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Ministerial Update (April 2014)

April 3, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Steve Kriss, Director of Leadership Cultivation, provided this update from the March & April meetings of the Credentials and Ministerial Committees:

Hadi Sunarto (East Rutherford, NJ) was approved for a license for specific the ministry of deacon at Philadelphia Praise Center.

Krista Showalter Ehst (Bally, PA) was approved with a license toward ordination to serve as pastor at Alpha (NJ) Mennonite Church.

Bill Martin was approved with a license toward ordination and to serve as associate pastor at Towamencin Mennonite Church.

Danilo Sanchez (Whitehall congregation) was approved to serve as Allentown area youth minister with a license toward ordination.

Donna Merow was approved for ordination and continues to serve as pastor at Ambler (Pa) Mennonite Church.

Several new members have been added to the Ministerial and Credentials committees.

Mike Clemmer (Towamencin) and Marlene Frankenfield (Salford) have been named to the Ministerial Committee. Heidi Hochstetler (Bally) resigned her position from the committee earlier this year. Continuing Ministerial Committtee members include: Verle Brubaker (Swamp), Ken Burkholder (Deep Run East), Carolyn Egli (Whitehall), Janet Panning (Plains), Mary Nitzsche (Blooming Glen), Jim Williams (Nueva Vida Norristown New Life).

Aldo Siahaan (Philadelphia Praise) and Marta Castillo (Nueva Vida Norristown New Life) have been named to three year terms on the credentials committee. Continuing committee members include: Rose Bender (Whitehall), Verle Brubaker (Swamp) and Mike Clemmer (Towamencin).

Steve Kriss began serving as Conference staff liaison for both committees since the retirement of Noah Kolb late in 2013.

New LEADership Ministers join Franconia Conference staff

April 2, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Sheldon C. Good

Experienced Mennonite pastors John Bender and Aldo Siahaan have joined the Franconia Conference team of LEADership Ministers, bringing experience in church planting, intercultural leadership, and congregational pastoral work. Each will serve alongside several congregations yet to be decided and will work from home bases in southeastern Pennsylvania’s largest cities while continuing pastoral ministry assignments.

Aldo Siahaan, based in Philadelphia, helped start Philadelphia Praise Center in 2005. The congregation joined Franconia Conference in 2006, and Siahaan became credentialed as lead pastor in 2007.

Siahaan’s other ministry experience includes being a board member of Mennonite Central Committee East Coast, teaching a summer cross-cultural course at Messiah College, and being a member of the Indonesian Pastoral Network.

Siahaan hopes that in his role as a LEADership minister he can both “be a blessing” to others and “learn more about leadership in a broader way.”

John Bender, based in Allentown, Pa., is a graduate of Eastern Mennonite University and Eastern Mennonite Seminary. He and his wife, Marilyn Handrich Bender, started Raleigh (N.C.) Mennonite Church, where they co-pastored for 18 years. For the past nine years, John pastored Pittsburgh Mennonite Church.

In July 2013 the Benders moved to Allentown, Pa., where John is the part-time director of Ripple Community, Inc., a ministry of the RIPPLE congregation. He is also interim associate pastor of the Franconia congregation.

Bender served in a number of leadership capacities with Virginia Mennonite Conference and Allegheny Mennonite Conference and has close to 30 years of pastoral ministry experience.

“I care deeply about pastors and churches and helping them to pursue healthy relationships together, and I hope I can be a resource to pastors and a guide along the way,” Bender said.

Both Bender and Siahaan bring fresh perspectives and proven track records as they join the team of LEADership ministers resourcing congregations in mission and ministry, said Ertell Whigham, Franconia’s executive minister. “We feel that both John and Aldo bring a variety of gifts and experience that will help us to provide the support congregations need while enabling us to continue the intercultural work that we have stated as one of our conference’s values.”

LEAD is the conference’s platform for oversight, designed to Lead, Equip, And Disciple both lay and credentialed leadership as they guide congregations. A congregation’s LEAD team is comprised of a LEADership minister, the pastor, the chair of the congregation’s governing body (when relevant), and a LEAD advisor from beyond the congregation. LEADership ministers serve as the primary point of contact between congregations and Franconia Conference.

Recovering catholicity

April 1, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Steve Kriss, Director of Leadership Cultivation

I still remember the words of my tour guide in St. John Lateran in Rome. She referred to our group’s Protestants with loving disdain. She announced, “For the Protestants here, I want you to remember that this was your ‘Vatican’ — the center of the Western church for centuries before you splintered away. Your faith has come to you through this space.”

I sought to find my own story in the midst of the grand, bright cathedral on Rome’s east side, close to the city wall. In my six months living in Rome, this worship space became significant as I worked to reconcile myself with the “catholicity” of my faith.

Walter Klassen’s book Anabaptism: Neither Protestant nor Catholic was published a year after I was born. His phrasing shaped many of the ways we Anabaptists have understood ourselves within the Christian story — as belonging to neither tradition. Upon reflection later in life, Klassen suggested the book might have been better titled with “both/and” rather than “neither/nor.”

I’d say it is clear that Anabaptists have been Protestants, but we have yet to live into what might be possible if we take our catholicity seriously.

In these days of Mennonite Church USA turmoil, what does it mean to embrace the best of catholicity?

Anabaptists are more than local, temporal communities. New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman writes that to flourish in a global era, organizations will need to embrace both their local and global nature. In the church, this suggests both the local and the catholic (global) are essential for identity and decision-making.

While many of us are biased appropriately toward our localities, we cannot ignore our catholicity, our togetherness. Privileging local discernment alone can ignore both the possibility and responsibility of living within and incarnating God’s shalom intended for all of the world.

Localities can be just as toxic, menacing and oppressive as distant and hierarchal systems that don’t understand the local or respect the relational context — where we sit face to face, see eye to eye, in relationship with one another.

Neither our locality nor our temporality alone will effectively shape our discernment and trajectory in a global age. Our faith and movement is undeniably interconnected (even though at times we wish it weren’t) and providential (part of the holy intention of the Spirit to cultivate a peoplehood beyond racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, national boundedness).

Localities can become self-referential and ignore the voice of the other. Our willingness to tell the story of a God who loved the world so much must be tied to a willingness to do likewise across the chasms of difference of experience and interpretation.

Our lifetimes will be filled with relentless questions and complexities presented by the gospel and our cultural contexts. Though it may be easier to disintegrate into 100 million blooming localities, I wonder if the time and the Spirit might not require more of us. I can’t shake the idea that Jesus’ final prayers for us included a plea for “oneness.” I hear this as an invitation to catholicity — a community that goes beyond the local, into the holy intention of mutuality.

Withdrawing into familiar localities is the invitation of the spirit of our age but not the invitation of the Spirit of our Lord. The Spirit and the Word require much more of us.

Conference focus groups provide feedback for national meetings

March 27, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Sheldon C. Good

Ten leaders from Franconia Conference congregations voiced wide-ranging perspectives during two conference calls held recently to garner feedback on a controversial action taken by Mountain States Mennonite Conference earlier this year. In addition to those on the conference calls, about a dozen other leaders and delegates submitted written responses to Franconia Conference.

Franconia Conference executive minister Ertell Whigham convened the calls on March 15 and 16. His goal was to listen to leaders’ perspectives in preparation for a meeting of the Constituency Leadership Council, or CLC, of Mennonite Church USA held March 20-22 in North Newton, Kan.

In response to a decision by Mountain States to license a pastor in a committed same-sex relationship, the Executive Board of MC USA appointed a task force to frame questions for discussion at the CLC meeting. The conference calls included persons from across the conference invited to provide insight and counsel in preparation for the meeting. Persons were chosen to represent a diversity of perspectives. About half of those invited participated.

Whigham, moderator John Goshow, and board member Klaudia Smucker (Bally congregation) represented Franconia Conference at the CLC meeting. Beny Krisbianto of Nations Worship Center also attended representing the Indonesian Mennonite Fellowship (a national group within Mennonite Church USA).

Whigham invited leaders on the calls to respond to three questions: What is your prayer for the leaders of our denomination and conference? What would be one important question that would represent the thoughts of the constituents within your congregation or community? What is one perspective of hope and one of challenge that you see within our denomination and our conference?

During the call Angela Moyer, co-pastor of RIPPLE in Allentown, Pa., said people in her congregation “have little to no awareness” about the discussions going on at the conference or denominational level.

“People at RIPPLE are concerned about having a place to sleep, food to eat, and friends that care about them,” she said in an interview reflecting on the conference call. “People know that RIPPLE is safe and caring; we treat one another with dignity as people and not statistics. Other people on the conference call seemed surprised [when I said this] and appreciated this perspective.”

Prayers from those on the calls included that fellow church leaders would: be led by the Holy Spirit, continue to be humble, and allow Christ to be at the center of all decisions; continue to find ways to be faithful in the midst of difference; work toward unity and understanding; be bold and avoid perfectionism; be sensitive to the needs of church members; and maintain spiritual integrity and values while leading.

The leaders wondered what following Jesus in the 21st century looks like and how to respond faithfully to Micah 6:8. They wondered how many people would leave the church because of the Mountain States decision. Some expressed their hope for spaces where church members could be “real and vulnerable.” Hopes of the leaders revolved around how to practice faithful discipleship, right relationship, and the lordship of Christ. Challenges focused on whether unity is possible.

Similar themes emerged during the Kansas CLC meeting.

According to an article by Gordon Houser in TMail, Mennonite Church USA executive director Ervin Stutzman said that over the last few weeks he has received hundreds of emails, which he categorized into three groupings: 1) greater inclusion of LGBT individuals, 2) faithfulness to the traditional stance, and 3) unity. Stutzman called the CLC meetings “a referendum on the Membership Guidelines” that were adopted at Nashville 2001.

Those attending the CLC meetings, including Whigham, Goshow, Krisbianto and Smucker, participated in table-group discussion on a serious of questions related to Mountain States’ decision. The task force appointed by the MC USA Executive Board plans to draft a recommendation for consideration by the Executive Board at its June 26–28 meeting in Chicago.

The focus group invitations included credentialed and delegate representatives from 20 congregations. Representatives from Bethany, Deep Run East, Doylestown, Finland, Franconia, Plains, Ripple, Salford and West Philadelphia participated in the calls. Representatives from Boyertown, Blooming Glen, Line Lexington, Nueva Vida Norristown New Life, Philadelphia Praise, Rocky Ridge and Souderton congregations were also invited but unable to attend at the scheduled conference call times. A few of those invitees who were unable to participate in the calls submitted written responses.

Constituency Leaders Council meets, offers direction to Executive Board

March 26, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Beny Krisbianto CLC — Karen Cox, moderator of Mountain States Mennonite Conference and pastor of Boulder (Colo.) Mennonite Church, is served communion by Beny Krisbianto, pastor of Nations Worship Center in Philadelphia, and Geri Jeanguneat of Clinton, Miss., a representative for Native Mennonite Ministries. (Photo by Hannah Heinzekehr)

NORTH NEWTON, Kan. (Mennonite Church USA)—Eighty-four leaders from across Mennonite Church USA gathered for the spring meeting of the Constituency Leaders Council (CLC) at Bethel College in North Newton, Kan., from Thursday, March 20, through Saturday, March 22.

The CLC members spent the majority of their time together offering feedback to six questions regarding church structure, polity and relationships, in reference to a decision by Mountain States Mennonite Conference (MSMC) to license a pastor in a committed same-gender relationship on Feb. 2. The questions were developed by a task force commissioned by the Executive Board (EB) and chaired by Moderator-Elect Patricia Shelly.

CLC members were urged to “trust God and trust each other,” to listen deeply and respectfully to one another and to spend time in worship and silence listening for God’s leading for Mennonite Church USA. Members of the Newton community set up a prayer room across from the CLC meeting space, and members of local Mennonite congregations were invited to come and pray for CLC members and their ongoing work.

Throughout the weekend, participants remarked on the care and respect that CLC members modeled for one another.

“The level of care for each other was extraordinary,” said David Boshart of Wellman, Iowa, task force member, CLC member and executive conference minister of Central Plains Mennonite Conference, in a report to the group on Saturday. “If we can carry that sense of extraordinary care to the rest of the church, they would be astonished at how God can work in human hearts.”

On Thursday, the meetings included time for MSMC leaders to share about the year-and-a-half-long discernment process that led to the decision to license Theda Good for ministry at First Mennonite Church in Denver.

MSMC leaders told their story using Scripture, prayer, worship through song and personal sharing. They also presented a timeline to CLC participants that illustrated the steps in their process. Those present had the opportunity to ask clarifying questions regarding MSMC’s process on Friday morning.

In response to what was shared, both Herm Weaver, MSMC conference minister, and Ervin Stutzman, executive director of Mennonite Church USA, identified some points of regret and things they might have done differently throughout the process.

The CLC spent Friday responding to the following questions posed by the task force:

Having heard from Mountain States Mennonite Conference (MSMC) and the report of the task force, what feedback does the CLC want to communicate to the leadership of the MSMC?
What is God saying to us and to Mennonite Church USA, as we listen and reflect?
Are there better ways than our current organization (and written statements) to cultivate relationships between congregations, area conferences and the denomination?
How will we tend our common life as Mennonite Church USA, especially in light of differing beliefs and practices?
What direction can the CLC offer the Executive Board as they tend to the relationships among congregations, area conferences and the denomination at this time in our history?
What direction can the CLC offer the Executive Board as they respond to MSMC’s recent credentialing process?

CLC members discussed each of these questions in table groups and then reported back to the larger group. CLC members acknowledged that MSMC’s actions place the area conference at variance with the relational covenant the conference made when it joined Mennonite Church USA in 2005. Table groups offered suggestions for how the EB could respond to the variance reflected by the MSMC decision as it impacts relationships with the rest of the church. The task force will compile and synthesize the table groups’ responses and report back to the CLC by May 1. The task force will then draft a recommendation for consideration by the EB at its June 26–28 meeting in Chicago.

CLC members urged the task force and the EB to tend to the relationship with MSMC. In addition, they encouraged the EB and task force to address the broader conversations and disagreements across the church regarding same-gender relationships. The CLC also expressed a strong hope for finding a way to be together, suggesting that the EB explore new models for relationship among area conferences and congregations. The Purposeful Plan—a 10-year strategic plan for Mennonite Church USA—was held up as a guide for the work that churchwide agencies, area conferences and congregations can collaborate on in spite of disagreement in other areas.

The CLC also called for a confessional report recounting the process and interactions between the EB and MSMC. Task force members will engage this work as they compile and interpret the responses from the table groups.

The importance of face-to-face conversation was named repeatedly. Several area conference leaders said they are looking for ways to promote healthier and more frequent inter-conference conversation and relationship-building in the future.

In their concluding reflections, task force members said, “We were told by countless people that they were praying for the CLC and our Church during these days. God’s presence among us has been palpable, and we have sensed the moving of God’s Spirit. We are not leaving the same. As we leave this meeting, let us continue to pray that God will open a way for our Church to not only survive, but thrive.”

“Come and See”: Mennonite leaders visit Israel/Palestine

March 25, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Participants in the Mennonite learning tour of Israel/Palestine visit the separation wall in the Aida Refugee Camp in Bethlehem. The wall cuts off the camp from an olive grove where residents used to work and play. (l. to r.) Isaac Villegas, Stanley Green, Ann Graber Hershberger, Mohammad Al-Azzah (Palestinian tour guide), Joy Sutter, Joanna Hiebert Bergen (MCC Jerusalem staff), Ron Byler, Tanya Ortman, Chad Horning, Ed Diller and Duane Oswald. (Photo by Ryan Rodrick Beiler)

by Jenn Carreto for Mennonite Church USA

Fifteen board members and staff representing various Mennonite agencies and organizations traveled to Israel/Palestine Feb. 24–March 4 to take part in a “Come and See” learning tour; participants included Joy Sutter, a member of Mennonite Church USA’s Executive Board from Salford congregation, and Noel Santiago, a member of Mennonite Education Agency’s board and a staff member for Franconia Conference.The tour marked the beginning of a denominational initiative to send 100 Mennonite leaders to the region on similar tours over the next five years.

While Mennonites have been involved in relief work, service, witness and peacemaking in the region for more than 65 years, the tour was organized in response to a 2009 appeal from Palestinian Christians called “Kairos Palestine: A Moment of Truth”

A coalition representing a range of Christians in Palestine—including Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant and Evangelical—issued the open letter to the global body of Christ as “a word of faith, hope and love from the heart of Palestinian suffering.” They invited Christian organizations and faith groups to “come and see, in order to understand our reality.”

“The memories of our experiences keep intruding on my everyday thoughts some two weeks after our return,” reflected Chad Horning of Goshen, Ind., Chief Investment Officer of Everence and a member of the learning tour. “I am inspired by the steadfastness of Palestinians and Israelis alike in working for peace in the face of many years of disappointments.”

The learning tour followed the path of Jesus’ life by traveling to Bethlehem, Nazareth, Galilee and finally, Jerusalem. Along the way, they visited Bethlehem Bible College, Nazareth Village, refugee camps, settlements and community organizations, meeting local activists and villagers in each setting and hearing their stories. In Jerusalem they spent time at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial, and attended a Jewish Sabbath service. The group also connected with people serving with Mennonite Central Committee, Mennonite Mission Network and Christian Peacemaker Teams.

Participants were left with much to contemplate and share with their faith communities. Horning said he gained a better understanding of the terms often used to describe life in the region.

“Words like security, wall, border, military, settler, outpost, tear gas, demolition, rubber-coated bullet, and confiscation have more meaning when I tell the stories of people we met and who live in the context of these sterile terms,” he said.

Participants brought with them a range of experience and familiarity with the region. Some had visited or served there, but most were witnessing the realities for the first time.

Madeline Maldonado, associate pastor of Iglesia Evangélica Menonita Arca de Salvación, Fort Myers, Fla., and board chair for Mennonite Mission Network, was a first-time visitor to the region. Before leaving, she shared, “I hope to experience the culture and the conflict. I hope to feel the pain and frustration that are felt there. I pray that I can see God in what seems impossible for my Western and Latina mind to comprehend. I pray that God opens my eyes.”

Isaac Villegas, pastor of Chapel Hill (N.C.) Mennonite Fellowship and Mennonite Church USA Executive Board member, shared reflections four days into the tour: “I’ve seen too much. Towering walls stretching for mile after mile, turning Palestinian cities into open-air prisons. Can I choose not to see … the used tear gas canisters I held in my hand—used against Palestinian youth, bought with my taxes, manufactured by a U.S. company in Pennsylvania?”

In addition to questions about the United States government’s involvement in the region, the group was encouraged the consider questions of faith in new light.

“Our experience gave us new insight into Jesus’ life and ministry, as well as the current situation,” said André Gingerich Stoner, director of holistic witness and interchurch relations for Mennonite Church USA. “We return better prepared to pray and work for God’s peace and blessing for everyone in this land.”

In 2011, Mennonite Church USA Executive Director Ervin Stutzman—in consultation with the Executive Board (EB)—responded to the writers of the Kairos Palestine letter, committing to expand opportunities for Mennonite leaders and members to visit Palestine and learn firsthand about the suffering there. Stutzman and the EB also wrote a letter to members of Mennonite Church USA, asking them to read and discuss the Kairos document, to study Scriptures together on the matter and to consider how their financial lives may be enmeshed in the occupation of Israel.

In 2013, the EB underscored its desire to help the church more fully understand both the Israeli and Palestinian experiences and the role of Christian Zionism in this conflict. A “Come and See” fund was established with initial contributions from Mennonite Central Committee U.S., Mennonite Mission Network and Everence to offer some scholarships for present and future learning tours. Individuals, agencies and local congregations covered the remainder, according to Stoner.

For more reflections from learning tour participants, see: www.mennoniteusa.org/2014/02/26/israel-palestine-learning-tour-travelogue

The next Israel/Palestine learning tour is scheduled for October 2014 and will include participants from Franconia Mennonite Conference, Eastern District Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference. There are limited spots available and some possible financial assistance is available as well. Contact Steve Kriss, skriss@mosaicmennonites.org, to express interest and learn more. To be considered as part of the delegation, you must contact Steve by April 7, 2014. This trip is intended for persons who have not previously traveled to the region.

Three local teachers honored with National Teacher Awards

March 20, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

Salford Monica Araway — Monica Araway at the Salford Mennonite Childcare Center in Towamencin. Photo by Geoff Patton

by Victoria Wolk, reposted by permission from The Reporter Online

Three local teachers have been honored by the Terri Lynne Lokoff Child Care Foundation, a King of Prussia-based nonprofit “dedicated to making America better by improving early care and education,” according to its website.

Each year, the TLLCCF chooses approximately 50 teachers from across the country for its National Child Care Teacher Awards. The local award recipients this year are Monica Araya, Inga Mountain and Amy Wertz. To apply for the award, each teacher had to submit a proposal for a classroom enhancement project. The winners receive $500 to fund their projects, as well as $500 for personal use.

Monica Araya teaches 2 and 3-year-olds at the Salford Mennonite Child Care Center in Lansdale. About one-third of her toddlers have parents from other countries, Araya explained, so she chose to create a project based on international sports. “It’ll educate my children on the different cultures they have in their classroom,” she said.

The students will learn about sports such as soccer, baseball, cricket and bocce. To go along with each sport, Araya will invite parents to come in and talk about playing those sports when they were young. She also plans on incorporating related books into the project.

Her classroom recently celebrated Diversity Week, during which students were asked to share things from home that reflect their various cultures. “It’s showing them that it doesn’t matter what our friends look like; we can all still be friends,” Araya said. It’s important to teach them that lesson at a young age, she said.

In addition to learning about different cultures, the students will also learn about teamwork and have a chance to work on their developmental skills. It’s good for them to learn the “importance of moving around,” she said.

Inga Mountain, who teaches kids between ages 3 and 6 at the Montessori Children’s House in Horsham, proposed buying a light table for her classroom. Light tables, which are backlit by LED lights, were originally used by artists, she said. A few years ago, the tables started to move into preschool classrooms.

Light tables are perfect for things like tracing, which helps preschoolers with their hand-eye coordination, Mountain said. The tables can also be used for fingerpainting and mixing colors; if you put red on top of yellow, it will look orange.

Only one kid at a time will be allowed to use the table. That gets them to focus on the task at hand, Mountain said, something which has become increasingly difficult since the introduction of modern technology. “A lot of technology that we have is actually doing the opposite” of helping kids focus, she said. Mountain plans on buying the table in the coming months.

The third local winner is Amy Wertz, who is a teacher in an infant classroom at Upper Gwynedd Child Learning Center. Her idea was to create an infant sensory garden on one of the center’s playgrounds. “We want babies to experience things through their senses,” she said. “That’s how they learn.”

The garden will consist of two planters surrounding a four-foot-arch, which will be the focal point of the garden. The planters will hold brightly colored flowers, carrots, elephant ear plants and more, Wertz said. There will also be mint for the babies to smell, and shorter planters around the garden will contain rocks and sand for them to touch.

“The garden takes a lot of upkeep, but I’m very passionate about it,” Wertz said. The project costs a little more than the $500 awarded by the TLLCCF, she said, but the child care center has offered to fund the rest.

In April, Araya, Mountain and Wertz will join winning teachers from around the country at Philadelphia’s Please Touch Museum for a special ceremony.

Reflections on "All You Need is Love"

March 19, 2014 by Emily Ralph Servant

by Diane Bleam, Bally congregation

A lot has changed since I last attended a Women Doing Theology Conference in Bluffton, Ohio in 1994. I was excited to attend “Anabaptist Women Doing Theology Conference: All You Need is Love” in Leesburg, VA on February 20-22 for some theological stimulation as well as to observe how young women are experiencing theology in the church today.

The most refreshing aspect of this conference for me was sharing with women from other ethnic groups, hearing their experiences, joys, and struggles as women leaders in the church. As one of the older attendees, most of whom were young women, I was encouraged by the energy and competency of many women and by their ability to step out and take risks.

I found that racial and ethnic differences are still an issue, although the issues are sometimes more subtle as we have become more sensitized to the long-standing oppression of many women. I was reminded how very difficult it is to overcome historical assumptions, whether related to gender, ethnic, or sexuality biases.

The women I met were strong women, women willing to take risks, while at the same time giving and receiving affirmation and appreciation, as evidenced by many public expressions of thanks and praise of work well done. It reminded me of the difference between a gathering led by men, with brief acknowledgements of thanks (maybe), and a women’s banquet, where everyone gets flowers. Not that one is necessarily better than another, just different.

While I didn’t notice much anger, I did notice a lot of determination. There was also grief and joy; many of us shed tears at different times. There were calls for justice in the face of any kind of oppression, and calls for solidarity among women. While I was sometimes uncomfortable being with so many women because I’ve spent most of my public ministry working with men, it was refreshing to see women learning from one another and being strong supports to one another.

Women being created in the image of God inspired rich experiences of worship and rituals. God’s immanence was emphasized as we sought to find God’s presence within ourselves.

If the conference schedule was an indication, much is expected by and from women today. I returned from the Conference exhausted, missing my own youthfulness, while at the same time feeling that these young women are well-prepared to go beyond those who came before. I’m excited to see where they take us.

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