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December 20, 2007

Columbia seminary official to preach on ‘Day 1’

Calvo, alumni and church relations director, kicks off new year

by Jerry L. Van Marter
Presbyterian News Service

The Rev. Randolph S. Calvo, Jr., director of alumni/ae and church relations at Columbia Theological Seminary, Decatur, GA, will be featured Jan. 6 and 13 on “Day 1,” a nationally broadcast radio program also accessible by podcast. Each program includes a sermon by Calvo along with interviews conducted by the program’s host and executive producer, Peter Wallace.  

Calvo is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) who has served as pastor of two churches: McDonough (GA) Presbyterian Church for 16 years, and Northwest Presbyterian Church in Atlanta for 10 years. A graduate of Clemson University, he worked in banking and insurance before entering Columbia Theological Seminary, where he earned his M.Div. in 1981. He assumed his current position with the seminary in May. 

Calvo’s first sermon for the new year, entitled “The Main Thing,” is based on the story of the visit of the wise men in Matthew 2:1-12. “Literally meaning ‘fantasy from the outside,’ at Epiphany we celebrate the belief that, in the birth of Christ at Christmas, God has entered into our world and our lives,” Calvo says. “Epiphany asks, where do we see God to be present among and in us? What are the signs of the sacred among us? It is with that quest, that search, that discovery that we concern ourselves today.” 

In his second sermon, “Baptism Made Real,” Calvo explores the meaning of Christ’s baptism in Matthew 3:13-17, and shares ways to make that meaning more relevant to our lives today.