GA06107

New multicultural internship program unveiled

Goal is to develop young pastors for diverse churches 

By Evan Silverstein

BIRMINGHAM, June 19 — A soon-to-be-launched internship program aimed at grooming new pastors for the challenge of creating multicultural churches was the topic of discussion during a breakfast event here Monday.

Rick Ufford-Chase, moderator of the 216th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), developed the program's concept along with the Rev. Ruben Armendariz, church development consultant for Mission Presbytery in Texas.

Multicultural churches are those that incorporate the cultural traditions and dimensions of more than one ethnic or racial group.

The former moderator outlined the 2006 Pilot Multicultural Internship Program during the fourth annual Multicultural Church Breakfast and Celebration. The goal is to begin the first internships this fall.

"Many of you are aware of the marvelous new world that's opening up to us because of new immigrant fellowships and new immigrant churches across the country," Ufford-Chase said at the breakfast.

He said interns would be recently graduated seminary students who have demonstrated "the ability to manage more than one culture." The internships will last one year.

Ufford-Chase said the graduated seminarians will join in a "partnership" with presbyteries committed to creating multicultural churches, "teaching churches" already engaged in multicultural ministry, and the Presbyterian Multicultural Network of churches and leaders committed to creating multicultural congregations with support from appropriate staff at the PC(USA)'s national offices in Louisville, KY.

The intern will work at an "intentionally multicultural church" or in two churches located near one another, he said. Following the internship, the ordination candidate will be placed in a multicultural New Church Development (NCD) or a church transformation project by the presbytery.

The Multicultural Network will help place the intern in a multicultural church or NCD if the presbytery does not have a multicultural congregation within its boundaries.
 
Ufford-Chase said the internship program has been included in the PC(USA)'s Mission Initiative: Joining Hearts and Hands campaign, which includes raising funds for multicultural NCD. However, Ufford-Chase said that money would take time to become available.

"If all goes well, by 2008 we'll be able to use Joining Hearts and Hands funding and draw on two years of experience to dramatically expand the program to 10 interns per year," Ufford-Chase said.