wfn.org | Shaw center celebrates 20th anniversary

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG>]

Oct. 28, 1998	Contact: Linda Bloom·(212) 870-3803·New York     {632}

By United Methodist News Service

The Anna Howard Shaw Center at Boston University School of Theology will
recognize its fourth "pioneer woman" and celebrate its 20th anniversary
on Oct. 29.

Founded in 1978, the ecumenical center promotes the empowerment of women
in the church. Its goals include:

* Facilitating research on the historical roles of women in the church,
and women's past and present contributions to theology and ministry.
* Providing educational opportunities on issues and practices relating
to women in ministry.
* Supporting women and men striving for equality of opportunity in
ministry, mission and religious/theological studies.
* Advocating for full inclusion of women in ministry, mission and study.

Margaret Suber Wiborg, hired in 1984 as its first full-time director,
continues in that role today and is being honored with the center's
annual Pioneer Woman Award in recognition of her efforts.

Wiborg helped develop the center from a meeting place for students and
faculty to its designation as the Women's Center of the Northeastern
Jurisdiction, United Methodist Church. Programs begun under her
leadership include the Oral History Project, Women's Study Series,
Women, Work and Wholeness Workshops, the ReImaging Redemption symposium,
the Woman and the Word annual preaching event and the nationwide United
Methodist Clergywoman Retention Study.

In 1878, Anna Howard Shaw, the center's namesake, was the second woman
to graduate from Boston University School of Theology. However, she was
refused ordination by the New England Conference of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. Two years later, she was one of the first women to be
ordained in any branch of Methodism when approved by the New York
Conference of the Methodist Protestant Church.

While serving as a pastor, Shaw earned a medical degree from Boston
University and later lectured around the world for the causes of
temperance, women's suffrage and peace. She and Anna Snowden Oliver,
Boston School of Theology's first woman graduate, were posthumously
elected as full members of the former United Methodist Southern New
England Conference in 1989.

United Methodist News Service
(615)742-5470
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