Social Witness Ministry
As followers of Christ, FPC's Social Witness Ministry seeks to meet the requirements of Micah 6:8 by doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with our God.
FPC members participate each year in the Martin Luther King, Jr. walk on Hilton Head Island.
The Purpose of Social Witness
Recognizing that neither the Church as the body of Christ, nor Christians as individuals, can be neutral or indifferent toward injustice in the world; we affirm our responsibility to speak on social and moral issues for the encouragement and instruction of FPC, its members, visitors and friends, seeking earnestly both to know the mind of Christ and to speak always in humility and love.
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Our duty is not only to encourage and train our members, visitors and friends in daily obedience to God’s will, but corporately to reveal God’s grace in places of suffering and need, to resist the forces that create injustices, and to support the forces that restore the dignity of all people as the children of God, for only so is the gospel most fully proclaimed.
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In support of such responsibility and duty, we will provide, facilitate, and encourage the delivery of focused social witness programs for our members, visitors and friends and other residents of the greater South Carolina Lowcountry.
Local Partners & Organizations
FPC's Social Witness Ministry is dedicated to establishing and strengthening partnerships with the following organizations/causes:
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Adopt-A-Highway
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Circles Hilton Head Island, Building Community to End Poverty (A program of the Deep Well Project)
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Coastal Cleanup Programs
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Gullah Geechee Land and Cultural Preservation Project
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Hilton Head Island Affordable Housing
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Hilton Head MLK Committee for Justice
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Prison Reform
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Sea Turtle Patrol Hilton Head Island
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Water Quality and Wetlands Conservation Organizations
Coffee & Conversation
This spring the Social Witness Ministry will again host Thursday morning Coffee & Conversation - an opportunity to talk with others about a particular "hot" topic. There are other upcoming SW events, too:
April 24, A Guided Nature Walk at Pinckney Island
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May 16 & May 23, 10 AM, Coffee & Conversation
For event details, click here
Earth Care Congregation
In August 2021, the Session of First Presbyterian Church voted unanimously (at the request of the Social Witness Ministry) to apply for official recognition as an Earth Care Congregation through the PC(USA) Mission Agency. Certification was awarded in the spring of 2022. This honor speaks to FPC's great commitment to care for God's earth in a variety of ways.
Each year since, a work group within the Social Witness Ministry tracks and reports to PC(USA) that we, as a congregation, have engaged in Earth Care ministry throughout the year via worship, education, our facility and outreach programs, thus earning the necessary points in each of those categories for recertification.
As part of the program, the church abides by the Earth Care Pledge: Peace and justice is God’s plan for all creation. The earth and all creation are God’s. God calls us to be careful, humble stewards of this earth, and to protect and restore it for its own sake, and for the future use and enjoyment of the human family. As God offers all people the special gift of peace through Jesus Christ, and through Christ reconciles all to God, we are called to deal justly with one another and the earth.