Marj Carpenter, Presbyterian leader and an ex-reporter, dies

DALLAS — Marj Carpenter, who pushed international missionary work while briefly leading the nation’s largest Presbyterian denomination in the mid-1990s following a journalism career in West Texas that included covering millionaire swindler Billie Sol Estes, has died. She was 93.

Carpenter, who once described herself as “sinfully proud” of being Presbyterian and traveled to more than 120 countries on the behalf of Presbyterian Church (USA), died Saturday at an assisted living facility in the city of Big Spring, Texas, her son, Jim Bob Carpenter, said Monday.

He said she had a “weak heart,” so they assumed it “just finally gave out.”

“Marj was truly one of a kind,” said the Rev. Cliff Kirkpatrick, clerk emeritus of the church’s General Assembly. “She had a truelife story for every occasion, and they all came together with an overflowing love for Christ and for this community known as the Presbyterian Church (USA).”

After working as a smalltown newspaper reporter in West Texas, she joined Presbyterian News Service and during her 15-year tenure eventually became its director. The attention she gained in that role and by traveling internationally to visit mission sites helped her get elected moderator of the church’s General Assembly — the top elected post within Presbyterian Church (USA)

Carpenter worked with the semiweekly Pecos Independent and Enterprise.

Her funeral will be held Thursday in Big Spring.