Mary Carol Pederson

Mary Carol Pederson Joins the CityChurch Network Team

Ray Williams Updated on Flourishing Families

Healthy families are vital for a flourishing community and the Church is God’s plan for developing healthy families. The Vital Families Initiative seeks to empower churches to strengthen families in churches, in schools, and in life-rebuilding places. Vital Families in Schools encourages church/school partnerships seeking to serve families through family support opportunities, student mentoring, and family to family connections. We are excited to announce that Mary Carol Pederson has joined our staff team to give leadership to this Initiative.

Mary Carol is passionate about uniting and mobilizing the Church of all denominations and ethnicities to help those most vulnerable in our community. The biblical mandate to care for the fatherless, the orphan, and the widow, fueled her desire to launch and grow The CALL, and now to mobilize the Church to do more in caring for impoverished local youth and their families to ultimately bring about sweeping community restoration. She and her husband, Jason, have three children – Spencer, Shelby, and a bonus son, JB.

In her words:

I have been inspired by the movement of churches uniting together since I first moved to Little Rock in the ’90s and was a part of ShareFest, which brought together churches across denominations and ethnicities to serve our community and schools in meaningful ways. That movement of prayer and service in our community was the foundation of CityChurch Network. With my passion for mobilizing churches to show God’s love to the most vulnerable in our community, I am so excited to get to join the CityChurch Network staff leadership team, whose mission is just that – “uniting the Church for the good of the community.” As for my new role, I’m seeing God move in obvious ways here in Little Rock to do something new. Little Rock is always in the top 10 cities in the nation as it relates to violence. God hates violence because it is an act against His most treasured creation – mankind. Studies show that mentoring of at-risk young men can directly impact violence in a community. God has been bringing great interest and excitement among many as He seeks to create a sweeping movement to rebuild our community through the mentoring of young men in the Little Rock area, and providing support to their families. As every church partners with a local school in need, the restoration will come. Perseverance and long-term commitment are vital – but restoration will come to our city.

Contact Mary Carol at [email protected] to learn more about the exciting vision to love students through church/school partnerships that help families.

Ray Williams
Ray Williams has served as the Founder and President of CityChurch Network since its beginning in 1999. Previously, he served in multiple pastor roles at Fellowship Bible Church in Little Rock for 38 years. He and his wife Carolyn love to attend movies and travel together. They have two daughters and seven grandchildren who know him as “Papa Ray.” He graduated from Ouachita Baptist University in 1977 and earned an M.A. in Interpersonal and Organizational Communication from UA Little Rock in 1985. He is pursuing a Doctorate of Ministry through the Antioch School for Church Planting and Leadership Development. His training as an Army Airborne Ranger and active-duty service as an Infantry officer in the 82nd Airborne Division from 1977 to 1981 earned him the nickname “Ranger Ray” with some of his long-term friends.