About a third of the formal requests coming to Synod 2023 touch on decisions made by last year’s synod on the human sexuality report. Four groups have differing hopes for how synod will respond and different plans for communicating about it.
News
Stories from people, congregations and ministries of the CRCNA, reported by The Banner's news editor and a team of regular correspondents and Church Worldwide news from the Religion News Service. Send news tips to news@thebanner.org.
“Lead Like a Boss,” a new nonprofit designed to prepare young women with leadership skills, was inspired by a CRC member’s experience teaching an interim course at an Illinois Christian high school.
In Memoriam: Rev. Henry (Henk) Numan
1941-2023A kind-hearted pastor who lived by a motto “to be Christlike with a servant heart,” Henry Numan died April 6. He was 81.
Meeting June 9-16 in the Calvin University Chapel, Synod 2023 will revisit decisions from 2022, receive two reports deferred from 2020, and address numerous questions of confessional alignment.
News editor Alissa Vernon, editor-in-chief Shiao Chong, reporters Roxanne Van Farowe, Kristen Parker, and Greg Chandler; and photographer Steven Herppich will be in Grand Rapids June 9-15 providing coverage of Synod 2023.
In its first time to be hosted at Redeemer University in Ancaster, Ont., the Kuyper Conference features Makoto Fujimura as keynote speaker and Kuyper Prize recipient.
Dan DeKam, a Christian school administrator with over 25 years of experience serving schools in Minnesota and Michigan, is the new director of U.S. ministry operations for the U.S. ministry board of the Christian Reformed Church in North America.
Meeting May 3-5 in Grand Rapids, Mich., the Christian Reformed Church in North America’s Council of Delegates and U.S. and Canada ministry boards made appointments, met new staff, and are passing along items to synod.
The CRC Council of Delegates has forwarded to Synod 2023 changes to both the U.S. and Canadian World Renew bylaws that clarify that the relief agency’s relationship to the Christian Reformed Church in North America is one that is connected, but not directed.
“Pastor Pete,” who served as a workplace chaplain for nearly 20 years after 28 years of congregational ministry, died April 13. He was 76.
A regional organizer with the Christian Reformed Church’s Climate Witness Project shares stories of neighborhood transformation through community collaboration.
In Goshen, N.Y., community members without insurance can find health care services by going to an unlikely place: church.
As United Methodist bishops from around the world meet this week in Chicago, they anticipate ‘reconfigured boundaries, reformed agencies, and a revised work plan to achieve our mission.’
On March 21, one month before fire would briefly disrupt demolition on the site of the former Maranatha Christian Reformed Church in St. Catharines, Ont., about 80 community members gathered to recognize the church’s legacy.
A Colorado church spends one Sunday a month with a discipleship focus, leading its congregants in different practices to deepen their faith.
A Florida judge has dismissed a lawsuit originally brought by more than 100 United Methodist churches wishing to immediately disaffiliate from the Florida Conference of the United Methodist Church.
The Evangelical Press Association and the Associated Church Press hosted spring conventions and presented recognition to member publications, including an EPA Award of Merit for The Banner and several ACP awards for Reformed Worship.
Joe Kuilema, who taught at the Christian Reformed Church-affiliated Calvin University for 14 years, did not have his contract renewed after officiating a wedding for a transgender former student.
After five years of building a community of language learners with free English as a Second Language classes, First Christian Reformed Church in Oostburg, Wisc., sees the blessings and prays for deeper community.
When a train derailed near Raymond (Minn.) Christian Reformed Church, Pastor Aaron Greydanus and several church members provided breakfast and shelter to those responding to the fire.
Evangelical Environmental Network’s Kyle Meyaard-Schaap speaks to young Christians in the church with his climate-focused book. “Millions of other Christians like you understand this. We’re concerned, too. And we want to do something about it. So let’s get to work.”
Just under two months before the 2023 All Ontario Youth Convention was to host an an expected attendance of 800 youth, the planning team canceled the event over questions of the invited speaker’s position on same-sex marriage.
After a three-year hiatus, an ecumenical choir festival in the Eastern Ontario village of Frankford is “back for good.”
“In no uncertain terms, the Church’s magisterium upholds the respect due to every human being,” the Vatican declared in a statement March 30. Some reacting to the formal rejection of the 15th-century Doctrine of Discovery say more steps are needed toward relationships with Indigenous peoples.