“Where’s your church?” It’s an innocent question, usually prompting a geographical answer such as “At the corner of Moorpark Street and Colfax Avenue.” While that’s a standard answer, we in the PSWR’s Church in Society Committee take the prepositional phrase “in society” very seriously: we recognize we are called to be the church, the living Body of Christ, beyond the walls of any building.
Our 2021 MLK Scholarship Awardee Jaimyon Parker, a Graphic Design major, created our CIS logo with input from our Committee:
The benevolent blue wings of the Holy Spirit support a Green urban environment framed subtly with a cursive “CIS” (like eyeglasses to watch over us) while lifting up the DOC Chalice, all demonstrating our active, Spirit-led involvement in the world outside the church walls.
We achieve our mission by overseeing the annual PSWR Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebration (set for 21 January 2024), the MLK Jr. Scholarship, and the Disciple of the Year award. Additionally, CIS receives and reviews applications, then awards the PSWR Reconciliation and Camile Christian Church grants every year. CIS also promotes the Ecumenical Advocacy Days in Washington, DC, every April. (See below for links.)
This past year, our MLK Scholarship recipient Keshun Elijah Valentine of Abundant Life CC and a freshman member of a suburban college football team, faced some direct racial discrimination on campus from older folks in the area. In his scholarship application, he wrote: "I believe that this scholarship award can push me to further my education at this school and show the [suburban] community . . . that black men could succeed and perform at a high degree at a University such as [this]." We in CIS very well know the maxim of American poet Walt Whitman from “Song of the Open Road”:
(I and mine do not convince by arguments, similes, rhymes,
We convince by our presence.)
Keshun’s integrating presence beyond his church’s geographical home helps the campus transform and overcome racism, and we are proud to support him.
One of our Reconciliation grants went to BeLOVED CC, pastored by Rev. Dale Suggs, and helped support this important 3-part series:
In addition, after receiving a CIS Camile CC grant, Rev. Dr. Linda Barkman wrote:
“Thanks to God’s grace and to the Camile Christian Church Grant, the Christmas gift bag project for the women incarcerated at the California Institution for Women (CIW) prison in Chino, California, was a total success. Nine hundred sixty bags were delivered to the prison on Tuesday, December 20th. It has now been confirmed by correspondence from current CIW prisoners that the bags were actually distributed prior to Christmas, and that there were a sufficient number for each and every woman who was incarcerated at CIW on that date.
“Approximately fifty volunteers participated in the December 17, 2022, bag stuffing event. . . . [T]his year each bag also contained a Christmas postcard on which a handwritten message of care, hope, and respect had been individually written by a volunteer.” For many of the incarcerated women, this was the ONLY Christmas greeting they received, and CIS helped make it possible.
As you can see, the Church in Society Committee takes our outreach mission with delight as we spread the Gospel guided by the Holy Spirit, upon Whose wings we find support. So, where’s your church? We answer, “Wherever the Holy Spirit is present.”
For full information, applications, and submission dates, use these links: docpswr.org/grants-scholarships
https://advocacydays.org/ and cis@docpswr.org