- Well Heather thank you so much for agreeing to be interviewed. If I could get some background first. And if you could please say and maybe spell your full name. - Yes, Heather Murray Elkins. - Great and how do you spell that? - It's H-e-a-t-h-e-r M-u-r-r-a-y E-l-k-i-n-s. - Great, thank you very much. And, are you lay or clergy? - Clergy. - Great, and your denominational affiliation? - United Methodist and it's the West Virginia Annual Conference. - Okay, thank you. And, Heather when and where you born? - In West Virginia, nearest town, I guess you'd go with the town, is Parkersburg and 1948. - Wonderful, thank you. And, where did you go to graduate and or divinity school? - Two stages, I got my first masters at the University of Arizona in fine arts and play writing. And then, I graduated from Duke with an M Duke and then from Drew with a PhD. - Okay, wonderful. And, what work or ministry were you doing at the time of Re-Imagining? - At the time of Re-Imagining I was a new faculty member at Drew. I had been a graduate student here. And then, a chaplain here at the university. And then, I joined the faculty in 1990. - Um-hm, and that's where you still are now. - Yes. - Great, wonderful. Heather, do you recall how and when you first became aware of feminist theology? - The use of the term came much later than the experience of it. And, I've thought over the years how to explain it. I would say primarily raised in an Appalachian environment that was basically matriarchal. The way in which we constituted ourselves as an extended family. So, the difficulty of moving from a matriarchal mindset to an alternative, it must have happened very early, very young. Again, we an Appalachian extended family growing up between, we spent part of the year in the deserts outside of Tucson and the other summers back in West Virginia. So, we were dislocated in some ways from the sort of the exposure of, I would call a understoodness about how God is Father, even though that was certainly the language, the experience wasn't that. - Oh, interesting. That's amaz-- - The other pieces of, and I've learned over the years to think about this as to why. In West Virginia we were in small, very small country churches where women's leadership per force is very strong because they can't afford educated, i.e. men clergy. So, that role was very evident. And then, in the Arizona setting we were literally, the church began in our living room. My mother just rounded up a bunch of people. And, it's now a congregation of about 1800. (gasps) So, to see church, it was just sort of, I think so new churching and dying churches have a great strange, wonderful opportunity for both children, girl children as well as boys, but that certainly women because they're being born when they're dying, one or the other. - Well, I'm curious, this is interesting, so what kind of roles did women play in those churches? - Well, for example in West Virginia as United Methodist 1956 there was finally the vote to allow women to become fully ordained. But, in the mountains area when that vote came in '56 there were already probably 12 to 17 women who's names we had who were traveling elders. They didn't have full ordination, but they were preaching and leading congregations. And, so maybe that's an Appalachian thing. I'm not sure, but there were women already in full administrative, not acknowledged and that, in Appalachia. My hunch is that might be very common, if somebody looked at records in rural church areas. So, that's one explanation, just the they were needed and so they were there. And, there was always a sense that women could do the teaching and the preaching, particularly as it came through in terms of testimony was very present. And, I think if you are dealing with a church that is deeply missional the history of women and mission is so deep and wide. - Yes. - That again, removes barriers. It's when the church got established main stream, the hierarchalable places being entity set, I think. - Mm-hm. That is wonderful, that is wonderful. And, when you first, I assume was it in, well when was it in your schooling that you encounter more formal feminist theology? - It would have been at Duke. Now again, prior to Duke I taught on a Navajo reservation for almost three years. And, not to, again, miss the point, they are so matrilineal and the identity of a woman's role in Navajo society is still very different than what we would assume. So, when it came to Duke, at Duke there was a woman named Jill Ray who was the first identifiable feminist who used that language. She's a Roman Catholic. A wonderful Reformation scholar, I assume you may know her. Anyway, she went on to head oh gosh I forget what university she went to from Duke. She was the first and she caused quite a stir because I believe she's been a nun and then left the order and openly taught classes about women in religion. That would have been in '74. - Wow. - So, at one point, there's a great story. I'll tell you the story because I want to, there's another woman whose work I assume you may about, Jeanette Stokes. - Uh-huh. - Who has the organization about south of the garden. It's a women's center down still in Durham. She was in the same class I was in. And, so there was group of those of us who identified with women's studies, women's center because there was a lot that, one there was still not very many women, and there was a very strong need to identify that way. And, I can remember when the people that had came out about the natural resemblements to Christ. - Yes. - At that, that was the reason why women would never be able to be priests. And, we read, Jeanette and I read about it in the hallway, we were just kind of going over this and Jill Ray, class with meetings, so we couldn't talk with her about it. So, we went on to the class we could. And, it was Father Roland Mercy who worked on it, the Jerusalem Bible, anyway it was his class. He was a wonderful teacher. But, Jeanette in the kind of time when you can ask questions raised her hand. She was a very slight woman with a wonderful southern accent, which I don't do well in imitating. But anyway, she raises her hand and says, "Father Mercy, can you explain to us why "the Pope thinks women can't be priests?" And, of course, I think there were maybe four of us in the class that were women. And, it caught him by surprise. We were supposed to be studying the Psalms, but he tried answering, explaining natural resemblance. And then, made the mistake and said to Jeannette, "Did that help?" And she said, "Father Mercy, would you mind showing us "your natural resemblance to God?" (laughs) - Oh my goodness. - So, and anyway. (laughs) That was better the way it was. When Jill Ray came up for tenure at the same time, it was discovered she had breast cancer. - Oh. - And, the committee recommended that they delay any decision. One male professor who's not in the theological school but was good friends with her rival made this mistake of bragging that they were waiting to see if she'd live long enough to make it worth their while. So, that was the kind of conversation. So, they had a tradition of having faculty lunches where people would present, of course, she was the only woman. And, after they had made that presentation, that decision to wait, now she eventually did get tenure, and then left Duke. She was up for giving a presentation, lunch time conversation. And, we all waited outside in the stairwell to see them when they came out from lunch because she had presented part of the paper in this grand studies class, that she was doing on the myth of vagina dentata throughout the world. - Really? - And, that's the paper she read-- - Wow. - While the men ate. So, it was great. - Wow. Well, those are amazing stories, Heather, thank you. (laughs) Oh goodness. Well, I have read your essay in remembering and Re-Imagining where you talk about that painful decision you had to make about whether to go to the '93 conference or write that footnote. And, I wondered if you could talk, I know you've written some about it, but I would love to hear a little more about what that whole experience was like at Drew that you lived through. - Well, in through around about I assume that in your conversations with Alex and... - Susan Morrison, yep. - You realize that that basically started long before it got to Drew. - Mm-hmm, yes. - That two things, I think, were triggered. One, my experience is that where there's that kind of heat it's usually because some kind of power base is shifting. Susan Morrison's election as the first woman in the northeast set off deep triggers and packs of resistance. And, her appointing Susan to one of the first major, mainline churches did, too. - Yes. - So, those two things should always be bred alongside whatever is going on with how you pray. But, my first encounter with the controversy face forward, would have been when I got called by Hal, I think Hal was the first one to call me to say could I come over, they were gonna have a day long kind of consultation, conversation, dialogue about the use of Sophia wisdom in worship by the eastern PA. And, Chuck Eragin, I think helped arrange that as a way of what they hoped was going to head off a major explosion at Annual Conference. - I'm sorry, and who was Chuck, who was that again? - He was at that point general secretary of archives and history, but a major clergy leader in that conference. - Okay. - But, he worked at Drew, the center for our denomination, the center for our archives was here at Drew. So, he was here but he had leadership in that conference. And, I think he helped set that up, or at least worked with other leaders in eastern PA to say, "Okay, let's study this." And, I was invited. They had wanted Katherine Keller to come and she declined. Would I come and talk about the use of Sophia wisdom in worship for United Methodist to this. And, I said, "Well, first of all just to let you know "I have not used those prayers. "I'm aware of them but if you want someone "who's used them in local congregations I'm not that. "I could, certainly, come and address it from "the perspective of given what "John Wesley used as guiding principles "for how worship should be crafted, evaluated, "I could do a general principle piece "to see how that specific local tradition "would match with what "our sort of rule setter, "in terms of what was and wasn't good worship would say." So, I said I would be willing to do that. And, as I remember Hal said, "Don't." I said, "How many are we talking about?" He said, "Maybe 40." So anyway, I prepared a variety of things that had to do with is it biblical? Yes. - Mm-hmm. - Is it scripture, does it honor the experience of women in terms of God and saw themselves as being created in God's image? Absolutely, you know. He paid to have women's sermon's published like this I've done. And, he got charged with heresy for allowing laypeople to preach. So anyway, I'd gone through this thing. In general, there is a very strong argument that could be made it's biblical. It was what I thought was a fairly a good piece of scholarship but it would not be exciting. But, the point wasn't to excite anybody it was to say if you looked at what Wesley would have said this stuff really measures very well. So, without specific, I didn't wanna go fight over different minds in a prayer. But then, two things happened. We went to war, Desert Storm broke out. - Oh. - And, someone in the Good News decided, coalition which was of course national and hierarchy all linked, decided this was the opportunity to trigger it all to put it all together. And, the next call I got was that there might be as many as 400 people. - Oh, my goodness. - Because pastors were hiring buses to bring their folk in. - Because Good News had advertised this or sent out the word? - I think in the turn around time between when I was invited when I was told by Hal it was like 40 it was not going to be, people who already felt what they felt probably weren't going to come. It was going to be a civilized conversation between folks at Asbury, Good News folk, and whoever would stand up for this liturgy. But then, it just exploded. - Wow. - Linked to Desert Storm and the thing that they were told, and that's why I think it had to be to generate that kind of defence in probably 10 days or less was that the enemy we were fighting across the world we had to fight in our own pulpits and our own seminaries, infidels kind of thing. So, and he said, "They are coming decorated with yellow ribbons." So, I thought about touching for the whole nature of what we were going to be about. But then,-- - I'm sorry, could you clarify why yellow ribbons? - Well, that's what you wore if you were a patriot, you remember? - I guess I'd forgotten it. - There were yellow ribbons everywhere. - Okay that's right, yep. - When we went to war there in Desert Storm. - Right, yep, I'd forgotten that, you're right, yep. - Okay, so we thought about that and I thought, "Okay, this means every word has to be "very carefully done because my experience is "when people are at that level there would be "a lot of recording going on "and not hearing, but a lot of high drama." So, I rethought it and this is what I decided to do. One of my long time ago ancestors was Daniel Webster and he used to give speeches about abolition that upset people. And, he would do three things before he gave a speech, before he was gonna talk to people. 'Cause I'm thinking I'm talking to a couple hundred people that are wearing the yellow ribbons, I better think about this. So, here's what he would do. He would when he got up to give a talk about abolition federally he would, first thing he would do is open a Bible, and lay it down and say "this is for those of you "who believe and honor the word of God." And then, he'd put down a copy of The Constitution and say, "and this is for those of you who "honor the laws of this land." And then, the last thing he would do is to unsheathe a very big Bowie knife and say, "And this is "for those of you who neither honor God nor country." And then, he'd give his speech and upset people. So, and right, that's what I did. - Did you, oh my goodness? (laughs) - Yeah, I said, "This is the Bible and give you a little "story about my ancestor and when he talked to people." And, I mean, I think it was close to 500 people. It was packed, there were cameras, videos, a sea of yellow ribbons. So, I said, "I'm gonna tell you the story. "I thought my ancestor had some good ideas "about trying to get heard when people were "maybe not wanting to listen." So, I put the Bible down and then I put down a copy of the Bill of Rights tied in a yellow ribbon and remind people "this is what we were fighting for." - Wow. - And, freedom of religion is one of those things. And then, I reminded them, I didn't put the knife down. I told them about the knife, but I put down the Book of Discipline. - Oh. - And then I gave what I thought was a pretty standard argument about scripture and women's experience based on Wesleyan. - Amazing. - It didn't make either side happy because I wasn't feminist enough. But, I had agreed to do what I thought was an important argument if you're dealing with United Methodists, say let's look at what two says who we identify with as setting some guidelines. Said, here is the text on guideline and this is why this works, but anyway. But, see it was not, and for the other side I pissed off really. - The Good News side? - Yeah, they didn't like the yellow ribbon thing at all and the Bill of Rights. - Did they write about this in their magazine? - I don't think so. - Yeah, 'cause I haven't seen that. I'll look, but I don't think I've seen it. - I just think it, like I said, I was just one of about five people. But, when I came back to Drew what I knew was that this was deep, this struggle and it was volatile. - Yes. - And so, when we invited Sue and Katy to give a now Morton lecture I was in charge of the chapel. I said to Katherine, and the interesting thing was for Katherine Keller this was the reason she became a United Methodist. - What was the reason? - The Sophia controversy, she wasn't. - Really. - She thought we;d finally started doing something interesting. - Oh, my goodness. - And she said, "Good, Roman Catholics have been "doing this for years. "There's nothing very exciting here. "This is old feminism, this is no big deal." And then, whoomp, and it got interesting. And, I know this because she joined my husband's church and was confirmed as a United Methodist so she could get into the fight. - Wow, that's an amazing story. - So, at any rate-- - Heather, can I interrupt just for one second? I apologize, I'm trying to get a sense of the, I didn't hear this story from Hal and Susan about this meeting. Was this, I assume, after Wisdom's Feast was published? I mean, was sort of prompted them to hold that meeting? - Yes, because now timing of this it would have been before Re-Imagining. So, some versions of this were circling, but they were also using them in Bible studies, but don't forget she had just been given a high steeple church. - Right, yes. - So, lots of stuff going on. Like I said, I don't imagine on their screen given the level of struggle they were dealing with, maybe it didn't even register. I don't know. For me, going and seeing the difference between having a handful of people and having the church full with yellow ribbons and buses but there were a lot video. I mean, people took videos. - Wow. - So, my understanding was I was going to be putting the service together for our communion service on Thursday. The lecturer preaches and then usually I mean does a lecture and then does a preach. Because of what I had seen and because I know something about church, I didn't come out of West Virginia not knowing about church after pastoring there for eight years I basically said I am going to select the most biblical of all the services, the most biblical. And, no students will assist me. I will do the service with Susan by myself. - So, the student wouldn't be put at risk, was that it? - Yeah. - Yep, yes. - And, again, I would say that it was seen as, I know Katherine said, "Why are you being so cautious?" And I said, "Katherine, I just saw something "that I'm taking seriously." - Yes. - And sanctuary is not the word for seminaries. We think it is, but it isn't. Depends on who's looking. - Right. - So, I made all those so it's the most biblical text and I presided and I made sure students didn't do reading, there was nothing that they could be critiqued for, but the good thing was I, of course, had everything written out, service, every piece of it. And, used the wonderful liturgy that is very biblical, we used a hymn by a typical priest. And, then Susan preached. Now, what happened was I didn't know and I couldn't have guessed and they why you might read his new book on it, Tom was looking for the occurrence for the occasion to have the text that he always likes these little vignettes of how seminaries have really betrayed the true faith. And, me being his seminary he had love lost for viewing us that way. So, he came to chapel that day and left before communion, sure I watched him leave. And then, about two weeks later he gave me a copy of what he was going to write, was going to send to Christianity Today. When I read it and I asked we went up and had lunch 'cause he's fairly famous and I'm up for being considered for tenure. And I said I needed to ask him if he knew his essay, long before he sent it in had been photocopied and had been mailed to all the bishops and general agency boards. That heresy, this bishop, this goddess Worship service was gonna happen at Drew, or had happened at Drew and I said to him, "Do you know that this is being anonymously mailed?" I mean, every bishop got it and every board. And, I began getting the calls because the way it was written it was not clear who the liturgist presider preacher was. So, I'm getting the calls. It's not about me, I'm just the in between so I crafted the service. I mean, it's all, they're trying to get to them. And I said, didn't he care that this was being used and I had to say, "Tom, I was there. "I did that service. "We weren't in the same service. "What you wrote is not true." And, I said I don't you care that this is being used to harm a bishop of our church? And he said, "She is not worthy." (gasps) - Wow. - And I said, "Okay, I understand what you just said." He said, "I know what they say when we're ordained. "You are worthy," that was the language. So, I said, "I have no idea what it is I'm going "to be able to do, but I will do everything "in my power to stop this from being believed. "It's not true." And I said, "I know bishops who've received this. "So, I am going to send them the service so they know." I picked five bishops sent them the service, sent in the account. I did not have, those days we weren't recording the sermon, wish we had but couldn't prove what he had said was still a lie. And, the other thing I said, "Tom," I said, "I've been in charge of this chapel for three years. "It's my job to know who comes." I said, "The other thing I'm going to send "the bishops is your attendance record. "You have been in this chapel once this year, "twice the year before, and once the year before that. "And, you write as if you are a faithful "worshiping member of this community." So, I said, "I'm going to send your attendance records." Well, he just flipped out and I'm not going to bend your arm, it was just-- - Wow, and you weren't tenured, wow. - No, I wasn't tenured. But I said, "What you wrote isn't true." So, I tried doing that and I got five bishops and all that eventually and we had a hearing here a Drew where people who were here said this. Well, then in the midst I get then a lawsuit against me from a eastern PA clergy who's trying to make his name by being the one who takes down the heretical woman bishop. And I'm just sort of in the way, it's not about me at all but the irritating thing is fortunately, I'm pretty compulsive about documents. But, he took a very long time and the other piece was when I got the legal documents I did have to get a lawyer. The Board of Trustees got letters saying that I shouldn't be tenured. And, that's where my son's, he read one of those letters. That's where his, he attempted then suicide because he thought, he was just so unhappy, been moved too many times as United Methodist. And, when you're about a teenager and you don't have friends in the new school anyway. But, the other piece that finally worked itself out I decided not to file a grievance against Tom Oden through the university. I decided to fight it through the church. And, Tom Kean who had been governor of New Jersey was our president. - Oh, okay. And, I told the dean who was trying to get Tom and I to reconcile, and I said, "You know what "he's lying, and he knows he's lying." "And, I'm like, "You don't reconcile when someone "won't admit that they're not right "with God and their community." So at any rate I said, "but, I'm not going to file "a grievance there I'm just gonna fight "it out through the church." And, I did get summoned to my own conference where there were, it was just a repeat of eastern PA. There were, I don't know 3, 400 pastors who brought their people in to basically denounce what that was about. But again, my bishop did it to try to head off a grievance being filed against me. So, it was a pretty nasty morning, but I survived. And, there's always very funny, very weird things in the midst of all this. So, the Re-Imagining piece I kept seeing when it's falling by the wayside. And again, my understanding was the targeting of this was not for heretical women but for women who had major leadership roles in the church, both clergy and lay. It was not about heretical women, though that is always a good market. You raise good money on heretical women, particularly if communism isn't available to fight with. But, it was to, in fact, to pull in the power of women's leadership. Because in many ways the most radical feminists have gone from the church long ago. So, this for the women that were exercising authority. Not necessarily radical feminists at all. - Heather, if you don't mind I just wanted to clear up a couple things. Was the legal charge against you slander, is that what they were claiming? - Yes. - And, what happened with those charges? - Ah, well I decided I need a lawyer and so I checked with the Women provide one full guidance over the years. They gave me the name of a lawyer that had worked with them. I contacted him, said, "It looks like "I will need legal defense." He said, "Well first, send me everything you have." So, I sent him the piles of documents and arguments and what happened, what didn't happen and here's service and yada, yada, yada. He said, "Let me look at this. "And then, call me in two weeks." And so, I called him and he said, "First, you have to answer a question for me "before we have any other conversation." I said, "Okay," and I said, "What is it?" And he said, "Will legally representing you "in any way endanger my immortal soul?" I said, "How in the hell would I know?" (laughs) And he just laughed and said, "Oh good, an honest woman." (laughs) So, in fact, he offered because we were so broke he offered, asked me to bring Daniel with me when I went to see him for the first time and explained to Daniel, 'cause he knew-- - This was your son? - Yes, and explained to him how he was going to defend me. - Wow. - So I wouldn't lose my job. - Wow. - And he said, "This session's for free." So, - What a good man. - What he did legally was what you do is you basically put all the arguments together saying this is what I'm going to present in court against you and you have a frivolous lawsuit for the following reasons. And, we are going to counter-sue and take you to court. It's just like you say here are all the arguments, this is what the judge should say, this is harassment and award damages to the person that you are trying to sue. That's where it went away. I did have a big bill. And, I only found out years late, I mean probably a year later the president invited me to lunch. Well, he doesn't do that. I mean, that was not a normal practice. So, I go to lunch, I'm thinking, "What is this about?" Things are still sort of swirling around as to whether or not I'm going to be sued or not sued, what's this about? And he doesn't mention it through the whole dinner. And then, at the very end, oh fiddle, I'm just losing the guy's name. He was just a nasty radio announcer. - Rush Limbaugh? - Yeah, thank you. What I learned at the very end why he took me to lunch was it was to thank me for not putting the grievance through the university because he had already been notified that Rush Limbaugh was ready to do a piece about how this liberal far-left university was harassing this faithful evangelical senior professor. - Really? - Mm-hmm. - Wow. So, Rush, he couldn't do that then because you hadn't done it through the university. - Exactly, because I chose not to go through the university. He said to thank you for not putting us through that. - And, the grievance that you filed, I'm sorry. - I didn't know this, but I met with years later, took me four or five years to learn that he paid, anonymously, probably half of my legal bill. - The president of Drew did. - Yeah. - Wow. - With no, found out about it long after he left. - Oh, that's wonderful. - Yeah, it was. - Yeah. And, just to clarify, tie up that end what happened with the grievance? - The grievance against Susan Morrison went all the way up through the jurisdiction. It was heard and then where I have a whole bunch of papers it says in the paragraph that it was dismissed because when they looked at it there were no supporting witnesses for what Tom had written. So, when you read his book, the new one, he's still trying to justify the account. - Wow, okay, yeah. That's amazing, thank you. - Yeah, pretty weird. - Yeah, yeah. And, I just can't resist asking, I mean, what a terrible thing for you to go through you're not tenured. I assume that you were worried that you weren't going to be tenured at this point. - I thought it might be a possibility. Again, because if you charge someone with not only unorthodox but unauthorized use of sacraments and you're hiring them to teach worship. - Yes. - And, I have the same sort of very strange response after the presentation I did at Re-Imagining. Then, when I did do the presentation and there was supposed to be no photographs and somebody took a picture, someone posing as a support woman took a picture of Lynny Russel and I and it ends up on the cover fold in the centerfold of Presbyterian Layman. - Really? - And, of course, at that point I was tenured and in fact at that point I had just been asked to come into the associate dean's office. But, two things happened when that came out. I'd been invited to preach at Ocean Grove, which is a big deal. And, I got a letter based on what they had read from the Good News and the Presbyterian Layman telling me that they were not going to invite me anymore. - Really? - I had learned a little bit more so I went to the Bishop and the cabinet here in New Jersey and said, "Here's the speech "I gave at Re-Imagining. "Please examine it if you have questions. "We believe in a free pulpit. "I believe I have done nothing to violate "any of the principals of what leading "preaching worship or preaching Gospel is. "I am going to send through you "to the board of Ocean Grove that "if they confirm that I am debarred from the pulpit "based on this then I will file a grievance "against the board for damage to my ministry. "If, however, they put on me on the longest line "of possible people to invite, "they can invite me long after I'm dead, then I won't. "'Cause I have no interest in fighting "to go down and preach there. "But, what I will fight about is barring a pulpit "before I even have a chance to open my mouth." - Yes, and did they do that? - Yes. - They put you on the long wait list? - Yes, I suddenly, said well they would get back to me about when they could so. So, it just even, past even community college it hadn't quite calmed yet. It still didn't come and update. - No. - But certainly, some of it is moved on to other targets and others battles. And again, I think I was a very incidental figure in this because I think the major targets were the bishop and women who were exploring far more radical forms of feminist worship than I was. - And, what do you think, what is it about feminist worship that makes it such a target? Heather? - That's a huge question, yes I'm still here. - Oh sorry, that was a huge question, sorry 'bout that. (laughs) - I think it's very complicated now in that right now I would say if we go out in the hallway here our younger women students they would say, "That's old stuff, we don't need to take classes "in feminist liturgy, that's all been done. "I mean that's our mother's generation. "That's been taken care of." - And how 'bout the use of inclusive language? - Because I believe the secular use of it is so pronounced people are willing not to fight about it in church. Church is going to be allowed. There's far more silence about that language. And, the counter movement back, in fact, one of our graduates Carol Cookmore wrote her dissertation on United Methodist the sign up thing. The rise in inclusive language and then it's demise. Because of the perceived numbers of women in church growing up in leadership positions it then becomes kind of passe, we don't need to do this. We need to encourage men to participate. So, they see the struggle as having quote been won and that then makes it even more ferocious in the back room. - Mm-hmm. Well, I'm curious you talked about this as seminary students. After they've been in the pastorate a few years? - Then, they come back and say, "Can we talk "about feminist principles?" - Uh-huh, yeah. - Anc, of course, Drew that's a great strength. That's some of what we are known for and our students chafe under this imposition of having to use inclusive, hospitable language about both God and the human community. And, they see that as being forced and there are issues about race and ethnicity-- - Issues about race and I missed the next word. - And ethnicity-- - Ethnicity, yes, uh-huh yes. - Basically, give it basically attempt to silence, which is I'm teaching a class on creative writing in the women's prison, maximum security this Spring. Half Drew student and the half Drew students are, in fact, behind bars. - Wow. - And the women in prison do not wanna have anything to do with feminist language, however, about God. We have this wonderful textbook called Ain't I a Woman and using those prayers and poems and what they write the surfacing of women's experience of the holy and themselves as holy is very strong. But, they do not, God is Father, that's the way it is. And so, the issues of, again, what is seen as potentially white women who have power saying, "You cannot use this language," is not particularly helpful. - Um-hmm, um-hmm. - So, I usually work at say this, and then add you say, "Almighty Father, king of kings" and then put something like kind Creator, or like a mother bird feeds her young. So, it's just trying to allow some of their own owning of the language of their experience to come back into God language. But, it's pretty... It's not something that if looked at their prayers you could see from the outset that they were even aware of. - Oh, interesting. I wanted to, if you don't mind, move onto the "A time of hope, a time of threat", would that be appropriate now? Except, I just wanna be sure I thought you might have said there were two things that happened as a result of the '96 Re-Imagining. Did you talk about both things, or did I misunderstand? - Oh, the one that first broke and the resistance was mounting. This was following in '94 when the "time of hope, time of threat" was done was because seminaries and key women were being threatened and harassed and some of the Roman Catholics lost their jobs. So, that's when that kind of gathering of Jean Underpower's really gathered everybody together in her apartment. And, I was invited to come along because of the time of the Drew service. I mean, people know that I was having that struggle which was, obviously, about the same thing. So that's when we needed to say something and there were resolutions denouncing Drew and denouncing different women who had leadership positions all through the United States. So, that was done as a way of providing an alternative teaching piece. And, it was done as a newscast because it was making news. And, then again, a professor here at Drew did a great deal of what we needed to get it out to annual conferences. - Heather, I just have to say after, given what you were going through at the time it seems like an act of bravery to then do that. There were nine of you who did that. Can I ask what your decision making process was there? - It was, Well, I'll tell you what just came in mind when you asked. Do you remember that terrible shooting in Canada of a young man comes in and basically shoots, I think it's maybe 11 women. - Yes. - Okay. - Yes. - Right and - Uhm-hmm. - One of the women is killed shouting "I'm not a feminist." - Oh gosh. - And, I cannot remember who said it, but whoever said it it had to have been out of the circle of women that I knew and it could had been through. Anyway, I have no idea who. If you're gonna get shot you might as well shout who you are. You might as well say, "yeah" 'cause they're gonna shoot anyway. - Yes, wow. - And, it was stories, plenty, plenty of stories and we told all the strange, funny, weird, sad things that were going on and in the apartment. I can't remember someone's name now, the Women's Division just being harassed and harassed and harassed with calls for somebody. The funniest one I remember from that somebody standing, somebody calling and saying, "I wanna talk to somebody. "They gotta stop this, they gotta stop this obsession. Saying, "What is it, what is it they have to stop. "What is the problem, why are you so upset?" And, the punchline was, "Tell them to stop "calling God Sophie." - Oh, my goodness. (laughs) - And, of course, some of this is because women's names, and nobody gets upset about men who name their kids Logos. - Yes, yes. - So, some of it was being able, but it was very well orchestrated. The chief counsel whose name is on the documents I got, was the lawyer for Good News. So, I know it was with I.O.D. organized. - Wow. To be clear which was it the lawsuit against you? - Yes, the lawsuit, right. - Yes, um-hmm, got it. - Because it was so, it was such good business if you don't, if communism seems to have collapsed who can the enemy be? Well, look heretical women. - Um-hmm, um-hmm. - And, now it's gay people. - Yes. - You've got to have the enemy to be able to mobilize an identity against. So, or Muslims, I think our political landscape's playing all of this out through time. And, it wasn't in some ways personal. I think they were just looking for the right means who could be used to generate a convincing threat to the church. So, again, in in that room, that house was to hear the piece and then to say "all right, this is that this one moment "we can make moves because the other thing "that is very clear on this once you make "the accusation it really doesn't matter "what the truth is." And, that's how the machinery works. So, it was very smart to make a news broadcast. - I'm curious, what memories do you have of writing, I've read a description from Burl Ward Ingram about the multiple authorship, I mean the editing and everything, but what are your memories about writing that document and about the press conference that you held? - Oh, I just was amazed by the strength and the creativity in the room because it certainly wasn't, I would say it wasn't easy, I mean it was hard work. It was hard work, I mean, what to say, what not to say. And, who to say it and how would the analysis of this play out. What is causing the fervor? Is it a matter of not knowing? How do you answer an argument when it isn't really a rational argument at all? And, the other piece that I don't think, it might show up. I would say my major contribution was I brought a wonderful eye of God, huge eye of God, that a woman had made for a conference. She was a feminist. And we were, it was Lake Junalaska and how to do an image of God that does not end up by binary or a dual visibility. And so she made this fabulous, I'm mean, it's a big eye of God. And, Bishop Morrison processed carrying this. And, I brought it into the news conference. And, I think if you look at it it's in the back. And, that sense of the seeing God, the God who sees comes straight out of Genesis. And, here God was a really important trust that we had, there is the God who sees. - Yes. What was the response? I mean, you got an amazing response in terms of signatures, 800 at first and then like 1200 later. What was the response to the press conference? - Initially, of course, it was fairly, I mean it was, I mean there weren't lots of people there. There were some questions but that wasn't the piece. It was that it was going to circulate in places we couldn't get to. And, it broke the silence. Like, I think it was important to break through the paralysis of all the pain that people were in. - Yeah, did it actually appear on newscasts? - It was in the New York area, but that is, again, why here at Drew it's very important that we ship out video tapes to other conferences that had resolutions denouncing this feminist goddess stuff without any information just resolutions. And, so it was very helpful the teaching piece, I think, for conferences that chose to use it. - I'm curious, and it's been a long time, I know, but I know the bishops, the United Methodist bishops finally wrote a study on Sophia. - Right. - And, I wonder if you had any reactions to that. - Oh, they took the safe ground. They said it's biblical, but you cannot allow it to pass into personification of a goddess. And so they basically, and I basically thought, "Okay, I wasn't off with making the argument "years earlier that it is that sense of "the attribute of God. "It is not a separate identity." It's where they came at it. But I think by the time they got to that work nobody was paying attention. - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. - The storm had moved on. - Mm-hmm. And, could you remind me all the resolutions they went to, they would have gone to annual conferences. What was the final resolution? Did it go to general conference? - There were eventually, I think, well I can remember preaching at Susan Morrison's conference gosh maybe five years later. And, there was still resolutions that she had to preside over, denounce. I mean, I think there were more than 12 at that one conference. - Wow, yeah. - And, I remember we had continuous union and it probably wasn't a good idea to invite me to preach. But, I said to her, "Why are you still here?" 'Cause I watched her preside through all this denouncing her, denouncing women. And she said, "So, we can sit "and have a cup of coffee and say, why are we still here." (laughs) And, I took that as an answer for why women who are feminists, which I am, are still in the church. - Could you say a little bit more about that, Heather, 'cause I think that's an important piece. Why are you still in the church? - Because, it's intentions are correct. And, as I hear Jesus and experience the spirit this is the work we're supposed to be about. So, where else would we go to do the work? - And, how would you describe the work? - Well, I would just be very particular right now, obviously thinking about the class last night. And, I'm sitting with this woman who will be in prison for probably most of her life. And, we are working on a poem, right, a five line poem. I'm just trying to think whether I can recite it or whether that violates, at any rate it's a poem that ends up whether it's, just one poem, "whether it's God love or agape love "the important thing is to have loved." And, that's pretty good. - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. - So, where else would I be? - Yeah, wow that's a great answer. - Yeah. (laughs) - I did wanna ask a quick question about you presented at the '96. You talked about Hipplytus and you also had a conversation with Letty Russell. And, I'm just wondering if you had any particular memories of that gathering or what it was like to be at Re-Imagining when you finally got there. - I finally got there and was, I guess even my sense was gratitude that it had been more than a moment. That there was some kind of incredible continuity. And, that I could give my speeches. Talking about, I came to Drew to study that prayer. - Yes. - About this type of milk and honey. So, they were just weird. (laughs) So, here we are doing this and nothing but fabulous sudden grasp on the wall of women who's had mastectomies. Do you remember? - I didn't remember that, no. - Oh, I did. That's was the work on the wall so you have women's bodies that are damaged but definitely alive, just vibrant with life. And so, that whole sense of holding those conversations surrounded by bodies that yeah, they'd been damaged but lived their lives. And, the point of the artist was to say "Look how beautiful these are." - Yes, yes. - And I thought that was wonderful pedagogy. - Yes, and having studied it what was it like to experience the milk and honey ritual? I mean it wasn't exactly Hipplytus, but. (laughs) - Right, right. The theme that I am convinced about give us a question is, was Hipplytus ever really done as a liturgy, and yet here it's survived. The last line still hooks me. "This cup of milk and honey is given "for the healing of the bitterness of the human heart "by the sweetness of Christ's words." - Yeah. - So, we have to keep working to get it back on the table. And, I also believe it's so deeply female that that cup is the resistance. - Well, it reminds me of that story you told about the lay preacher came to visit you to save your soul. He certainly thought it was female. Yes, (mumbles). Yes. - And, what was that, I missed that Heather. - Well, it is so deeply yes that we're in a period right now where we seem to be allergic to those deep female symbols. - What are you thinking of when you say that? - The reactions of, I'm just thinking poetically I don't know who you're gonna vote for or why you're gonna vote for, but this notion of we cannot have a woman in a White House. What's that about? Why? And, it's not rational, but it's pretty deep and pretty wide, doesn't really matter who it would be, I think. So, that's the political piece that never disappears. I wanna, as we come to a close, I want to also share a wonderful quote that is not in our book it's just comes oral tradition. You know Morton who taught here? - Yes. - Was gone the year just literally the year before I got here we have a hallway dedicated to her thanks to Katherine Keller's wonderful art contributions. And so, she as far as we know, is the first woman who taught a class called Women in Religion in 1967. - Wow. - In a seminary. - Wow. - And one of the things, like I said, I think about and written about is what she reportedly said once which is, "If you don't "think God is a male word try saying Goddess "out loud and see what comes out of the woodwork." - Wow, boy she knew what she was talking about. (laughs) Oh well, and I do wanna respect for your time, I just had two quick questions to end with. And one is in the end what do you think is the greatest legacy of Re-Imagining? - That it claimed a theological process and owned the connection between of theology that is case of Re-Imagining, I'm thinking now of Marjorie Porchersmith's work, which is we always do this work. She's the soap line in the fields. She said, "We always do this work "with memory and imagination." So, it was that, it was and of course the politics that went into it and the reactions that came out of it just means we keep on the piece. So, like she just received a major award from again the North American Academy of Liturgy. She's retired now. And, she spoke at that time and she said the thing that she believed again was that being able to name it right, say it right, tell the truth about women's experiences would make a difference. - Wow, so true. - Yeah, the question is has it, does it, will it? - Yes, actually that is kind of my last question. What do you think, what does Re-Imagining mean today? And, I don't mean just the Re-Imagining conference, but I mean what needs to be re-imagined today? - I would Oikos, household, economics, ecumenical, the poor, whether or not we are capable of being a friend to each other across our differences. And the household, that literally the necessity of identifying whether or not we are capable of generating a sustaining life in household, in whatever we call family as a culture. I do not know the answer to that, but that's the work. So oikos, all of it. - Yes, oh well thank you unless there's anything else you wanna add, this has been wonderful, Heather. - You're a great listener. - Oh, well it's great to listen to you. I'm gonna turn the recording off now. - Sure.