wfn.org | Speakers, Preachers Highlight Gathering of PW

[PCUSA.NEWS@pcusa.org]

16-July-1997 
97280 
 
            Outstanding Speakers, Preachers Highlight 
            Churchwide Gathering of Presbyterian Women 
 
                         by Julian Shipp 
                         and Alexa Smith 
 
LOUISVILLE, Ky.--Uniting nearly 6,000 strong here July 9-13 for its 
triennial meeting, the Churchwide Gathering of Presbyterian Women was 
highlighted by outstanding speakers and preachers from across the 
denomination and beyond. 
 
     With the main theme "Surrounded by a Cloud of Witnesses" taken from 
Hebrews 12:1-2a, the Gathering offered participants the opportunity to 
celebrate their oneness in Christ, their identity as Presbyterian Women and 
their commitment to the Presbyterian Women purpose, which is to nurture 
their faith through prayer and Bible study, to support the mission of the 
church globally, to work for justice and peace, and to build an inclusive, 
caring community of women that strengthens the denomination.  
 
     Plenary leaders were Dr. Thelma C. Davidson Adair, moderator of the 
188th General Assembly of the former United Presbyterian Church in the 
U.S.A.;  Dr. Renita J. Weems, author of "Just a Sister Away" and associate 
professor of Old Testament studies at Vanderbilt University Divinity 
School; Felicia Ekejiuba, chief of the Africa section of the United Nations 
Development Fund for Women; and the Rev. Marta Benavides, a Salvadorian 
educator and Baptist minister. 
 
     Bible study and theology leaders were Dr. Miriam Therese Winter, 
professor of liturgy, worship, spirituality and feminist studies at 
Hartford (Conn.) Seminary, and Dr. Jane Dempsey Douglass, professor of 
historical theology at Princeton Theological Seminary, president of the 
World Alliance of Reformed Churches and daily theologian-in-residence 
during the conference. 
 
     Gathering preachers were the Rev. Angela L. Ying, executive secretary 
of the Church Council of Greater Seattle; the Rev. Sarah Jo Sarchet, a 
recipient of the Austin Scholarship for Leadership Potential at the J. L. 
Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University; the Rev. 
Danelle C. Crawford McKinney, pastor of six PC(USA) congregations on the 
Nez Perc Indian Reservation in northern Idaho; and the Rev. Eileen 
Williams Lindner, a Presbyterian pastor and associate general secretary for 
Christian unity on the staff of the National Council of Churches of Christ 
in the U.S.A. 
 
      On July 9, few remained unmoved by Adair's opening plenary address 
titled "A Covenant to Keep: Legacy of the Past, Vision of the Future." Even 
those scarcely able stood on their feet in respect as Adair was assisted 
back into her wheelchair. 
 
     "We are pressing forward in the race," Adair said. "First, by the 
ministry of our presence. It is the quality of our relationships which 
become the catalyst for change. Next, it is the efficacy of our response -- 
its grounding in reality. Third is that we are witnesses and must realize 
someone might take that witness seriously enough to imitate us." 
 
     During her July 10 sermon "Square Pegs and Round Holes," which tied 
into that day's theme of  "Seeking Oneness in God's Creation," Ying said it 
is an incorrect assumption of Western culture that economic injustice is 
consistent with Christ's teachings and that community is defined by 
sameness. 
 
     "If we can acknowledge and grapple with these [assumptions], we can 
then come together," Ying said. "We can be with the other. We can listen to 
the victims and the hurt stories. We can see the gifts that each of us 
uniquely carries. And by the presence of a gracious, merciful and mighty 
God, we too can begin to dare and lay aside every weight and every burden." 
 
     Speaking also July 10 on the theme of oneness in Christ, Weems, 
keynote speaker for the evening, said she believes Christian solidarity is 
obtained through a conversion of the heart. Weems, an African American who 
described herself as a "recovering racist" following a lifetime of 
harboring feelings of racial bigotry toward whites, said God used the birth 
of her four-year-old daughter Savannah to show her the evil of racial 
prejudice and hatred. 
 
     Centering her remarks on Revelation 7:14, Weems called on Presbyterian 
women to continue to remain steadfast in the love of Jesus Christ despite 
society's divisive obstacles of racism, sexism and classicism. 
 
     "There is still a chance for us to change our hearts if not our 
minds," Weems said. "Let us for the sake of our children learn to be one in 
Christ." 
 
     During her July 11 sermon "Cross Training," which she tied into the 
day's theme of "Running with Perseverance," Sarchet praised women for their 
unique strength and resiliency despite the social, economic and political 
barriers they face in society.  
 
     Speaking from 1 Timothy 4:7-10, Sarchet encouraged Presbyterian women 
to keep themselves spiritually trained for a godly life, since doing so 
promises life both for the present and the future. 
 
     "Christian women are God's people and we know about perseverance," 
Sarchet said. "Women who are children of God use their faith and talents 
for God's goodness. And isn't that what Presbyterians are doing these days 
-- persevering in the search for God's revelation?" 
 
     July 11 keynote speaker Felicia Ekejiuba, chief of the Africa section 
of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), presented a 
briefing on UNIFEM and its goals titled "Women's Development Agenda for the 
Twenty-first Century." 
 
     She said UNIFEM provides direct support for women's projects globally 
and promotes the inclusion of women in the decision-making processes of 
mainstream development programs.  UNIFEM's mission is to support efforts of 
women in the developing world to achieve their objectives for economic and 
social development and for equality, and by so doing to improve the quality 
of life for all. 
 
     "We can change things if there is a will, if there is wisdom and if we 
have a determination to work," Ekejiuba said. 
 
     In her sermon, "Responding to God through Late-Night Feedings," 
McKinney urged Presbyterian women to reflect on how sacrifice pleases God 
-- be it Noah's offering after surviving the watery holocaust or the 
sacrificial response of women to a needy world.  "When God is pleased," the 
Native American minister told the Gathering, "[we are given] something in 
return to show how much God loves us." 
 
     Benavides took that argument one step further, insisting that God not 
only loves believers, but needs their lives to make God's dreams for this 
world come to life.  She pushed her listeners to demonstrate faith -- and 
to resist shallow expressions of faith -- in the face of injustices such as 
outrageous costs for basic health care and education.  "We are [called] to 
live simply but not to simply live. ... 
 
     "We are," she said, "the way to this new world order of peace, justice 
and love that we dream of."  Benavides -- a Latin American activist -- said 
believers are to remember the plenitude that God has promised for life and 
to celebrate it. 
 
     Sunday morning's Communion service wrapped up the week's worship, as 
Lindner unraveled Luke's post-Resurrection tale along the Emmaus Road. 
Stressing how hard it is to recognize Christ in the face of a stranger, 
Lindner said Christians are called to do just that.  But it is harder 
still, she told the Gathering, to recognize Christ when believers are 
standing still looking sad, as Cleopas was on that long-ago day. 
 
     "Ya gotta get on down the road to Emmaus," she said, urging the church 
to understand  that privledge has to give way so that the burdens of others 
may be lifted. 
 
 

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