wfn.org | Three women transform their times even as their times transform them

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Note #6087 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

30-June-2000
GA00137

 	Three women transform their times even as their times transform them

	Stephen, Hwang, and Hernandez celebrate over a century of ministry with the
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

	by Emily Enders Odom

LONG BEACH, June 30 - The spirited interaction of the three women witness to
a relationship of long standing.  A relationship that has reached across
racial ethnic, geographic and even the occasional ideological lines to find
its commonality in their shared sense of call and their nearly lifelong
employment with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

	Diana Stephen, associate for Rural Ministry and Small Church Development,
Evelyn Hwang, associate, Resourcing Committees on Preparation for Ministry,
and Yolanda Hernandez, associate for Women's Ministries with Hispanic/Latin
Presbyterian Women, claim and celebrate some 40 years of service each, a
combined total of 120 years of ministry, as employees of the denomination.

	"We've been through a lot," said Stephen, who reported for her first day of
work at 475 Riverside Drive, New York City, exactly 40 years ago on June 30,
1960, the day after her high school graduation.  "Women's aspirations were
different then than they are now," she recalled.  At that time, Stephen's
only identified short term goal was to become a secretary, and her long term
hope was that she not have a boring job, and might eventually earn $100 per
week.

	Yolanda Hernandez, who arrived at the National Mission Board some seven
months after Stephen, described herself as a product of mission.  A native
of Cuba, Hernandez graduated from the Presbyterian Mission School there, was
then further educated at the Presbyterian-related Warren Wilson College, and
immediately returned to her alma mater, "La Progresiva," to teach there.

	Evelyn Hwang, who also expressed gratitude for the mission background which
had shaped her, with visible affection, invoked the names of Gardner and
Ruth Tewksbury, former missionaries to China,.  "They became my parents in
this country," said Hwang.  After first encouraging Hwang to find a church
home in New York City, the Tewksburys urged her to apply for a job at the
national church headquarters, where she said she "was hired on the spot" in
the personnel office.

	It was there at 475 Riverside where this extended family of Stephen,
Hernandez and Hwang, interacting with representatives of many cultures and
many denominations, first began to develop their deep and abiding commitment
to justice issues.  Hernandez joined Stephen and Hwang in locating the
origin of that passion in the turbulent and exciting 1960s.

	"I came to a church that expected us to learn English overnight," said
Hernandez, describing a church which took for granted her assimilation into
the culture.  "Later in the '60s," she continued, "the church changed,
opening the door for us to see justice."  In the '70s, the Minority
Executive Women's Group was formed, which continues today as the Racial
Ethnic Executive Women.

	"It was very exciting in those days," remembered Stephen, "a little
terrifying, too."

	All three women, who are elders in the church, cited Presbyterian Women and
their local church roots as particular sources of inspiration and support
throughout their faith and vocational journeys.

	Contemplating what the future might hold, Hwang quietly allowed that she
had begun in earnest to sort out her priorities and reflect upon her "final
journey home" following her husband's death.  Mindful of the Biblical
significance of her 40th anniversary, she said her strongest emotion is
gratitude for the significant, meaningful work she has enjoyed in the area
of vocation.

	As Stephen, Hwang and Hernandez continue to model their own carefully honed
ability to network and to support one another as women and as colleagues, so
they would advise other women to encourage and uphold one another as "a
total community," especially in the church.  To women and to all who would
become discouraged when the systems and structures are less than supportive,
they speak a word of hope out of their own deep sense of "thanksgiving for
the journey and the people."

	"We've all been transformed,"observed Stephen.  "We're very different from
when we started. Each of us in our own way," she concluded, "has continued
to try to play a role in a variety of ways of trying to be supportive to our
sisters."

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