wfn.org | Enthusiastic Crowd Greets Women of Faith Award Winners

[PCUSA NEWS <pcusa.news@ecunet.org>]

GA99023 
20-June-1999 
 
                    Enthusiastic Crowd Greets  
                   Women of Faith Award Winners 
 
FORT WORTH A wildly enthusiastic crowd of more than 500 Presbyterians paid 
tribute to the 1999 Women of Faith Award winners Sunday, belying the 
controversy that has swirled around one of them for two months. 
     The three recipients   professor emirita Jane Dempsey Douglass of 
Princeton Theological Seminary; the Rev. Letty Russell, a professor at Yale 
Divinity School; and the Rev. Jane Adams Spahr, an openly lesbian 
"evangelist" for an outreach ministry to gay, lesbian, bisexual and 
transgendered people called "That All May Freely Serve"   were chosen early 
in April from among 58 nominees for the annual awards.   
     Forty-seven women have been honored since the Women of Faith Awards 
were instituted in 1986. 
     A furor erupted over the decision to honor Spahr, the most visible 
advocate in the church for the ordination of gay and lesbian persons to 
church office.  Various church committees first rescinded and then restored 
the award.  Last Thursday, the General Assembly Council seemingly settled 
the dispute by voting 41-40 to let the award to Spahr go forward.  Many are 
anticipating a commissioners' resolution asking the Assembly to overturn 
the award. 
     But all of that was at least temporarily forgotten at the Women of 
Faith Awards Breakfast as Spahr was greeted with a prolonged, standing 
ovation.  And with her customary grace and humor, Spahr thanked supporters, 
paying special tribute to the unnamed GAC member who cast the deciding vote 
on Thursday.  "Whoever you are," she said, "there is a special place in 
heaven for you!" 
     Spahr expressed the hope that her award would bring Presbyterians 
closer together.  "We are all people of faith together," she said.  "The 
difference is that for this moment, the people who have no voice or vote 
because of denominational exclusive leadership policies, are given the 
opportunity to speak and to share our faith." 
     Spahr said the award "honors the people I serve by saying, 'Yes, we 
are together ... we are with you and beside you and with you in the 
struggle for freedom and justice   we are you and you are us.'" 
     Russell   also openly lesbian   and Douglass both voiced their support 
for Spahr. 
     "I count it a privilege to stand now ... in the company of Janie Spahr 
and Letty Russell," Douglass said.  "I have been deeply troubled by 
attempts to deny the award to Janie and by some of the hostile reactions to 
the careful decisions to reinstate it." 
     Russell praised her "sister reformers through the word" -- "reforming 
through the word" was the theme of this year's awards -- and said she "is 
very glad that we have come this far by faith, leaning on the Lord." 
     She praised "this breakfast ... because it is the place women have 
chosen to make a stand for one another and our shared ministry in this 
church.  As they said of women in South Africa who resisted apartheid, 
'When you strike a woman, you have struck a rock!'" 
     Supporting Spahr's efforts on behalf of full inclusion of gay and 
lesbian persons in the church, Douglass reminded the crowd that "only in 
recent history has our own church accepted reforming arguments that racism, 
sexism and slavery are sinful.  I live in hope that one day soon our church 
will agree that it also excludes restrictions on participation by gay and 
lesbian people of faith in the life of the church." 
     Asked at a press conference after the breakfast what the underlying 
issues are in the awards controversy, Russell said one factor is "tension 
between liberals, conservatives and moderates about how to carry out the 
church's work in a rapidly changing world."  Douglass added that a 
fundamental tension is "different ways of understanding the Bible as 
authority  sincere people read the Bible differently."  
     And Spahr said the controversies in the church "are also about power, 
about who defines the issues and who decides what is 'normal.'" The church 
has not done a good job of studying complex issues, she said, "and so we 
have fallen back on scapegoating." 
     Returning to the theme of hope they all sounded in their 
presentations, the three recipients told reporters they all are optimistic 
about the future.  "I have hope because all things are possible with God," 
Spahr said.  "This award has given hope to lots of people   not just the 
people I serve 
  who want to speak the truth but who are still afraid."   
     Douglass said that in her travels around the church she is finding 
that support for fuller inclusion of all people in the church "is broader 
than we often assume and is coming from people and groups that we would not 
expect to be supportive." 
     And Russell said she finds the most hope in the congregations and 
communities of the church.  "People are often way ahead of the national 
leaders and organizations," she said.  "Hope is the strength to make 
change." 
 
Jerry Van Marter 

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