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An Ecumenical Ministry in the Parish of St Patrick's Catholic Church In San Diego USA

米国サンディエゴの聖パトリックカトリック教会教区におけるエキュメニカル宣教

Thursday, October 17, 2024

Rev. George Walker Smith interview (1999, Heart of San Diego)

Religious Leader and Civic Icon

In 1963, George Walker Smith became the first Black elected to office in San Diego County, serving on the San Diego Unified School Board of Education for 16 years (and was elected its president four times). One of his key accomplishments was initiating a diversity campaign, insisting that the district travel to the Historically Black Colleges to recruit Black teachers and educators.

George Walker Smith was born in 1928 in Haynesville, Alabama as the third of 11 children born to sharecroppers on one of the hundreds of plantations that continued to exist into the 1960’s. At a very young age, George learned two lessons that served him well throughout his life: (1) An education is needed to be successful; and (2) “following the tail of a mule” is not how life is supposed to be lived.

Always a strong student through primary school, he attended the Presbyterian boarding school Miller’s Ferry Institute where he played basketball, became student body president, and ultimately graduated valedictorian. He was also awarded a $100 scholarship to attend Knoxville College, majoring in chemistry and German. Knoxville College is where he met and married his beloved wife, the late Elizabeth Irene Hightower Smith. His goal of becoming a doctor was short-lived. Alabama’s laws prohibited Blacks from attending any state supported medical schools, so he took a job teaching science at Arlington Institute.

By the summer of 1953, George decided to become a Presbyterian minister. He had witnessed a great deal of prejudice and discrimination in the south and being a part of the clergy was another way to help humankind. Following George’s graduation from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in 1956, the Smith family, which now included their son Anthony, traveled to San Diego to start what would be known as Golden Hill Presbyterian Church. In 1981, Golden Hill and Brooklyn Heights Presbyterian Churches merged to form Christ United Presbyterian Church and Rev. Smith was called as its Pastor.

In 1970 he started the Catfish Club, a weekly lunch meeting on civic affairs which the San Diego Union-Tribune called “a mandatory stop for aspiring politicians, elected officials and the quiet power brokers in the city. “Something that started as a meeting between friends and colleagues of like minds, eventually became “the place to be.” The Catfish Club was open to all and non-partisan. The discussions included the most critical issues facing San Diego.

Rev. George Walker Smith retired in December 2000, after more than 30 years in the ministry. His role in politics and education in San Diego was profound and it can be said that he changed the landscape and direction of San Diego Schools for the better and helped to teach the citizens of San Diego the need to treat one another with civility.

Submitted by Carolyn Smith and Joyce Y. Suber

Trump or Jesus with James Talarico

He’s Deeply Religious and a Democrat. He Might Be the Next Big Thing in Texas Politics. James Talarico confounds Fox News hosts, fights the culture wars by quoting scripture, and has fellow Democrats talking about his statewide future. Talarico professes a Christian faith and was raised Presbyterian. He is active in St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church in Austin. He is an outspoken critic of Christian nationalism calling it "a cancer on our religion."

Wednesday, October 16, 2024

Is Christianity “conservative”?

Is Christianity “conservative”?

By James Kalb on Oct 10, 2024 09:30 pm
Last month I pointed out serious problems with progressive Christianity, mostly having to do with the progressive rejection of transcendence. To fill out the discussion, it seems I ought to say something about conservative Christianity. [...]
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Is Jack finally free?

By Charles J. Russo on Oct 10, 2024 07:26 pm
On October 8, 2024, in a 4-3 decision in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Scardina, the Supreme Court of Colorado may have finally ended the long-running ordeal of persecution by lawfare of Jack Phillips. The high-profile case began [...]
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Report: Nearly 150 Catholic hospitals provided transgender drugs or surgeries to children

By Catholic News Agency on Oct 10, 2024 02:50 pm
null / Credit: ADragan/Shutterstock Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Oct 10, 2024 / 11:50 am (CNA). Nearly 150 Catholic hospitals across the United States provided children with transgender drugs or performed gender-transition surgeries on them betwe... [...]
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Easter in autumn

By David Paul Deavel on Oct 10, 2024 05:00 am
Spring or fall? I’ve never been able to make up my mind as to my favorite season. Spring is my official favorite. The season of new life after the cold, the sleep, the death of [...]
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The Real Goal: Human dignity, local community and the common good

By Dr. R. Jared Staudt on Oct 10, 2024 04:00 am
“It’s the economy, stupid.” That’s what we’ve heard really matters in our elections. Economic growth and the consequent effects on our standard of living. It’s a dangerous train of thought if you think about it. [...]
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On the continuity of the Roman Mass: An interview with Fr. Uwe Michael Lang

By Paul Senz on Oct 09, 2024 11:29 pm
The Eucharist is the source and summit, the font and apex, of the Church’s life. As a result, the Mass is at the heart of the Church, a constituent part of the daily and weekly [...]
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How two 19th-century Blesseds truly read the “signs of the times”

By John M. Grondelski, Ph.D. on Oct 09, 2024 03:23 pm
Two Blesseds appear on national liturgical calendars this week: Blessed Marie-Rose Durocher this past Sunday, October 6, in Canada and Blessed Angela Truszkowska on Thursday, October 10, in Poland. Both women deserve our attention. Both [...]
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Indifference is irresponsible

By George Weigel on Oct 09, 2024 04:00 am
I can understand why many Americans seem dispirited about world affairs. Things are indeed a mess. What I cannot understand, however, is the electorate’s seeming indifference to the global mess: an indifference that manifests itself [...]
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Extra, extra! News and views for Wednesday, October 9, 2024

By CWR Staff on Oct 09, 2024 03:00 am
Pope Passes Over Patriarch – “But one appointment … seems like an especially Francis move — the elevation of a 44-year-old Australian, the Ukrainian Catholic Bishop Mykola Bychok of Melbourne — who is not the [...]
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End-of-life care should never hasten death

By Susan Ciancio on Oct 08, 2024 07:54 pm
“I want to change how the world sees my patients.” These words were spoken by a neurologist on a new show called Brilliant Minds, based loosely on the life of the late Oliver Sacks. Dr. Wolf, the [...]
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Who are the Christians in Lebanon?

By Catholic News Agency on Oct 08, 2024 04:00 pm
St. Elie and St. Gregory the Illuminator Armenian Catholic Cathedral in Beirut. / Credit: Jari Kurittu, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons CNA Staff, Oct 8, 2024 / 09:00 am (CNA). The Middle East edged closer to large-scale crisis this week as Ira... [...]
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Analysis: Why Trump will likely carry Catholic-Democratic Pennsylvania

By Sean Fitzpatrick on Oct 08, 2024 01:08 am
President Joe Biden recently attended the funeral of a childhood friend of his at his old parish of St. Paul’s in the Green Ridge section of Scranton. He came quietly, delivered a eulogy in the small neighborhood [...]
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New Converts, Old Selves

By Matthew Becklo on Oct 07, 2024 07:41 pm
In his First Letter to Timothy, St. Paul, when laying out the qualifications of a bishop, includes this telling remark: “He must not be a recent convert, or he may be puffed up with conceit [...]
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Did Tim Walz allow abortion for any reason up to birth? Here’s what the law he signed says

By Catholic News Agency on Oct 07, 2024 05:30 pm
Democratic vice presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz speaks during a debate at the CBS Broadcast Center on Oct. 1, 2024, in New York City. / Credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images CNA Staff, Oct 7, 2024 / 17:30 pm (CNA). Since Democrat... [...]
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Lepanto, the Poles, Islam, and Our Lady

By Derya M. Little on Oct 07, 2024 04:00 am
October 7 is the day the Ottoman navy was defeated in Battle of Lepanto, thus saving Europe from further conquest by the formidable Muslim empire. [...]
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Encountering Christ the Healer in MyCatholicDoctor

By Edward Short on Oct 06, 2024 09:49 pm
While the need for a more faithful, more far-reaching, and more sustainable Catholic healthcare model has long been acknowledged, especially in circumstances in which the deficiencies of secular healthcare, especially with respect to life and [...]
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Pope Francis names 21 new cardinals, including archbishops of Tehran and Toronto

By Catholic News Agency on Oct 06, 2024 09:41 am
Pope Francis creates new cardinals at a consistory in St. Peter’s Basilica on Oct. 5, 2019. / Daniel Ibáñez/CNA. Vatican City, Oct 6, 2024 / 07:41 am (CNA). Pope Francis announced on Sunday that he will create 21 new cardinals, including the ar... [...]
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The Battle of Lepanto commemorated in a South Carolina parish

By Kathy Schiffer on Oct 05, 2024 07:35 pm
On October 7, 1571, things weren’t looking good for nations in Europe and the Mediterranean region. The Ottoman Empire, seeking to expand its influence throughout Europe, aimed its fleet of galleys and galleasses—with 12,000 to [...]
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The liberal and flawed roots of tiresome synodal grievances

By Larry Chapp on Oct 05, 2024 11:58 am
One of the things I have learned in my 65 years of being a Catholic is that the meaning of the term “Church reform” in the post-Vatican II era is almost always a cognate for [...]
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The Mystery of Creation and the Sacrament of Marriage

By Carl E. Olson on Oct 05, 2024 03:00 am
Readings: • Gen 2:18-24 • Ps 128:1-2, 3, 4-5, 6 • Heb 2:9-11 • Mk 10:2-16 “No human institution,” writes Jorge Cardinal Medina Estévez in Male and Female He Created Them (Ignatius Press, 2003), “is [...]
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My Father Gives Me Bread: What the LGBTQ+ community needs from the Church

By Amy E. Hamilton on Oct 04, 2024 04:00 am
Or what man of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, [...]
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The fascinating, free, and faithful Saint Francis of Assisi

By Dawn Beutner on Oct 04, 2024 03:30 am
Why do so many Catholics—both those who practice their faith and those who don’t—have statues of Saint Francis of Assisi in their yards? Why would Francis’ hometown of Assisi be considered the perfect place to [...]
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Evangelium Vitae and the culture of death today

By Richard A. Spinello on Oct 03, 2024 11:11 pm
As we approach the thirtieth anniversary of St. John Paul II’s landmark encyclical Evangelium Vitae, it is instructive to reflect on the current breadth and depth of the culture of death referred to in that remarkable [...]
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The transparent silliness of the lack of synodal transparency

By Russell Shaw on Oct 03, 2024 03:17 pm
Participants in the Synod on Synodality spent two days before the start of its final session in a closed retreat that ended with a “penitential liturgy.” The synod office also provided the participants with a [...]
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Pakistani woman sentenced to death for allegedly blaspheming Muhammed

By Catholic News Agency on Oct 03, 2024 11:00 am
The archbishop of Islamabad-Rawalpindi, Joseph Arshad, addresses the persecuted Christian community of Jaranwala in August 2023. Twenty-one Catholic churches, Bibles, and family homes were set on fire. / Credit: Courtesy of Aid to the Church in ... [...]
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