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Third Sunday after the Epiphany Christ, the Fulfillment of the Good News  The lectionary is quite intentional in beginning today’s passage with the empowerment of the Holy Spirit and ending this section before the conflict ahead. One must contemplate the intentionality of Luke’s portrayal of Jesus’ identity and his purpose before escalating to the implications […]

Washington, D.C.—CWS today expressed alarm and disappointment in response to the abrupt and sweeping freeze of funding for U.S. foreign assistance, which will cause immediate harm to millions of people who are served by these vital programs around the world. This includes funding for critical services provided to refugees resettled to the United States, as well as humanitarian assistance for ... Read More

Anastasios Yannoulatos, Archbishop of Tirana, Durrës, and All Albania, died in Athens, Greece, on 25 January 2025 at age 95.

The Church of the Brethren Mission and Ministry Board expresses grave concern for those across the country who are of migrant, immigrant, or refugee status who may be under threat of deportation following recent presidential executive orders. These renewed threats of deportation are already affecting the lives of many in our denomination’s congregations.

Greetings as we enter this year of 2025. With these new beginnings, our thoughts bring memories of the past, evaluating our present, and looking forward to the newness of life where God is leading us as individuals and as the church. It is not an easy time, and loss and grief are a part of this process.

The temperature on the thermometer read two degrees below zero as hundreds of Anabaptists of all persuasions (and garb) gathered for worship the evening of Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025, at College Mennonite Church in Goshen, Ind. It was 500 years to the day after a small group of believers met in a private home in Zurich to study scripture together and perform baptisms, an event considered the beginning of the Anabaptist movement.

El programa de Pastor a Medio-Tiempo; Iglesia a Tiempo Completo ofrecerá un nuevo estudio en formación espiritual con la acompañante del camino (Circuit Rider) Mayra Calix a fines de febrero 2025.

Marcia Sowles has joined the Church of the Brethren’s Office of Peacebuilding and Policy in Washington, D.C., volunteering as a Policy and Governmental Affairs associate. She will primarily focus on immigration policy by also providing legal expertise on related issues.

[Episcopal News Service] A growing number of Episcopal bishops are speaking out in response to the Trump administration’s threat to fulfill a campaign promise of mass deportations of undocumented immigrants, possibly including raids in churches and other places that previous presidents had deemed off-limits for such enforcement. Arizona Bishop Jennifer Reddall, in a newspaper op-ed and in a recent radio interview, has opposed border enforcement officers making arrests in churches. She also specified that family separations are among the diocese’s biggest concerns since President Donald Trump took office this week. “In our congregations, we’re worried about how these [policies] are going to be enforced,” Reddall said in her interview with KJZZ-FM. “There are norms that say you don’t invade churches to arrest people, but those are just norms. … We aren’t sure if we’re going to be targeted.” New York Bishop Matthew Heyd raised similar concerns Jan. 24 at a news conference of interfaith leaders at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. Later in the day, the two bishops of the dioceses of Massachusetts and Western Massachusetts released a joint statement voicing support for Washington Bishop Mariann Budde’s post-inauguration sermon, in which she called on President Donald Trump to show mercy to immigrants and their families. Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe also underscored the church’s long-time support for respecting the dignity of immigrants. Rowe, in a joint Jan. 21 letter with House of Deputies President Julia Ayala Harris, affirmed “Christ’s call to welcome the stranger” in the face of the new administration’s shift in policies. Trump, in the hours after his Jan. 20 inauguration to a second term, issued a barrage of executive orders, many of them aiming to limit both legal and illegal immigration in the United States. He declared a national emergency on the U.S.-Mexico border, which is experiencing the fewest number of illegal crossings in four years after a surge earlier in the Biden administration. Trump sought to selectively end birthright citizenship in the United States, a right protected by the Constitution. He suspended the country’s 45-year-old program of refugee resettlement, which has long enjoyed bipartisan support. He reinstated a policy from his first term that required asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico for their cases to be heard. In addition, the Department of Homeland Security issued directives reversing Biden administration policies that avoided immigration enforcement at “sensitive” or “protected” areas, including schools, hospitals and houses of worship. Ending such protections “curtails our liberties, upends our civic tradition and makes all New Yorkers less safe,” Heyd said at the news conference in New York, according to a written summary of his remarks. “Invading school classrooms, library read-alongs and our sacred spaces makes no sense. So today, we’re calling on all New Yorkers to join a coalition of care and welcome; that together, we continue our traditions of caring and welcoming everybody and making New York better.” The Diocese of New York is among several Episcopal dioceses that have adopted policies enabling their churches to offer sanctuary to immigrants who fear arrests because of their legal status. Other dioceses with similar policies in place include Chicago, Los Angeles, San Diego and Washington. Some cities have taken parallel actions, declaring themselves “sanctuary cities.” That designation indicates local officials will not enforce immigration laws, which they deem solely the responsibility of the federal government. The Trump administration has threatened federal prosecution of state and local officials who adhere to such policies. Like sanctuary cities, sanctuary dioceses now are considering how best to prepare for possible immigration enforcement actions in their communities and congregations. “Since 2016, we have been a sanctuary diocese,” Los Angeles Bishop John Harvey Taylor said in a Jan. 21 message to his Southern California diocese. “That means it is up to each of us to make a sanctuary in our heart for immigrant workers and their families, especially workers of color, and, if we are so called, to provide concrete assistance, including through political advocacy.” Budde also spoke to such concerns in her sermon Jan. 21 at Washington National Cathedral’s Service of Prayer for the Nation. Trump attended the service, and Budde addressed the last four minutes of her 15-minute sermon to him. “I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away,” Budde said. “Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land.” Budde’s sermon continues to make waves nationally and globally, as Trump and his supporters criticize her for what they saw as a personal “attack.” Many others, including her fellow bishops, have thanked Budde for upholding Christian and American values at such a polarized and uncertain moment. “One of the many vows bishops make at ordination is a promise ‘to defend those who have no helper,’” Massachusetts Bishop Julia Whitworth and Western Massachusetts Bishop Douglas Fisher said in their Jan. 24 statement in support of Budde. “Bishop Budde pointed out that many of our neighbors are ‘scared now’ – immigrants and refugees, those who identify as LGBTQ+,” Whitworth and Fisher said. “They need our non-violent defense. They need us to stand beside them and proclaim the inherent dignity of every human being. They need us to hold the vision of God’s dream for the world in which there is room at the table for everyone.” – David Paulsen is a senior reporter and editor for Episcopal News Service based in Wisconsin. He can be reached at dpaulsen@episcopalchurch.org.

KING OF PRUSSIA, PA (ABNS 1/24/25)—American Baptist Home Mission Societies (ABHMS) is pleased to announce that the Rev. Dr. A. Roy Medley, general secretary emeritus of American Baptist Churches USA (ABCUSA), is the 2025 recipient of the prestigious Edwin T. Dahlberg Peace and Justice Award. The award will be presented formally during the ABCUSA Biennial […]

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