Jihyun Oh is committee nominee to lead PCUSA

A Presbyterian Church (USA) nomination committee has named Jihyun Oh, director of the denomination’ s Mid Council Ministries and an associate stated clerk in the Office of the General Assembly, as its choice for stated clerk.

If elected, Oh, who was born in South Korea and raised in Kansas, would be the first Korean American to serve in the denomination’s highest ecclesial office, the second woman, and the first woman of color. Commissioners to the PCUSA general assembly, meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah, June 30-July 4, will vote on Oh’s nomination.

Before being selected to lead Mid Council Ministries in 2019, Oh managed the denominational office that supports people discerning a call to the pastorate, served as an interim or associate pastor at three churches in Illinois and Georgia, and served as a staff chaplain and clinical pastoral education resident at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta.

Oh is a trustee of the New Covenant Trust Company and has served as a member of the PC(USA) Foundation Board, and as an ordination exam reader in both English and Korean.

Oh “has training and experience in transitional ministry, a must at this time of transition and shift in the life of the denomination,” said Leanne Masters, the nomination committee’s vice-moderator. “She has a gift of discernment and has the ability to see and work through complicated systems and situations and seek and find the grace-filled, Christ-led answer. Jihyun is a deeply Spirit-filled leader who has both vision and the ability to bring others along with her.”

In an interview, Oh said she feels hopeful for the church. “I feel incredibly hopeful for the church, and I hope I can communicate and invite people to that sense of hope,” she said. “We are doing and can still do amazingly faithful things, with God’s help.” —Presbyterian News Service