Women of Color scholars must lift all women's voices, bishop says
Aug. 14, 2006 News media contact: Linda Green * (615) 7425470* Nashville {480}
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By Linda Green*
CHICAGO (UMNS) - Women of color scholars must address some specific challenges in church academic life to ensure the voices of all women are heard, according to one of the denomination's bishops.
Bishop Minerva Carcaño, who leads the denomination's Desert Southwest Annual (regional) Conference, spoke to a consultation of clergywomen of color scholars Aug. 13 about the boundaries that must be transcended in order for all women to follow the path of Christ. The consultation was organized to celebrate the United Methodist Church's Women of Color Scholars Program as well as identify challenges ahead.
The bishop applauded the growing number of women of color who have earned advanced degrees in the church, but she noted that the lack of Hispanic/Latina, Native American and Pacific Islander women must be addressed. The Women of Color Scholars Program must find ways to encourage and accompany all women of color who have the gifts for intellectual pursuit and teaching, Carcaño said.
She urged African-American and Asian clergywomen in academia to "transcend the racial boundaries and encourage women of other ethnicities to join you, giving them your best wisdom, your best support."
In addition to recruiting people from other ethnic groups, she urged the care and support of women of color who are ostracized because they are lesbian, bisexual or transgender. Carcaño said she has often been told to cease advocating for their inclusion, but she tells her critics that "if another suffers then it is my suffering; it is our suffering. And we will never be whole and well until all God's children are accepted not as we would like them to be, but as God made them."
People of faith are called to be a community where all are welcomed and received, she added.
Competitive atmosphere
A second boundary the women of color scholars must recognize and address is the competitive nature of academic work. Individual scholars are required to bring original contributions to the table, and a fear exists that ideas and proposals could be stolen, she said. That boundary will be knocked down when seminaries and universities realize that an atmosphere of mutual respect and integrity - along with a vision of serving God together - is more conducive to a sharing of ideas.
The seminaries need to be reminded that God's work is done in community and not in competition, she told the pastors and scholars. Regardless of whether the work is done in the seminary or in church, Carcaño said, "we are called to point not to ourselves but to God, and we are to be builders not of our own reigns, but rather builders together of the reign of God."
In the last 10 years, a boundary has existed between academia and the church, she said. The church wants good pastors to make God's word relevant to people, but some in academia say the seminaries exist to produce theologians and scholars, not pastors, she said.
When she was in seminary, she saw a disregard for the work of the church, and she sees that same disregard today, she said. "A false dichotomy in the life of the church" has arisen because the church and seminaries exist separately from one another, she said.
While the intellectual freedom of a seminary is important, Carcaño said those institutions should train students to think critically, theologically and exegetically. "The purpose of the Christian academy is to serve Christ and enable Christ's church to be the church in the world," she said.
Sacred work
Carcaño applauded the assistance a seminary gave to the Council of Bishops after the United Methodist Judicial Council (the church's supreme court) affirmed a Virginia clergyman's denial of church membership to a gay man. She said the seminary's perspective on the implications of the ruling demonstrated the "interrelatedness of our parts in the sacred work we all hold common."
And the bishop congratulated those who created the Women of Color Scholars Program 18 years ago. Administered by the Office of Loans and Scholarships and Division of Ordained Ministry of the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry, the program addresses concerns about the lack of women of color faculty in United Methodist seminaries.
Said Carcaño: "I also give thanks for those of you who had the wisdom to know that without the voice of women of color, the work of the academy and the work of the church were incomplete."
*Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in Nashville, Tenn.
News media contact: Linda Green, (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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