’s Day and Pride Month, and even days like our Day of Service, give witness to the perseverance of God’s people seeking human rights, freedom from fear and oppression, care for our loved ones, and faithfulness to God’s will for God’s people and all of Creation.

May we continue to glimpse and nurture God’s kin-dom of mutual care for each other and the land we inhabit. Thank God for San Gabriel Presbytery.

Peace.

Wendy

The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom;
like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly,
and rejoice with joy and singing. Isaiah 35:1-2a

We have another Presbytery meeting, and our annual Day of Service, coming up this Saturday. We are asking everyone to REGISTER for the meeting and especially the Day of Service. There are some details especially for the people who will be working with the Tongva Taraxat Paxaavxa Conservancy which will help our hosts better plan for us.

Even though the business meeting will be short, the day will still touch on varied events in the life of our Presbytery. The title of this reflection—Ancestors, Children, Servants—was my attempt to sum up the common threads as I look ahead to the day.

First of all, we have many ancestors to remember. Most immediately, it seems that God has opened the window for many of our beloved to pass on to heaven. Just this last week, I heard that we have lost two minister members of San Gabriel Presbytery, Rev. Pat Williams and Rev. Dale Morgan; the mother of staff member Wendy Gist; and Dave Weber, a long-time and beloved member and former clerk of session for Shepherd of the Valley Presbyterian Church.

We also have the transitioning of congregations and church properties. We will receive the final report from the Administrative Commission for St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church, as they made final donations to several nonprofit agencies, and an update on the plans for redevelopment of the Eagle Rock Presbyterian Church property. While it is not final enough for presentation to the Presbytery, we are also revising and renewing agreements for our fellowship in West Covina with International Theological Seminary and two partner churches. In God’s resurrection economy, these actions of generosity, vision, and partnership grew out of the closure of three churches—St. Andrew’s, South Hills in Pomona, and Community West Covina—and the decision of the Presbytery to make a major investment in the Eagle Rock church property, with the hope of creating a new community center and worship space for Interwoven new worshiping community. There certainly is new life springing forth in these spaces, with the St. Andrew’s property continuing to be used as a preschool, Interwoven at Eagle Rock seems to have a new baby appear nearly every month, and at West Covina, pastors are being taught for ministry here and around the world, including a plan for ITS to begin offering MDiv classes for domestic as well as international students. Since ITS is an ATS-accredited seminary with Reformed roots and tuition that costs a fraction of that of other local seminaries, this will be a boon for us as we welcome new pastors in training, starting with an online Polity class taught in Spanish by our own Amy Mendez.

In our Presbytery meeting we plan to receive Rev. Trina Zelle, the former director of PHEWA (Presbyterian Health, Education and Welfare Association) and an old friend to several of us—and she has great energy to serve! And in the Day of Service, we will continue with our tradition of assembling hygiene kits for patients at Los Angeles General Medical Center (formerly LAC+USC Medical Center) who are released to homelessness, as well as helping our host church, Trinity Presbyterian, sort through artifacts of the history of the church.

Several of us will be going to the first land in Los Angeles County owned by the Tongva community in over 200 years, an acre in Altadena that will be restored to native flora with a house that will eventually be used as a gathering place and cultural education center. Talk about ancestors! We are blessed to have a relationship with the first peoples of this land where we all dwell, going back at least several decades, when Cheryl Prentice welcomed the Tongva tribe to have their headquarters at La Casa de San Gabriel. Leaders of the tribe were just recently at the White House, to witness a proclamation expanding the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument with protection for land with significant cultural and sacred importance to the Indigenous peoples in this area. Wendy Gist reminds us that we were advocating for the establishment of the Monument with the “San Gabriel Mountains Forever” campaign several years ago, and it is growing to be an even more profound act of honor for our Indigenous hosts, and stewardship of the land. It is another sign of God’s penchant for new life that the Tongva people’s care and deep knowledge of the land is now being recognized and sought after in this time of climate change and wildfires.

Ancestors, Children, Servants.

In this coming weekend, the weekend of Father’s Day and the weekend before Juneteenth, may we give thanks for ancestors on this land, for ancestors of the faith for our Presbytery family, and ancestor churches whose legacies are fueling new ministries in the future.

May we look to the future marked by our abiding faith in God’s generosity. May we give thanks to God with a willingness to commit our efforts, resources, and hopes to emerging generations of pastoral leaders, new ministries and faith communities, and young families, as well as children of God who are sick and without sufficient shelter. 

And let us be responsive to God’s call for service. Let us give thanks for new friends and on-going partners in ministry as we serve together. We hope to welcome Trina and her husband Phil Reller, a UCC pastor, as well as a few Interwoven members coming to the Day of Service and maybe even their first Presbytery meeting.  

There are so many ways to honor ancestors, care for God’s children, and serve. I look forward to seeing you and serving with you this Saturday, and I pray for a joyous Father’s Day for all on Sunday.

Peace,

Wendy

“Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man.” Luke 6:22

June is upon us, and soon we will have our Presbytery meeting and Day of Service on June 15^th (please make sure to REGISTER today!), and Father’s Day on June 16^th. Since next week will be focused on the Presbytery meeting, I hope you will indulge me as I share a story about my father, Ted Tajima, who happened to be a very regular elder commissioner to this presbytery from First Presbyterian Church, Altadena. My sister Elaine is developing an art exhibit that gives a brief glimpse into individual lives, and Dad’s is one of them. And as we look ahead to General Assembly later this month, I will get to worship at the Japanese Church of Christ in Salt Lake City, a church my grandfather built in the town where my father was born. 

Ted K. Tajima taught at Alhambra High School for 35 years. I always thought how wonderful that he had a job he loved so much that he’d keep it all those years. I tried to find a job I could stay in my whole life, but couldn’t find it (at least not until I went into the ministry). One day I told my father how I wish I could find a lifelong job that I loved like he did. Dad replied in a somewhat disgusted voice, “I never wanted to be a teacher. I wanted to be a journalist. But teaching was the only job I could get, and then we had you four girls, so I had to stay.”

Mom and Dad were young adults during World War II. Both were born in the United States, and as far as I can tell, neither had never stepped foot out of the country, yet in 1942 they and all Japanese Americans on the West Coast were treated as enemy aliens and forcibly evacuated. Because Dad’s father was a pastor (he was pastor of what is now First Presbyterian Church, Altadena), he was able to arrange to send my father and his siblings far enough east, so they did not go into the camps. My mother, whose father had just passed away, was sent with her family to Gila River Camp in Arizona. My mother took the initiative to apply for a program that allowed her to leave the camp, to work as a domestic for a wealthy family near Cleveland, Ohio. She arranged for jobs for her family and friends, and for her boyfriend (my father), so my whole family was in Cleveland at the end of the war. My grandfather even started a Japanese church while they were there, and my parents married in Cleveland. But when the war ended, they all returned to Los Angeles. 

My father worked for the Army, teaching Japanese (and then English) to soldiers going to occupy Japan. He then got a Master’s degree in Journalism. His communication skills were excellent. His writing was easy and evocative, and his bass voice was the envy of broadcasters and preachers alike. But, by 1948, he had a wife, a baby, and no job prospects in journalism for a Japanese-American, so he took my mother’s advice and became a public school teacher. He taught English at Alhambra High School, and he developed the school paper, The Moor, into a national award-winning weekly.

Whether or not Dad wanted to stay at Alhambra, he did, and according to hundreds of his students— many of whom went into journalism themselves—he transformed lives. My cousin Renée, an Oscar- nominated documentary filmmaker, has said that wherever she goes, someone will come up to her and ask if she’s related to Ted. Upon his death, his obituary ran on the front page of the “California” section of the Los Angeles Times, and was run again in the year-end review.

Dad was especially known for encouraging working-class kids to go to college, and several became outstanding leaders in their professions. So, it has been a fitting tribute to have a high school named for him. Alliance Ted K. Tajima High School in downtown LA has just been rated in the top 2% of all public high schools in the United States. 97% of their students graduate and 95% are accepted into college, while 92% are on the free lunch program and most are the first in their families to attend college. Like so many fellow Presbyterians, Dad was a big believer in the transformative power of education. Like his pastor father, Dad also believed in responding to Christ’s call for justice, especially for those who have been persecuted.

Dad didn’t achieve his dream of becoming a journalist. So instead, he helped countless students achieve more than they ever dreamed of. And now, I am thrilled to hear teachers of working-class, mostly immigrant Latin teenagers talk about their “Tajima Family” and know that our family now includes hundreds of families whose futures are being changed in the name of my father.

I hope you have stories to share of your father, or one who has been like a father to you. And may we all find—and share—hope and empowerment in the name of our heavenly father, who makes us one in Christ’s family.

Happy Father’s Day in advance,

Wendy

[The Lord said,] “Come, let us go down, and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand one another’s speech.” Genesis 11:7

In these times when it seems easier to divide than to connect, I’ve noticed how even when we speak to each other, even when we think we’re speaking the same language, we might say the same word, but mean very different things. So the confusion that was injected into the human experience after the Tower of Babel has become quite insidious, because we don’t even realize that we are envisioning different concepts when speaking to each other. How can we understand each other when we don’t know all the different experiences, perspectives, and word views we bring to each interaction?

Take, for instance, the brave conversations that have been happening around the United States about race issues. I feel that folks have made significant progress in our efforts to eradicate racism, and one sign of that progress is our ability to talk more openly about race and racism. But the word “racism” or, even more anxiety-producing, “racist” causes a visceral reaction in some folks that often stops the conversation. I confess that in my cynicism, my initial thought was that the reaction was a useful way to defend against a difficult discussion. But the pain is quite evident and sincere for many folks, and my current theory is that we define “racist” differently. It reminds me of how we don’t like to talk about “sin” in church, though especially as Reformed Christians, we are very aware of our sinfulness.

Some of us think of sin as the intentional, malicious act of an individual, or worse, the evil character of that individual. This is why we are so troubled by the idea of innocent babies being born into sin. Church leaders try to address this by defining sin not as an intentional act but just “missing the mark” or being imperfect. More frequently, we just stop talking about sin altogether. Personally, I believe we are born into sin by virtue of being born into a broken world, and so we are infected by the brokenness of the world long before we can defend ourselves against it. Worse, we are told that the broken world is not broken, so our perceptions are distorted from the start.

In a similar way, some people understand racism to be the intentional, malicious actions of individuals who hate other individuals. But others think of racism as a systemic illness, an example of the brokenness of the world which impacts us from birth. For most of us, we do not choose the prejudices we pick up out of the fears of the people or media around us—and we certainly don’t choose whether we are born into privilege or marginalization. But, as with other challenges or privileges that are thrust upon us, we learn to be responsible with the cards we are dealt.

Lately, we have all been shocked by the catastrophic violence that has occurred in Israel and Palestine, especially on and after October 7, 2023. For myself, I have also been mystified by the reactions to the conflicts in the United States, including the conflicts on college campuses. Our Education, Equipping, and Empowerment Committee (EEE) decided to offer the “God’s Word in God’s Land” seminar as a way of addressing what some pastors were seeing in our churches. It was a revelation for me, because I did not realize there were so many people in our Presbyterian churches who follow the theory that the current nation of Israel must be protected at all costs—including at the cost of Palestinian lives—in order to fulfill a prophecy about the return of Christ. In the first hour of the seminar, Dr. Dennis Okholm addressed the difference between the dispensationalism of what is now considered the Evangelical church (that’s another term that has meant different things!), and what he called the “amillenial” belief of Presbyterians (some might talk more about “covenant theology”—or maybe I’m still confused; I always swore I would never use the word “eschatology” in my ministry).

In the planning for the event, the word “Zionism” kept coming up, and at least for me it became a cause for confusion, because that word is used to describe many different things. Interestingly, the word was not used much in the “God’s Word in God’s Land” seminar, but Dr. Tommy Givens instead discussed the ways the name “Israel” references different peoples.

But Zionism seems to raise fear and anxiety for many, and in different ways. I have mentioned the Israeli-Palestinian Joint Memorial Day event, held on Israel’s Memorial Day, when Israelis remember those who gave their lives defending the present state of Israel. After the event, there was a Zoom webinar with two peace activists, one Israeli and one Palestinian: Maoz Inon, whose parents were killed on October 7^th, and Musa Juma‘a, a doctor born and raised in Jerusalem who lost an aunt and eight cousins in the current violence in Gaza. A week later, Maoz Inon and another Palestinian peace activist, Aziz Abu Sarah, met with Pope Francis, and the Pope signed a letter they brought from 250 peace organizations calling on the G7 nations “to working together multilaterally – and with other international partners – to . . . build the foundations necessary for a negotiated and lasting Israeli- Palestinian peace.” The embrace they shared offered more hope than any of the words spoken.

As with many major actions for peace, the road is not straight. During the Zoom meeting with Mr. Inon and Mr. Juma‘a, the chat was mostly supportive and positive, but then some disagreement arose about Zionism. It was disturbing to me that even in this hard-fought effort to build peace between Palestinians and Israelis, disagreement rose up. But as I reflect on this, I believe that the way of understanding and peace does not come from a lack of disagreement, but the practice of communicating disagreement as a way of learning and broadening our understanding. As St. Francis of Assisi prayed,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

There are so many points of confusion and disagreement in this broken world. But that means there are that many opportunities for communication and understanding—and perhaps that communication and understanding will lead to mutual compassion, respect, upbuilding, and maybe even peace. St. Francis was also quoted as saying, “Preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words.” Sometimes we can come to an understanding through a mutual hug, or by working together. That is the purpose behind our annual Day of Service, which will be held on June 15^th this year. I hope you will join us, and as we work side by side, we come to appreciate each other beyond the words we speak.

Praying for peace,

Wendy