This month Perspectives takes a look back at the recently held 214th General Assembly (2002). Emily Enders Odom offers three profiles of participants at the assembly meeting this year: two are commissioners and one is a youth advisory delegate. Crossing Boundaries takes a look at a minister who shares in delivering a gift from Korea to the larger church; A Family Thing offers a view of the assembly meeting from the perspective of a youth advisory delegate; and From Columbus to Columbus one commissioner's journey is seen through an ever-reforming denomination.

Clifton Kirkpatrick, Stated Clerk of the General Assembly, offers two articles. The first is the text of his remarks to Pope John Paul II on behalf of the PCUSA delegation that traveled to the Vatican in the spring of 2001. In those remarks, he refers to the discussion paper that was prepared for these talks entitled The Successor to Peter. That paper is available for review at the following link: www.pcusa.org/oga/publications.htm. The article is entitled Presentation to His Holiness, John Paul II.

Last, but certainly not least, is a brief yet powerful statement from the Stated Clerk on The Church: A Missionary Society.

Don't forget to return . . . as we continue to examine Presbyterian Church life with new eyes - to engage the Bible and our theology in exploring issues facing the Church - to utilize a constitutional and confessional framework for appreciating the ambiguities we face - to rediscover new avenues from the lessons of history that enable us to comprehend contemporary situations.