Race Matters: SF Achievers Share Their Stories
Reverend Joann • June 28, 2020
Please join us for this online Calvary Adult Education program that focuses on the important work of San Francisco Achievers, one of Calvary Presbyterian Church’s non-profit partners, whose goal is to help close the opportunity gap for African American young men seeking to fulfill their potential through higher education. A panel of recent and soon-to-be college graduates from SF Achievers, who were mentored by Calvary congregants, will share their personal insights into the current events around Black Lives Matter and where we go from here. San Francisco Achievers mission is to support African American young men in San Francisco to lead and thrive in higher education and beyond by closing the opportunity gap.
SF Achievers does this through college scholarships, leadership training, and mentoring. The students benefit from a community of support that starts with staff and extends to volunteers, businesses, and nonprofits throughout the Bay Area. Studies show that African American men make up only about 5.5% of all college students, with only 1 in 6 graduating with a college degree. SF Achievers addresses these disparities through its programs: a skills development program in high schools; a Leadership Academy for selected high school seniors; and scholarships, mentoring, and other support for college students. For more information on AF Achievers: https://www.sfachievers.org/.
When bread is shared, this drab world regains its color. Little by little. This week we sit with the desert's own wisdom and ask what it means to rebuild steadily rather than wait to be rescued. And we will share Christ's bread and cup.
The hymn "How Great Thou Art" is well known and sung in many churches and in many languages. While the story of the hymn itself is interesting enough, how the hymn has helped faith get passed down from one generation to the next is also fascinating! Join us in worship as we sing this age-old song and as our youth share
It may be aged and worn, but the old hymn "What a Friend We Have in Jesus" has a story to tell! More than a sweet Sunday School song, this chestnut is planted in biblical narratives and calls us into an intimate theology of abiding love.
Kathleen Norris writes, “There is a powerful moment in any religious conversion… in which a person realizes that… it is nothing you have done, but it is all of one event, God’s being there, and being of help.” The author of the hymn, “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” concludes that God’s grace calls for “songs of lou
The hymns we sing in church have a theological and often biblical basis. “Holy, Holy, Holy,” one of the most familiar hymns to Presbyterians, takes language from Revelation. Revelation can be a confusing, difficult book, but the writer was responding to the crisis faced by first century Christians: Do we worship God,
What if the glory we're waiting for is already shining through us? Presbyterian trailblazer, Janie Spahr, preaches on Job's cosmos and Mark's mountain — where Transfiguration means seeing what was always true: dazzling glory, holy mountains, and the light hidden in ordinary flesh. Holy Communion.
Why do so many of us feel so much pressure to compete, judge, produce, win? The Parable of the Prodigal Son is about two sons. One son learns the hard way that he doesn’t have to earn his father’s love. The other son doesn’t get it. With which son do you identify?
God does not create for the sake of creating. Rather, God creates in order to enjoy, relate, connect, and abide in love with all that is created. Sabbath allows us to enjoy and rest in that love.
“Observe the Sabbath day, and keep it holy,” says Deuteronomy's version of the Ten Commandments. Does that sound like one more religious rule that’s too hard, or at least, too inconvenient, to take seriously? Or might an intentional break from our hectic lives be a path to freedom?
The "morning after" our country’s 250th, we turn to a similar would-be dynasty with its own ancient treasury scandal, arbitrary system of discrimination, and freewheeling corruption. As in Queen Esther's time, we live somewhere between our nation's promises and betrayals. And yet miracles still find us!