LEARN: Storytelling, arts, movies all part of 2021 virtual Covenant Gathering

Picture from https://www.covenantgathering.com/

Registration is now open for the 2021 virtual Covenant Gathering with a full slate of speakers and inter-generational experiences from July 11-16 to engage and educate participants from July 11-16.

The event will include an email each morning with devotions, links and video content. Then, through the day, various live presentations and interactive events will be held for children, youth and adults. 

Like previous years, the 2021 Covenant Gathering provides worship and community time for participants.

The cost is $25 per email address.  

Presentations during the week will include:

• Keynote “Storyteller” — Caroline Dennis, co-pastor of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Greenwood, South Carolina and former vice president of the Great Lakes Association of Presbyterian Church Educators. Dennis says she understands herself best not in terms of accomplishments achieved, degrees attained or positions held but in terms of relationships.
• On Earth as It Is in Heaven: Transforming Mission for the 21^st Century – Jeff Moles, this director of Christian Education and Mission at First Presbyterian Church in Owensboro, Kentucky has also served the PC(USA) in a variety of roles at its local and national levels. An experience worship leader and church musician, Jeff will bring conversation about our call to mission as a community and how our interactions can create mutually-transforming relationships.  
• Photography and Poetry as Spiritual Exercises – Julie Nemecek, an accomplished photographer with her own photoblog who also is an award-winning and published poet as well as a choral composer, retired pastor and professor emeritus. Julie will lead a hands-on class to examine how photography and poetry can be meaningful spiritual exercises, and encourage participants to develop their own expression.
• Good Vs. Evil – Movie Heroes and Villains and Biblical Ethics – Mark Bedford, pastor of New Windsor Presbyterian Church in New Windsor, Illinois who is still angling for the position of Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts. Mark will guide comparing scenes from movies with Bible scriptures to learn more about what the Bible says is good or evil, and how the big screen portrays these qualities.

Covenant Gathering traces its roots to the “Synod Schools” once widely held through the PC(USA). These summer intergenerational gatherings were held on Presbyterian-related college campus. When the Synod of the Covenant was no longer able to offer its own Synod School after 2006, a group of participants felt called to continue some form of the gathering and began networking with congregations and presbyteries. Click below to learn more about the annual event.