wfn.org | ABCUSA: Cook to Head Major Black Clergy Conference

["SCHRAMM, Richard" <Richard.Schramm@abc-usa.org>]

American Baptist News Service (7/12/02)--The Rev. Suzan Johnson Cook, senior
pastor of the Bronx Christian Fellowship, was elected in June as president
of the Hampton (Va.) University Ministers' Conference, the largest
nondenominational conference of black clergy in the U.S.

In the historic action Cook, an ordained American Baptist, was the first
woman elected president in the conference's 88 years.  "We have made
history," noted outgoing president the Rev. Walter S. Thomas.

Prior to forming and leading the Bronx Christian Fellowship Cook served for
13 years as pastor of historic Mariners' Temple Baptist Church in Manhattan,
where she led the church in a nearly ten-fold increase in membership.  She
also served as the first female chaplain for the New York City Police
Department.

She is a former member of the American Baptist Churches' General Board.
Among many honors she has been named an Outstanding Young Woman of America
and one of America's Top 100 Black Business and Professional Women.
She was a plenary preacher at the 1989 American Baptist Churches USA
Biennial Meeting in Milwaukee, Wis. 

In June 1997 Cook was appointed by President Bill Clinton to serve as one of
seven members of the President's Advisory Board on Race.  Cook previously
had served in an advisory capacity to the Clinton Administration, as a White
House Fellow in 1993-1994.

02ABN109

American Baptist News Service: Office of Communication, American Baptist
Churches USA, P.O. Box 851, Valley Forge, PA 19482-0851; (610)768-2077; fax:
(610)768-2320; www.abc-usa.org; richard.schramm@abc-usa.org