wfn.org | New vice president appointed at CBP

["Office of Communications"<wshuffit@oc.disciples.org>]

Date: July 10, 2000
Disciples News Service
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
Contact: Clifford L. Willis
E-mail: CWillis@oc.disciples.org
on the Web: http://www.disciples.org

00b-35

	ST. LOUIS (DNS) -- An Episcopal priest has been named vice president for 
congregational ministries with Christian Board of Publication. The Rev. 
Kamila Blessing also will serve as director of CBP's new Incubation Center 
for Congregational Resources. 

	The center is a three-year pilot project that "intends to combine the 
genius of congregationally based resource developers, the publishing 
skills and capacities of CBP, and the expertise of invited consultants in 
an array of disciplines," according to Cyrus N. White, president of the 
publishing house.

	"The resulting resources," he said, "will help congregations to bring the 
unchurched to awareness, seekers to belief, and believers to deeper 
faithfulness and service to God. The center is funded, in part, by a grant 
from the Lilly Endowment, Inc.

	White praised Blessing's writing and consulting experience, and her 
background in congregational revitalization, multicultural worship and 
community, and spiritual development. He also acknowledged her gifts for 
seeing congregations' strengths and weaknesses and her relational skills 
for engaging and equipping others. 

	Blessing was ordained in 1984 and has been active in parish ministry, 
interdenominational work and evangelism. In her most recent parish in 
Rocky Mount, N.C., Blessing and the priest of a predominantly African 
American congregation merged the resources of both churches into a single, 
multiethnic parish.

	She has written numerous pastoral and academic works, including It Was a 
Miracle: Stories of Ordinary People and Extraordinary Healing (Augsburg 
Fortress 1999), an article in the Women's Bible Commentary to be published 
next year by InterVarsity Press. 

	Blessing earned a bachelor's degree in technical writing from 
Carnegie-Mellon University, Pittsburgh, a master's degree from Pittsburgh 
Theological Seminary and a doctor of philosophy degree from Duke 
University, Durham, N.C.

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