wfn.org | Marian McClure new Director of WMD

[PCUSA.NEWS@pcusa.org]

GA97118 
 
               Marian McClure Is the New Director 
            of the Worldwide Ministries Division of 
                the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) 
 
                       by Dee Wade 
 
Syracuse: After receiving unanimous recommendation from the Assembly 
Committee on Mission Program and Coordination to be the next director of 
Worldwide Ministries, one of the three program divisions of the General 
Assembly Council,  the Rev. Marian McClure was overwhelmingly confirmed in 
that post by the commissioners to the 209th General Assembly (1997), 
meeting in Syracuse, N.Y. 
 
    In an interview, McClure shared her sense of calling to this new phase 
of her service to the Gospel and to God's church.  Though she wouldn't say 
it herself, another could say that it seems that the denomination has found 
in her a person born to the task of global outreach. 
 
    A preacher's daughter, a preacher's sister, and a preacher herself, 
McClure is well acclimated to the world of the church.  A scholar with 
practical experience in international affairs, fluent in two languages and 
conversant in two others, she also possesses a quiet, confident 
understanding of the church in the world. 
 
    Born in Knoxville, Tenn., McClure moved with her family to Wisconsin 
for a few years before moving again, this time to Birmingham, Ala., the 
family following her father's sense of call and her mother's sense of the 
South.  The fourth of five children, Marian's father is the Rev. Scott 
McClure, long-time pastor of Independent Presbyterian Church.  Now, after 
retirement, he serves the Springville Church in Alabama as stated supply. 
 
    Her mother, Margaret Messer McClure, who died a few years ago, is 
described by Marian as "the real thinker in the family."  Her brother is 
the Rev. John McClure, professor of preaching at Louisville Presbyterian 
Theological Seminary. 
 
     Of all of her family relationships, however, she wants it known that 
none is more important to her than the one of aunt to Leslie and Ian 
McClure and to Heather and Andrew McClure. 
 
    After high school, McClure attended the University of the South in 
Sewanee, Tenn., receiving a degree in political science, with much emphasis 
on French language and literature.  From there she attended Harvard 
University, Cambridge, Mass., earning a Ph. D. in political science in 
1986.  While working on her doctorate, Marian spent a year in rural Haiti, 
studying the relationship between the Catholic church and  the life of the 
people in the Haitian countryside. 
 
    When the funding from her Fulbright Grant ran out, McClure received 
financial help from the mission fund of her father's church, allowing for 
an extra month in Haiti to finish her work.  After Haiti she returned to 
Cambridge as a teaching fellow for a few years.  From 1985 to 1990, she 
lived in Mexico City as a program officer for the Ford Foundation, working 
on various grants and programs stemming from them. 
 
    During her time at Harvard, in Haiti, and in Mexico City, McClure had a 
consistent feeling that she should consider the ministry. She reports 
struggling with that feeling, wondering whether she was hearing the voice 
of family tradition or the voice of God.  Finally she realized that it was 
the latter, even if echoed by the former. 
 
    She entered Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, graduating in 
1995.  She was ordained by the Presbytery of Sheppards and Lapsley and is 
now a member of the Presbytery of Louisville. 
 
    Though she felt some trepidation at having to sit before her big 
brother the preaching professor, she turned out all right in that area. 
While in seminary, she was awarded the David H.C. Read Preacher/Scholar 
Award, and delivered her prize-winning sermon before the Madison Avenue 
Presbyterian Church in New York City. 
 
    Her service to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) includes work in 
Mission Funding and as a liaison between the church and foundations.  In 
1996 she became coordinator for Global Education and International 
Leadership Development within the Worldwide Ministries Division.  Her local 
church life, primarily lived among the Crescent Hill congregation in 
Louisville, finds her singing in the choir and teaching a senior high 
Sunday school class. 
 
    Marian McClure's father, Scott McClure, was born on a farm in southern 
Ohio.  During his active ministry, Marian reports, her father would often 
take the family out on Sunday afternoon drives through the country, where 
he would look at farm land, barns, cows, and the like.  "He was always 
looking for a farm of his own," she said.  In retirement, he has finally 
found it, a small but beautiful place in Alabama. 
 
    In talking to her and to those who know her, it is obvious that Marian 
herself has been on a search.  She's been looking for a particular spot, a 
place of her own, a place in which she can settle down and do good work. 
It seems that she has found it in global missions. 
 
    This is not a spot that exists in one location, however, but in many, 
and settling down to it involves much movement from one location to 
another.  One can reasonably assert that the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) 
will be served faithfully and dynamically by this tall woman with the broad 
smile and the voice of graceful articulation. 

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