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Vision & Mission

Vision Statement Since 1946

We are the church of the warm heart, the open mind, the adventurous spirit 

That cares, heals, comforts, challenges;

That knows no division of color or class or frontier;

That inquires and looks forward as well as backward.

 

We are the church of the Master, and of the people; a working, worshipping, winsome church

That interprets the truth and challenges its times;

That inspires courage for this life, and hope for the life to come.

1995 Mission Statement 

Our Session – the ruling body of each Presbyterian Church – adopted a Mission Statement in 1995, which it reaffirmed in 2006.

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Our mission is to live our faith as a congregation, inspired by Jesus Christ as individuals and as a corporate body, and to move forward in our mission of peace within our church, our community and the world. We covenant to:

  • Be stewards of God's Word and Actions;

  • Develop strong lay leadership;

  • Provide for the regular worship of God in accord with Presbyterian precepts and traditions;

  • Be Christian educators with each other in all facets of our lives;

  • In the spirit of Psalm 78, to teach our sons and daughters, that it might be known to a future generation, to children yet unborn to put their trust in God, to hold God's great acts ever in mind and to keep God's commandments;

  • Welcome diversity and sing our differences in harmony and without fear;

  • Constantly expand our service to our community and to the world through mission outreach;

  • Support each other in living our faith at home and in our work in the world.

Stone Church's congregation about 1950

We Take a Stand

From its beginning, Stone Church has been a congregation that has challenged itself to live up to its Vision Statement of 1946 because we believe it is what Jesus has called us to do. 

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In 2020, as people around the nation joined in protests of police killings of black suspects, our Session voted to add a Black Lives Matter banner on the exterior of our church and to publish a letter to the community explaining why. Here's a copy of that letter expressing our confession and repentance about ignoring the plight of black and brown people in our community for too long and our commitment to stand with and support people oppressed by authority.

 

In the 1960s, we participated in Civil Rights marches to fight for racial equality.

 

In 1998 we fought for equality in the governance of our own denomination, the Presbyterian Church USA. After the General Assembly – our national governing body – had changed the church's constitution, known as the Book of Order, to forbid the ordination of gay and lesbian Presbyterians to church offices, our Session adopted this Covenant of Dissent.

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It took 13 more years, but the General Assembly finally adopted, and a majority of presbyteries ratified, an amendment to the Book of Order that restored the right of churches (in the case of Elders and Deacons) and presbyteries (in the case of Teaching Elders, or pastors) to ordain those whom they chose without regard to sexual identity.

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