Empowering Women

This summer the Episcopal Church in the USA elected a new presiding bishop at their General Convention. Unlike the Catholic Church, the Episcopalians allow women to become priests. They even have a number of female bishops. The dramatic event at this summer's churchwide gathering, however, was the election of a woman to serve as the next presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church. When Katharine Jefferts Schori enters office in a little less than a month, it will mark the first time in any mainline denomination (to my knowledge) that a woman will be serving as its primary leader. YOU GO GIRL!! (Okay, I couldn't resist the cheer...)

Although I am not an Episcopalian, I have worked in an Episcopal Church for the past 3 1/2 years. I have been reading this week of another first in the denomination: For the first time in the 32 years since women have been ordained as priests and bishops, there was a church-wide conference held for such women--the "IMAGINE: Claiming and Empowering Ordained Women's Leadership" conference.

One of the presenters at the conference was The Rev. Dr. Carter Heyward, lesbian priest and theologian--a woman whose writings captured my attention while I was in seminary. I have only read bits and pieces of her work, but what I have read I have loved.

As I read some of the words she shared at this week's convention, I thought immediately of Cindy's struggles with the church that she described in her own blog. Heyward proclaimed to the women gathered that the priesthood of all believers is a call to help one another:

"It's the work of healing. It's the work of liberation. It's what we're put here by our maker to do; to be a priesthood of believers, to be not primarily focused on ourselves but sharing a passion -- and by passion, I mean energy as well as a willingness to suffer -- with and for the world. The church doesn't exist for itself, we all know that. We're here in the world, for the world. The church is here to be a voice of justice-making ... of compassion, of peace, of reconciliation."

The world is filled with broken, hurting, angry, confused, suffering, and dispairing people. We all carry with us our own wounds. Sometimes the injuries of others weigh heavy on our own hearts. When we witness exclusion and injustice in our own church, this heaviness threatens to smother our own spirits. We feel betrayed as equally as our sisters and brothers who are the victims.

Cindy's words are insightful when she asks, "Am I a victim or a witness?" She elaborates, "What an amazing thought? Transform my feelings of victim to witness. I saw. I know. Ben says that with knowledge comes responsibility."

Our calling as the priesthood of all believers is to engage in the work of healing and of liberation. To be a witness is indeed a huge responsibility. It calls for truth-telling. It calls for courage. It calls for channeling the anger and the passion that we feel in response to injustice in oder that we might transform it into the power that works for "justice-making...compassion...peace...[and] reconciliation."

All this is made possible only by the amazing power of faith--faith even as small as a mustard seed.

And by grace.

And by love.