UCC - Three recipients receive Antoinette Brown Awards

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@igc.org>]

Three recipients receive Antoinette Brown Awards

> Written by Micki Carter
> July 4, 2011

For the first time in its 37-year history, the
Antoinette Brown Award was presented to three
clergywomen, rather than the usual two, at a GS28 luncheon on Monday.

> The three included:

The Rev. Carole Carlson, former Conference

Minister for New Hampshire, who was ordained in
1977, was recognized for her pastoral skills and
for embodying the spirit of Antoinette Brown ? ?a
trail-blazer, an advocate for justice for women,
a voice of protest against abusive power wherever
it?s found and a deeply caring pastor.? She was
introduced by the Rev. Susan Henderson.

The Rev. Barbara Gerlach, an advocate for women
who was ordained in 1971, was a significant
personality in the creation of the Coordinating
Center for Women in Church and Society. She and
her husband, the late Rev. John Mack, shared a
co-equal pastorate, in Scranton, Penn., and she
has been recognized as an artist portraying the
suffering of women and children. She was
introduced by the Rev. Davida Foy Crabtree.

> The Rev. Bernice Powell Jackson, a former
> executive minister of Justice and Witness
> Ministries of the UCC, was ordained in the
> Amistad Chapel in the Church House in 2005.
> Pastor of First United UCC in Tampa, Fla., she
> currently serves and president of the North
> American region of the World Council of Churches.
> She was introduced by the Rev. Yvonne Delk.

Crabtree, a former award-winner, noted that

previous honorees were wearing their ?Netties,?
their awards, on Monday at General Synod 28 and
at home if they were not able to be in Tampa.

The award honors the memory of the first woman
ordained in the United States. Antoinette Brown
Blackwell attended Oberlin College, graduating in
1847, then lobbied the college for admission into
its theological School. She completed seminary in
1850 but was not granted her Doctor of Divinity
degree until 1908. She was ordained in 1853 and
called to serve the Congregational Church in South Butler, N.Y.

The Rev. Alice Hunt, the 12th of president

Chicago Theological Seminary, reviewed the life
and character of Antoinette Brown in her keynote address.