Connecting our Conversations

Recorded in December of 2021 as the Omicron variant of Covid-19 was surging in New England, the Rev. Mieke Vandersall and Matt Beams share about the strange blessings of the pandemic and their worshipping community, Not So Churchy, whose participation has nearly doubled as they shifted to a virtual community, welcoming people from all over the country.  How did the Queering of Things inform how this community navigates the pandemic? What does it mean to Queer the Church? Let's find out: "Come on in, the water's fine!"

Advent is a season of waiting, of darkness, of anticipation. In this Advent season of 2021, PSNE Communications Manager, Erika Plank Hagan, talks with the Rev Dr. Terrlyn Curry Avery, Pastor of Martin Luther King Jr. Community Church in Springfield, MA, near the one-year anniversary of the hate crime where their building was destroyed in a fire, and about how that community is looking forward and not backward to their new ministry in the world.
As our church moves into 2022 after two years of pandemic and unrest - can we also look forward toward the unexpected?

Presbyterian clergy are ordained to a call - a vocational calling. PSNE Communications Manager, Erika Plank Hagan, talks with three of our Presbytery's newest ordained clergy, the Rev. Dale Green, the Rev. Jessica Jones, and the  Rev. Grace Woodward, on their calls to chaplaincy during the Covid-19 pandemic and its fallout.

How has God prepared us for *this* moment? What can we learn from ministering to the sick and vulnerable and those who care for them, and can we apply any of it to our churches as we come out of this pandemic season?

Season 2, Episode 2: No Justice No Peace - Confessional Interactive Art at FPC New Haven.

PSNE Communications Manager, Erika Plank Hagan, talks with the Rev. J.C. Cadwallader, Pastor and Head of Staff at First Presbyterian Church, New Haven.

When it became apparent that FPC New Haven wouldn’t be worshipping together at the church Fall 2020 due to the continued spread of coronavirus, leadership began thinking about how they could use their space to share their faith. This moment coincided with the protests of racial injustice across our country following the deaths of George Floyd – a Black man killed by a White police officer – and Breonna Taylor – a Black woman killed by White police officers in her home, among many others.
The resulting No Justice No Peace art installation is powerful, confessional, and interactive - and created both opportunities for relationship building and negotiating conflict in the local community.

PSNE Communications Manager, Erika Plank Hagan, talks with the Rev. Kevin White and Elder Nancy Boyd about the recent celebration of Calvin Presbyterian's 50th anniversary - made more complicated by Covid - and how the church's beginnings as two churches pivoting to become one church perhaps informs where we are now, pivoting into a post-Covid church world.

Our two Presbytery Commissioners to the 224th General Assembly, Walter Manual and Jenny Peek, hosted a Zoom conversation about the Assembly and some of its actions. They were also joined by PSNE Stated Clerk, David Baer, and Shannan Vance-Ocampo and Tom McNeill from our Presbytery who were corresponding members and resource persons to the Assembly.

  Anthony Trujillo, a good friend of our Presbytery, who is under care of the Presbytery of NYC is on the national PCUSA Native American Coordinating Committee and was also a corresponding member and resource person to the Assembly also joined us and shared about the specific important actions of the Assembly around Native American issues in the PCUSA.

  We also discussed some of the concerns around anti-racism that came up around the work of the Assembly.

A June 2, 2020 conversation with Jessica Vazquez-Torres of Crossroads Anti-Racism Training and Organizing about the why behind our summer book group, our anti-racism work as a Presbytery and what our explorations will and can be this summer.