Mission Network Contact List

The World Mission office has released a new Mission Network Contact list.  If you are interested in getting more connected with mission efforts in a particular country or region, please contact someone on the list in that area and ask them to send you some information.  They’d be glad to help.  You may also find information on the PC (USA) website: http://gamc.pcusa.org/ministries/global/.

Click here to view and download the list.

This Month on Mission Crossroads

This month on Mission Crossroads, we Pray the Way in our new podcast featuring Mary Nebelsick, mission co-worker in the Philippines since 2001; Marilyn Borst, Co-convener of the Syria-Lebanon Mission Network and Associate Director for Partnership Development of The Outreach Foundation.  Download the podcast at: http://www.missioncrossroads.org/podcast.htm

We also discuss issues of cross-cultural communication in our downloadable webinar – Bridge the Gap! Featuring Mark Wright, a PC (USA) Mission Co-Worker in Honduras, Stan Wythe, the Associate Director for the Presbyterian Frontier Fellowship, and Bruce Whearty, a former Co-worker in the South Pacific and Ethiopia and now working for Presbyterian World Mission. Download the webinar at: http://www.missioncrossroads.org/webinars.htm

Don’t forget to sign up for the Mission Crossroads interactive community, a social network for Presbyterian Mission Advocates and Leaders. Sign up for free and find out more at: http://missioncrossroads.ning.com/?xgi=3fgSd8j

A message from our YAV Office

The deadline to apply to serve with the Young Adult Volunteer program is January 20, 2011—only a few months away!  Young Adults will be placed in one of 16 sites—10 of which are in the U.S., and 6 of which are abroad.  Young Adult Volunteers serve for one year with the PC (USA), serving with either national or global partners.  Placements vary according to both the needs of the community where the YAV is placed, and the interests and skills of the Young Adult.  Each site focuses on the church’s unique response to the world’s needs, including Presbyterian World Mission’s 3 Critical Global Issues.  Young Adults also focus on vocational discernment and intentional community, both with other Young Adult Volunteers with whom they are placed, and with their new community, with whom they are placed for the year.  Sites and descriptions are listed at www.pcusa.org/yav.

The YAV program is currently offering scholarships for young adults who are highly qualified and called to mission service, and who otherwise may not consider the program for financial reasons.  The scholarship money is also available for those who are currently under-represented in the YAV program, especially people of color.  The YAV program hopes to better represent the PC (USA) as a whole by encouraging a diverse group of young adults to apply for the program.  For more information about scholarships, contact Shannon Langley, coordinator for the Young Adult and National Volunteer Office (Shannon.Langley@pcusa.org).

The YAV program focuses on transformation — transformation of the young adults who serve, the communities where they serve, congregations which support them, and the PC (USA) as a whole. “The Young Adult Volunteer Program of the PC (USA) completely changed my life,” says Mamie Broadhurst, who is currently serving with her husband, Richard Williams, as a mission co-worker in Colombia.  “My year [as a YAV in Guatemala] was one in which I truly saw what it meant to be part of an international family of Christians and in which I deepened my understanding of social justice as an outpouring of the beliefs I held about God and about Christ’s ministry.  I went from being the girl who left church at college only to visit on rare occasions, to someone who was more deeply connected to the church and willing to bear with it through good times and through bad because of the experience I had under its wings in Guatemala.”