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Note #8319 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

Presbyterians urged to mine 'mother lode'
GA04028
June 27, 2004

Presbyterians urged to mine 'mother lode'

1st black female ordained in Presbyterian church inspires luncheon group

by Corey Schlosser-Hall

RICHMOND, June 27  - The Rev. Katie Geneva Cannon urged her listeners at
Sunday's Witherspoon Society luncheon to draw on "the mother lode of life
lessons" that African-Americans have learned over centuries about persisting
in spite of setbacks.

Cannon is the first African-American woman ordained in the Presbyterian
church, who said her family has been Presbyterian "since we arrived as
Africans."

"We (African-Americans) know our hope is in the struggle," she said.

Cannon, the Annie Scales Rogers Professor of Christian Ethics at Union
Theological Seminary/Presbyterian School of Christian Education (Union-PSCE)
in Richmond, spoke to an audience of about 250 men and women on "The Power of
Ontological Blackness in the Presbyterian Tradition." (Ontology is the study
of the nature of being.)

Her address incorporated her personal experiences, African-Americans'
historic struggle for justice and civil rights, and the current struggles in
the Presbyterian Church (USA).

"I wanted to inspire the Witherspoon Society, encourage them not to quit,"
she said after the meeting. "Quitting is not an option."

She told the largely white audience that her African-American "sisters and
brothers ... have known from the get-go, from the beginning," how to stay the
course.

She spoke of an incident that took place shortly after her 1974 ordination
(in the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America) when she
attended a conference of women of color at a hotel. She said a hotel
attendant "looked at my clerical collar, slammed me into a wall, and said,
'How dare you defy Jesus Christ?'"

She said she shared that story with a reporter years later, and the reporter
turned it over to a fact-checker who refused to publish it, saying that it
could not have happened.

"There was no evidence that the hotel was there," she said, because it has
long since been torn down - "but that did not mean my truth was a lie."

She said fear is not "a luxury we can afford ... even when the truth of our
private experience appears stranger than public fiction, even when people
slam us into walls.

"We need to read and write, even when the lights are out," she said. "Study
the life lessons handed to black Americans ... body slam after body slam. And
walk to freedom, taking a bunch of folks with us."

The audience erupted in a standing ovation.

Catherine Stegall, an African-American from Milwaukee, WI, said Cannon had
"put words and ideas to feelings that I have," and "helped me affirm my
commitment to the Presbyterian Church."

"She raised the energy for commitment," said Barbara Smith, of Lathrop
Village, MI.

The Witherspoon Society presented its annual Whole Gospel Church Award to
Richmond's All Souls Presbyterian Church, for its role in the Civil Rights
movement and its continued commitment to the "whole gospel" The church's
pastor, the Rev. Ulysses Payne, led a delegation that was present to accept
the award.

The Rev. Douglas F. Ottati, a professor at Union-PSCE and an author, received
the society's annual Andrew Murray Award, which honors an individual for
Christian service and witness reflecting the society's commitment to justice
and peace. The presenter, the Rev. Trina Zella, of Tempe, AZ, credited
Ottatti with putting the "bounce back into Barthes, sizzle into
Schleiermacher and capaciousness into Calvin."

The Witherspoon Society says in its mission statement that it responds to
"God's call to do justice ... and to work with hope for healing and wholeness
in a world increasingly broken."

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