| | | NCC Represented at 33rd Anniversary
of NAN Convention | | Gwen Carr (left), Eric Garner's mother, Bishop Vashti Murphy McKenzie, NCC President and General Secretary, and Sabrina Fulton, Trayvon Martin's mother, attend the National Action Network Convention (NAN) in April 2024. | Bishop Vashti Murphy McKenzie, NCC President and General Secretary, joins a cadre of nationally recognized figures in attending the National Action Network Convention (NAN) this week, from April 11–13. The 33rd anniversary gathering of this prolific convention holds the theme "Fighting for Justice". Notable speakers include: Rev. Al Sharpton, President and Founder of NAN; Robert Smith, Chairperson of Vista Equity Partners, LLC; Stacey Abrams, former Georgia State Representative; Joe Scarborough, television host and political commentator; Whoopi Goldberg, EGOT award-winning entertainer and TV talk show host; the Honorable Phil Murphy, New Jersey Governor; and Benjamin Crump, attorney, Ben Crump Law, PLLC. Virtual remarks were given by President Joe Biden. Other notable attendees include Sabrina Fulton and Gwen Carr the mothers of Trayvon Martin and Eric Garner, respectively. Both women lost their sons unjustly to gun violence. Stay tuned for more of NCC's journey at the 2024 NAN Convention. Visit NAN's Facebook page for convention updates and livestream coverage. | | V. Rev. Dr. Anton Vrame, Long-Time NCC Partner, Elected Bishop | | The Very Rev. Dr. Anton “Tony” Vrame was elected Bishop of Synades on March 22, 2024, by the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, making him an auxiliary bishop for the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America. He will be ordained on April 20, at the Archdiocese Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in New York City.Bishop Anthony, as he will now be called, represented the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese to the Faith and Order Commission (now Convening Table) of the National Council of Churches from 2005 to 2019, including five years as Chair of the commission (2008–2013), which placed him on the Executive Committee of the Governing Board. He currently represents the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese to the NCC’s Convening Table on Christian Education, Faith Formation, and Leadership Development. He also serves on the Board of Trustees of Friendship Press, the publishing arm of the NCC, after serving a three-year term on its Bible Translation and Utilization Committee.
Bishop Anthony is Director of Holy Cross Orthodox Press and Adjunct Associate Professor of Religious Education at Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology, Brookline, MA. He will continue in these duties as part of his episcopal ministry. | | Register for the NCC Spring
Governing Board Meeting | | | | NCC Joins 250+ Faith Leaders in Advocating for U.S. to Increase Protections for Haitians | | | The National Council of Churches and more than 250 faith leaders sent a letter addressed to the White House and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkasin, urging the Biden Administration to act immediately in response to the escalating humanitarian crisis in Haiti and expand protections for its citizens. | | | | Celebrating 60 Years: Join NCC's
Freedom Summer Campaign | | NCC is excited to announce the upcoming launch of NCC Freedom Summer, a faith-based civic engagement campaign inspired by the 1964 Freedom Summer project, to educate, engage, and empower voters for social change. NCC Freedom Summer will celebrate the 60th anniversary of the original Freedom Summer by mobilizing voters in five priority states (Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Michigan) through voter registration, voter education, and voter mobilization efforts for the 2024 election.
Educate – NCC Freedom Academy
Freedom Academy is designed as an intensive six-week virtual “Sunday school” with the goal of teaching on the principles of civic engagement, social justice, and the importance of voting rights from a faith-based perspective. Upon their completion of the program, attendees will receive an NCC Freedom Academy Certificate.
Engage – NCC Freedom Fellows NCC Freedom Summer is recruiting Freedom Fellows to engage congregations for voter registration, community canvassing, and phone and text banking.
Applications Deadline: May 1, 2024
Interviews: May 8-10, 2024
Fellowship Duration: June 10, 2024 – August 17, 2024
Empower – NCC Freedom Ride July 19, 2024 – Jacksonville, Florida
July 26, 2024 – Atlanta, Georgia
August 2, 2024 – Durham, North Carolina
August 9, 2024 – Detroit, Michigan
August 16, 2024 – Jackson, Mississippi
Learn more about this exciting commemorative campaign, share with your network, and get involved today! | | | Upcoming Reparatory Justice Series: Creating a Culture of Repair and the 2024 Election | | The reparatory justice movement is gaining momentum in communities across the country. During this election year, it is vital that impassioned activists inject the need to create a culture repair into the ongoing political debates defining elections at the local, state, and federal levels.
To help us with practical ways we can do this, we will be joined by Rev. Robert Turner, author of the new book, Creating a Culture of Repair: Taking Action on the Road to Reparations. In his book, Rev. Turner provides an accessible guide for individuals and groups wanting to influence significant institutional action while also acting on their own to repair the effects of racial injustice in our communities, churches, and spheres of influence. Following the conversation with Rev. Turner, RJS will provide essential points to emphasize at candidate town halls, rallies, community forums, and other campaign events in your community. | | | | NCC Highlights: Share Your Content for
NCC Social Media Channels | | | Grow in Prayer: Devotional and Prayer Resources | | | | Registration Open for Ecumenical Advocacy Days 2024 Spring Summit | | Amid multiple wars, threats to voting rights, and ongoing discrimination based on race and ethnicity worldwide, Ecumenical Advocacy Days (EAD) will focus on promoting and protecting human rights both domestically and around the world. EAD will be returning to an in-person gathering in Washington, DC, May 17–19.
The theme for this year’s gathering is “Faith in Action: Advancing Human Rights and Peace for All.” Sessions will include plenaries, worship, workshops, and times for state networking and organizing.
Registration is now open for the gathering. More details are available here. | | Save the Date for Upcoming North American Annual Conference Events | | We Dwell in Common:
Ecumenical Resources for Interfaith Engagement Wed, May 1, 2024 (1:00–2:30 p.m. Eastern) Please join Graymoor Ecumenical & Interreligious Institute, the Interfaith Center of New York, and an international panel of distinguished experts, for a webinar exploring the repertoire of ecumenical perspectives and methods that are crucial resources for interfaith engagement today—particularly important as ecumenical training is increasingly marginal in most programs of theological education and interreligious dialogue. Following a presentation by Dr. Linda Hogan, Professor of Ecumenics at Trinity College Dublin and Former Head of the Irish School of Ecumenics, participants will hear responses from and conversations among leading figures in US interfaith engagement and interreligious studies. This program will be held online via Zoom. Full details and registration are available here. | | | | | North American Academy of Ecumenists 2024 Annual Conference September 27–29, 2024, Toronto, Canada
The North American Academy of Ecumenists (NAAE) will hold its next Annual Conference from September 27–29, 2024, at the Toronto School of Theology, in Toronto, Canada. Their theme for 2024 centers on the history of displacement, violence, abuse, and genocide of Indigenous Peoples in which the Christian churches are implicated — especially through the Canadian Residential School System, but also in the USA, Mexico, and elsewhere in Greater North America. More broadly, it is recognized that church communities regularly sustain traumatic and alienating memories, including accounts of betrayal, oppression, violence, and scapegoating, which are narrated differently and often incompatibly in the ecclesial communities that have been shaped and divided by these experiences. Thus, retrieving, revisiting, and countenancing these memories together are critical tasks for ecumenical engagement and intercommunal reconciliation. Proposals are invited that consider: (1) any ecumenically pertinent dimension of the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission; (2) analogous questions of justice and reconciliation in other North American ecclesial communities; or (3) other resonant ecumenical questions around truth, reconciliation, and conflictual memory. | | | |
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