A number of short, but interesting and relevant, items flashed across my screen in the last couple of days so here is a round-up:

PC(USA) Choses a theme for the next, 2008 General Assembly in San Jose, California.  According to an item from the Presbyterian News Service the Committee of the Office of the General Assembly as the theme for the next GA Micah 6:8:

He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord
require of you but to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly
with your God? (Micah 6:8, NRSV)

The Rev. Mark Malcolm, a 32 year old Church of Scotland minister has been chosen as the next moderator of the Presbytery of Lothian.  Mark is believed to be the youngest to be elected to that position.  (That would be young in our presbytery, even for a minister.)  He is the pastor of Ormiston and Pencaitland Parish Church and regularly plays on a rugby team.  More about Mark from the East Lothian Courier as well as a great description of what the moderator’s role is.

And finally, a BBC News item headlined “Church Must Become Less Formal:  The Presbyterian Church must become less formal in order for it to survive, a Presbyterian minister has said.”  The odd thing about the article is that it is really about Prof. Laurence Kirkpatrick of Union Theological College in Belfast and his new book “Presbyterians in Ireland.”  Almost all of the article is about his new book, a book that sounds interesting and includes exterior photographs of almost every Presbyterian church in Ireland.  Only the headline and the lead paragraph seem to mention “appealing to young people.”