Kim, Judith
Loading the media player...
Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
- | Well, Judy, thank you so much | 0:01 |
for agreeing to be interviewed. | 0:03 | |
If we can just get some background information. | 0:04 | |
Could you say your full name? | 0:07 | |
- | My name is Judith Allen Kim, | 0:09 |
the Reverend Judith Allen Kim. | 0:13 | |
- | Wonderful. | 0:15 |
How is Allen spelled? | 0:16 | |
- | A-L-L-E-N | 0:17 |
- | Great. Good. | 0:19 |
And are you lay or clergy? | 0:20 | |
- | Clergy. | 0:22 |
- | And your denomination? | 0:22 |
- | Presbyterian Church U.S.A | 0:24 |
- | Thank you so much. | 0:25 |
And Judy when and where were you born? | 0:27 | |
- | I was born in 1946 | 0:29 |
in Minneapolis, Minnesota. | 0:31 | |
- | Oh, great. | 0:33 |
And where did you go to school? | 0:34 | |
Graduate or divinity school? | 0:36 | |
- | I went to, | 0:37 |
after Macalester College I was a teacher for a while | 0:38 | |
and then I went to | 0:41 | |
United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities. | 0:43 | |
- | Wonderful. | 0:46 |
And what worker ministry were you doing | 0:47 | |
at the time of Re-Imagining? | 0:49 | |
- | (chuckles) I was trying to think about that | 0:51 |
on the way here. | 0:53 | |
(Interviewer chuckles) | ||
I was ordained as an interim pastor | 0:54 | |
at West Minister in 1989 | 0:56 | |
and I went on to do several interim pastorates. | 1:00 | |
And I don't actually remember where I was in 1993. | 1:03 | |
- | I don't blame you. | 1:06 |
- | But I was an interim pastor | 1:07 |
at a Presbyterian church in the Twin Cities area. | 1:08 | |
- | Okay. | 1:10 |
That's good enough, yes. (laughs) | 1:11 | |
- | I could find out the exact answer | 1:13 |
if you needed to know. | 1:14 | |
- | That's fine. | 1:15 |
- | Okay. | |
- | And what worker ministry did you do after Re-Imagining? | 1:17 |
- | Well, I did a lot of other ecumenical work. | 1:23 |
I was on the board of the Minnesota Council of Churches, | 1:28 | |
as a Presbyterian representative. | 1:29 | |
I worked with other ecumenical bodies | 1:33 | |
but mostly, I stayed as an interim pastor | 1:37 | |
at various Presbyterian churches. | 1:40 | |
Except five years at Wayzata Community Church, | 1:43 | |
which is UCC. | 1:46 | |
- | Okay. | 1:47 |
And did you say you're | 1:48 | |
at West Minister Presbyterian now? | 1:49 | |
- | I am, as a parish associate, | 1:51 |
which is a volunteer clergy position | 1:54 | |
for retired pastors. | 1:56 | |
But I do about 10 hours a week | 1:58 | |
of pastoral calling, | 2:00 | |
usually hospital and nursing home visitation. | 2:01 | |
- | Oh, wonderful. | 2:03 |
- | Yeah, it is a wonderful position to be able to do. | 2:05 |
I'm also a volunteer bible study leader during the year. | 2:07 | |
We just finished our bible study year. | 2:10 | |
- | I love it. | 2:13 |
And that's at West Minister, as well? | 2:14 | |
- | At West Minister. | 2:15 |
- | Oh. | 2:16 |
- | So after I retired, I went back | 2:17 |
to where I was ordained and where I first was a pastor. | 2:18 | |
And then these other things evolved out of that, | 2:22 | |
the fact that I was worshiping there. | 2:26 | |
- | Oh, I love it. | 2:28 |
That's great. | 2:28 | |
Now do you recall how or when you first | 2:30 | |
became aware of feminist theology? | 2:33 | |
- | Well, that would be at, | 2:36 |
even before I went to United Seminary | 2:37 | |
because I think we had, | 2:40 | |
I was a member of Oak Grove Presbyterian Church | 2:43 | |
in Bloomington | 2:46 | |
and we would occasionally have pastors | 2:47 | |
or teachers from United Seminary | 2:49 | |
teach adult education classes. | 2:52 | |
And I think that's where I first became aware of it. | 2:54 | |
- | Um-hmm. | 2:56 |
- | But it has, | 3:01 |
has bubbled up in me for a long, long time. | 3:03 | |
I think it says in the book, | 3:06 | |
I was surprised that it said, | 3:07 | |
had the little story about when I was in seminary. | 3:09 | |
And my son, who was in the third grade at the time, | 3:12 | |
had to write a paper about God | 3:14 | |
and wrote, "God is a good dude or dudette." | 3:16 | |
So I knew I'd had some influence on this child. | 3:19 | |
(both laughing) | 3:22 | |
I'm not sure about the older ones. | 3:23 | |
He got that idea, | 3:24 | |
God is good and God is neither male nor female. | 3:25 | |
- | Yes. | 3:28 |
- | I love that he, | 3:29 |
he got that. | 3:30 | |
- | Yes. | 3:30 |
And at a young age, already! | 3:31 | |
- | At a young age, third or fourth grade. | 3:33 |
I'm not sure which. | 3:34 | |
- | That is wonderful. | |
Yeah. | 3:36 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | Do you recall, | 3:37 |
kinda your reaction to feminist theology? | 3:38 | |
- | It was like, | 3:40 |
bring it on! | 3:41 | |
(Interviewer laughs) | ||
It's what I've been waiting for. | 3:42 | |
- | Yes. | 3:44 |
- | This is, | 3:44 |
and I knew Sally Hill | 3:46 | |
before I went to seminary. | 3:49 | |
So I was exposed to these wonderful women | 3:51 | |
who were doing feminist theology in a quieter way. | 3:54 | |
Sally Hill, Sheila Gustafson, | 3:57 | |
Marianne Lundy. | 4:00 | |
I mean, I grew up in St. Luke Church | 4:02 | |
where Mar, | 4:03 | |
My parents were charter members of that church | 4:06 | |
where Marianne Lundy's was the, | 4:08 | |
husband was the pastor. | 4:09 | |
- | Oh, right. | |
- | Her ex-husband. | 4:11 |
- | Yes, yes. | |
Dick Lundy. | 4:13 | |
- | Who was one of the participants in the conference. | 4:14 |
Did she tell you he was asked to change tables? | 4:16 | |
- | Yes, she did tell me that story. | 4:19 |
Yes, she did, yes. | 4:21 | |
- | Some woman complained | 4:22 |
about having a man at her table. | 4:23 | |
- | That's right. | 4:25 |
- | And it was Dick Lundy. | |
- | It was Dick Lundy, yes. | 4:26 |
That's right. | 4:27 | |
I'm actually going to be interviewing him too. | 4:28 | |
- | Oh, good! | 4:30 |
- | So I want | |
to hear his perspective, as well. | 4:31 | |
- | Good, good, good. | 4:32 |
- | That's wonderful. | 4:33 |
- | Yeah. | |
- | Good. | 4:34 |
If we could move | 4:36 | |
to Re-Imagining. | 4:37 | |
- | Okay. | |
- | I would love to hear | 4:38 |
about you relationship to Re-Imagining. | 4:39 | |
How you first got involved, | 4:41 | |
we can start with that. | 4:43 | |
- | I don't even know how I first got involved. | 4:44 |
(both laugh) | 4:45 | |
I just know that I was rec, | 4:46 | |
probably by Sally Hill, | 4:48 | |
was recruited | 4:50 | |
to be on the Program Committee, | 4:51 | |
starting in 1990. | 4:53 | |
And it was already underway, | 4:55 | |
this whole idea of the Ecumenical Decade, | 4:56 | |
the churches in solidarity with women, | 4:58 | |
and Marianne Lundy had some money. | 5:03 | |
She had some money | 5:07 | |
and she earmarked it for this conference | 5:09 | |
that we were going to plan that was har, | 5:11 | |
you know, in the very beginning stages. | 5:12 | |
- | Yes. | 5:14 |
- | But she saved that money | |
just for this conference. | 5:16 | |
And so, Marianne and Sally | 5:21 | |
really were the beginning, | 5:24 | |
the very beginning. | 5:27 | |
And then they recruited all these women they knew locally | 5:28 | |
and then, | 5:31 | |
it grew and grew and grew. | 5:34 | |
- | You know you have an important story to tell, | 5:36 |
as being involved really early on. | 5:38 | |
I would love to hear what you remember | 5:40 | |
about how this whole thing evolved, | 5:42 | |
what you remember about that process, | 5:44 | |
or what it was like. | 5:46 | |
- | It evolved | 5:47 |
slowly and I would say, | 5:50 | |
I guess the current buzzword is organically. | 5:51 | |
But I think that's how it grew. | 5:55 | |
I mean, first we were looking at, | 5:56 | |
as the Program Committee, | 5:59 | |
looking at people we knew to be teachers and preachers | 6:00 | |
and people who we knew were already into feminist theology. | 6:04 | |
But because we talked, | 6:07 | |
we, some people talked in denominational heads | 6:09 | |
and other people around the country | 6:13 | |
we got the names of so many other people | 6:16 | |
we'd never heard of | 6:17 | |
who ended up being these fabulous speakers. | 6:19 | |
And it was probably, probably pivotal for them | 6:22 | |
to have been invited to be in this conference | 6:27 | |
from around the world. | 6:29 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | And so I loved the way it grew, | 6:32 |
just grew in ways we hadn't foreseen | 6:35 | |
when we first started out | 6:38 | |
saying we're going to have this conference. | 6:39 | |
- | Yeah. | 6:40 |
- | This one-time deal. | 6:41 |
- | Yeah. | 6:43 |
And I wonder, you wrote a little bit about this | 6:43 | |
in your great essay in "Re-membering and Re-Imagining," | 6:45 | |
about how, | 6:48 | |
could you say a little bit more | 6:49 | |
about how the speakers developed | 6:51 | |
to include women of color, women around the world, | 6:52 | |
what that... | 6:55 | |
- | You know, I didn't do that part of it myself. | 6:57 |
I think Sally Hill did a lot of that, | 7:00 | |
and Marianne did. | 7:02 | |
- | Did they? Yeah. | |
- | Because I didn't know these women from around the world. | 7:05 |
This was all new to me. | 7:07 | |
- | Yeah. | 7:09 |
- | You know, I knew the Letty Russell | 7:10 |
and Beverly Harrison and these people | 7:12 | |
that were kind of in our world. | 7:14 | |
- | Right. | 7:17 |
- | And I actually also went to a conference | 7:19 |
at Ghost Ranch in New Mexico, | 7:24 | |
the year before the conference | 7:27 | |
and Marianne was there | 7:29 | |
and Letty Russell was there. | 7:31 | |
- | Hmm. | 7:33 |
- | And it was sort of preparing for this. | 7:34 |
So all these other great thinkers just kept | 7:36 | |
making the list of speakers grow and grow and grow | 7:39 | |
so that we were exposed to things | 7:44 | |
we'd never, ever dreamed we be hearing about. | 7:45 | |
- | Yeah. | 7:48 |
- | Yeah. | |
- | From, would you talk a little bit about, | 7:50 |
it's the impression I have, | 7:52 | |
and you can tell me if this is right or not, | 7:53 | |
is it started out fairly small | 7:54 | |
but then it just kept growing and getting, | 7:56 | |
Is that right? | 7:58 | |
- | Right. | |
I think that's true. | 7:59 | |
I think probably it was originally | 8:00 | |
going to be a one or two day conference | 8:02 | |
and then all of a sudden it's a four day conference. | 8:04 | |
And because we had so many wonderful speaker ideas | 8:07 | |
sent to us and workshop ideas | 8:11 | |
and all these various ideas for presenters, | 8:13 | |
and we wanted to include as many. | 8:16 | |
There was a lot of fundraising that went on | 8:18 | |
so that women from around the world, | 8:20 | |
lay and clergy, could come on scholarships, | 8:22 | |
which was a really important part of deal. | 8:25 | |
I didn't have to do any fundraising | 8:27 | |
but somebody did. | 8:28 | |
And it was partly the money that Marianne Lundy | 8:30 | |
had squirreled away. | 8:33 | |
- | Yes. | 8:34 |
(both laugh) | 8:34 | |
- | Paying for that. | 8:35 |
But there were denominational contributions. | 8:37 | |
I mean, denominations weren't expecting something | 8:39 | |
that was going to be earth-shaking. | 8:43 | |
- | Yes, exactly. | 8:44 |
Yeah. | 8:46 | |
- | Well, some people in the Presbyterian denomination, | 8:47 |
I'm sure, had figured that out in advance | 8:49 | |
but most people didn't. | 8:52 | |
- | Yeah, yeah. | 8:54 |
I mean, you say "some people." | 8:55 | |
Do you mean -- | 8:56 | |
- | Some leaders in the Presbyterian church | 8:57 |
surely knew where, | 9:00 | |
that this was going in a very feminist direction. | 9:00 | |
- | Right, right. | 9:04 |
Yeah, yeah. | 9:05 | |
So you ruf-- | 9:06 | |
- | And didn't seem | |
to be worried about that. | 9:08 | |
- | Oh, interesting. | 9:09 |
Yes, yeah. | 9:11 | |
- | That's interesting too. | 9:12 |
- | We'll have to talk more | 9:13 |
about the backlash in a minute. | 9:14 | |
- | Okay. | 9:15 |
- | So you were on the Program Committee. | 9:15 |
You were at the '93 conference. | 9:16 | |
- | Um-hmm. | 9:19 |
- | Do you remember what that was like, | 9:20 |
what that experience was for you? | 9:21 | |
- | It was fabulous. | 9:23 |
I wished that I had gotten a room downtown | 9:26 | |
so I didn't miss anything in the evening | 9:29 | |
after the main programs were over. | 9:30 | |
Every speaker had more to say | 9:33 | |
that was new and fascinating to me. | 9:36 | |
And the workshops, | 9:39 | |
I mean, there were so many workshops. | 9:40 | |
You couldn't attend half of them. | 9:41 | |
- | (chuckles) Right. | 9:43 |
- | They were all wonderful. | 9:43 |
I mean, I thought, | 9:46 | |
"How did we ever get this accumulation | 9:48 | |
"of people in one room? | 9:51 | |
"How did we, the big we, make this happen?" | 9:52 | |
But it did. | 9:56 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | It did. | 9:57 |
- | Are there certain moments that stand out to you | 9:59 |
from that conference? | 10:01 | |
- | Well, certainly the worship, | 10:02 |
and the rituals that we did, | 10:04 | |
the ones that made us look like goddess worshipers | 10:06 | |
to some more conservative folks. | 10:10 | |
The language was so beautiful, | 10:15 | |
all-inclusive language. | 10:17 | |
Rituals that included women. | 10:19 | |
Remembering and being told out loud, | 10:22 | |
"Remember you're created in the Divine Image | 10:26 | |
"with a uterus." | 10:29 | |
- | Mm-hmm, yes. | 10:30 |
- | I mean, very earthy. | 10:33 |
This is it. | 10:34 | |
Milk and Honey Ritual, | 10:35 | |
very biblical. | 10:37 | |
Oh how that was interpreted | 10:39 | |
was crazy. | 10:41 | |
- | Exactly. | |
Yes. | 10:43 | |
- | I mean, I really did not expect, | 10:45 |
because I hadn't thought forward from the event, | 10:47 | |
I had not expected backlash. | 10:50 | |
But when it hit, | 10:53 | |
I was like "Oh yeah, of course we're going to get hit." | 10:54 | |
- | Mmm. | 10:57 |
Why did you think that, | 10:58 | |
"Of course we're going to get hit"? | 10:59 | |
- | Well, just because, | 11:01 |
especially because of the worship | 11:03 | |
that folks of a more conservative ilk | 11:04 | |
would realize that this kind of worship | 11:09 | |
was created by women for women | 11:12 | |
and that men didn't have a damn thing | 11:15 | |
to do with it. | 11:18 | |
- | Yeah. | |
And so, how do you interpret why that was, | 11:19 | |
Why they reacted the way they did? | 11:23 | |
- | I think so many men | 11:25 |
were really threatened by the idea of women doing theology. | 11:28 | |
Because it had always been done by men before. | 11:33 | |
It just never occurred to them | 11:37 | |
that you could talk about being created | 11:38 | |
in the Divine Image with a uterus. | 11:40 | |
It just, it threatened so many people. | 11:42 | |
I mean, it threatened women too | 11:45 | |
but I, it was the men in leadership | 11:46 | |
who caused the real problems, of course. | 11:48 | |
- | Yeah, yeah. | 11:49 |
Now were you directly affected by the backlash at all? | 11:51 | |
- | I was not. | 11:54 |
Because I was, | 11:55 | |
First of all, everyone knew I was part of it | 11:56 | |
so I, you know, I read Judy Strauss's essay | 11:58 | |
- | Yes. | 12:01 |
- | About, and I knew that Judy and I were good friends. | 12:02 |
We were at the conference at Ghost Ranch as roommates | 12:05 | |
the year before Re-Imagining, | 12:07 | |
so we were all over this. | 12:09 | |
And I know that she was very worried | 12:11 | |
and she would never put that in her resume | 12:13 | |
because she was moving. | 12:16 | |
I mean, she remarried | 12:17 | |
a former denominational executive. | 12:19 | |
She moved to Pittsburgh, | 12:21 | |
where there'd been a lot of backlash. | 12:23 | |
So just because I was local | 12:26 | |
and even if I'd wanted to hide it, | 12:29 | |
I couldn't have. | 12:31 | |
- | Yes. | 12:32 |
I'll just add, I'm going to interview her too. | 12:33 | |
I'm looking forward to it. | 12:34 | |
- | Oh, good. | |
Oh good. | 12:36 | |
- | Yes, yes, yes. | |
So let's, that's good to know. | 12:37 | |
That's great. | 12:38 | |
So it didn't affect you personally | 12:39 | |
but obviously people you knew | 12:40 | |
were really affected. | 12:42 | |
- | Oh yes. | |
Certainly Marianne, being fired. | 12:44 | |
I mean, it was just appauling. | 12:46 | |
We were all, | 12:48 | |
we couldn't believe. | 12:49 | |
And we knew that she | 12:50 | |
had support of a lot of people quietly. | 12:51 | |
She talks about her colleagues quietly supporting her | 12:54 | |
but in public, being examined | 12:56 | |
by a General Assembly committee | 12:59 | |
and not being allowed to speak, | 13:00 | |
not being, | 13:02 | |
not allowing people to thank her | 13:03 | |
for her contribution. | 13:06 | |
I mean, that was just appauling. | 13:08 | |
- | This was a General Assembly, | 13:11 |
people wanted to publicly thank her? | 13:12 | |
Could you say whi -- | 13:14 | |
- | I just read her piece. | 13:15 |
- | Yes, sure. | |
- | So it's in there. | 13:18 |
- | Yes. | |
- | It was at a General Assembly meeting | 13:19 |
where they were interviewing her, | 13:21 | |
or they were dealing with the backlash. | 13:23 | |
- | Right. | 13:24 |
- | And she said something to the effect of, | 13:26 |
"My colleagues were individually supportive of me | 13:28 | |
"but I was not allowed to speak." | 13:31 | |
- | Mm-hmm, yes. | 13:34 |
- | "And when people got up at the end to thank me, | 13:35 |
"they were ruled out of order." | 13:37 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 13:40 |
Were you at General Assembly | 13:42 | |
where they talked about Re-Imagining? | 13:43 | |
- | I was. | 13:45 |
I went to testify. | 13:46 | |
- | You did? | 13:48 |
- | That's not in the book. | 13:49 |
- | I want to hear about this. | 13:50 |
This is really important. | 13:51 | |
- | So there was committee dealing with Re-Imagining backlash. | 13:52 |
- | Mm-hmm. | 13:56 |
- | And the General Assembly was in Kansas City. | 13:57 |
I was not a commissioner | 14:01 | |
but I went just to testify to this committee | 14:01 | |
about Re-Imagining. | 14:04 | |
And I was given a very short time limit, | 14:07 | |
maybe three minutes, | 14:10 | |
so I had actually written it out. | 14:11 | |
I didn't read it | 14:14 | |
but I had it in front of me. | 14:14 | |
And the basis of my testimony was, | 14:17 | |
the church has always re-imagined itself. | 14:21 | |
And if it hadn't, it would have died out | 14:24 | |
as a group of Jewish fishermen. | 14:26 | |
- | Um-hmm. | 14:29 |
- | This was the bottom line of my testimony. (chuckles) | 14:30 |
- | Oh. | 14:33 |
So you, first of all, you volunteered to do this, | 14:34 | |
right? | 14:36 | |
- | I volunteered to do that | |
because I wanted to be supportive. | 14:37 | |
- | Yes. | 14:38 |
- | And I wanted to say this was a wonderful thing. | 14:39 |
One of the interesting things about that General Assembly | 14:41 | |
is sitting and talking with a man | 14:45 | |
who was obviously very conservative | 14:47 | |
but had listened to every single one of those tapes | 14:49 | |
on his drive to Kansas City | 14:51 | |
from wherever he was from. | 14:53 | |
He had listened to all those conversations | 14:54 | |
and I thought, | 14:57 | |
even if he's a conservative man, | 14:58 | |
he's gotta be in some positive way influenced | 15:00 | |
by what happened in all those conversations, | 15:03 | |
all those lectures, | 15:07 | |
and worship. | 15:08 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | It's got to have affected, | 15:09 |
and he seemed pretty gentle when he talked to me. | 15:10 | |
- | Did he? | 15:12 |
- | It wasn't an attack. | |
He was clearly conservative | 15:13 | |
but he was not attacking me. | 15:14 | |
- | Yes, yes. | |
- | It was just, | 15:16 |
we're having a conversation over lunch | 15:17 | |
and I said, "I just am so ecstatic | 15:19 | |
"that you listened to every one of those tapes." | 15:23 | |
- | Yes, yeah. | 15:25 |
And there was a conversation. | 15:26 | |
- | Yeah, there was a conversation. | 15:27 |
- | Yeah. | 15:29 |
- | So I go to have that. | 15:29 |
- | Now did you get any reaction to your testimony. | 15:30 |
- | "Thank you." | 15:33 |
That was it, nothing else. | 15:34 | |
- | And what was your reaction | 15:37 |
to the report that came out of General Assembly? | 15:38 | |
(Judy sighs) | 15:41 | |
And I know it's been a while. (laughs) | 15:42 | |
- | Well, the report that came out, | 15:43 |
and it's funny | 15:45 | |
because they've used this now in other instances, | 15:47 | |
was called "Theology Matters." | 15:51 | |
- | Um-hmm. | 15:53 |
- | And "Theology Matters" was a way of saying | 15:54 |
what we did, was theology but it wasn't their theo, | 15:56 | |
It wasn't the theology of a lot of the people in power. | 16:00 | |
- | Yeah. | 16:04 |
- | Though it was the theology of some | 16:05 |
of the people in power. | 16:06 | |
- | Yeah. | 16:07 |
- | And every once in a while, | 16:09 |
I see something up coming up | 16:11 | |
where they use that "Something Matters," | 16:13 | |
"Black Lives Matter." | 16:15 | |
- | Right, right. | 16:16 |
- | But there have been several others since then, | 16:18 |
that have come up, using that phrase | 16:20 | |
but that was what they came up with. | 16:22 | |
And I thought, "Well, that part is true. | 16:23 | |
"Theology does matter." | 16:26 | |
It's like, it is true. | 16:28 | |
God is good and God is neither male nor female | 16:30 | |
and theology matters. | 16:33 | |
And the denomination has to deal | 16:34 | |
with it's right wing conservatives. | 16:37 | |
And this is how they did it. | 16:39 | |
And it ended up with Marianne being fired | 16:41 | |
and people being afraid | 16:45 | |
to say they were a part of this movement. | 16:47 | |
- | Yeah. | 16:49 |
- | And yet, they were. | |
- | Yes. | 16:50 |
- | They were. | 16:51 |
So yes, | 16:54 | |
and theology done by women matters. | 16:56 | |
- | Yeah. | 16:59 |
- | Why would it all be done by men? | 17:00 |
Really, why? | 17:03 | |
- | Yeah. | |
So what do you think the net result was | 17:05 | |
of the backlash and the report that came out, | 17:07 | |
the testimonies? | 17:11 | |
- | It made some people stronger | 17:14 |
in their convictions as feminist theologians. | 17:16 | |
- | Yes. | 17:19 |
- | Feminist thinkers. | 17:19 |
And it made other, it made some people, | 17:21 | |
especially in more conservative areas | 17:24 | |
afraid to voice what they believed. | 17:26 | |
- | Yes. | 17:29 |
- | But it also made the organization | 17:31 |
continue as an organization | 17:32 | |
instead of a one-time conference. | 17:34 | |
- | Right, right. | 17:36 |
There was one part of that report | 17:37 | |
I wanted to get your reaction to, | 17:38 | |
if you remember. | 17:40 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | One of the comments was, | 17:41 |
it talked about how, | 17:41 | |
you know, theological work by women is important | 17:43 | |
and everything. | 17:44 | |
I believe one of the phrases in it is | 17:46 | |
something about, | 17:48 | |
this went beyond the boundaries | 17:49 | |
of Reformed Theology. | 17:50 | |
So how would you respond to that? | 17:52 | |
- | Well, a lot of that was driven | 17:53 |
by those conservative reporters | 17:57 | |
who came to our meetings | 17:59 | |
from especially the Presbyterian Layman was the worst. | 18:00 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 18:03 |
- | The group that accused us of | 18:05 |
worshiping a goddess | 18:07 | |
because we sang to Sophia, Wisdom. | 18:09 | |
Not a woman but wisdom, sophia wisdom. | 18:12 | |
(Judy sighs) | 18:18 | |
It was so depressing | 18:22 | |
that the ideas came out in those conservative, | 18:25 | |
in the conservative press. | 18:29 | |
And then that Presbyterian conservative press | 18:32 | |
affected other denominations. | 18:34 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 18:37 |
- | They got the Methodists, | 18:39 |
little bit the Lutherans. | 18:40 | |
They got to other groups | 18:41 | |
but it was primarily lead | 18:43 | |
by the conservative Presbyterians. | 18:44 | |
So the money originally came from the Presbyterians, | 18:45 | |
the backlash of, | 18:48 | |
the biggest part of the backlash | 18:49 | |
started with the Presbyterians. | 18:51 | |
- | It did. | 18:52 |
- | So I've already forgotten what you actually asked me. | 18:53 |
- | Oh about the beyond the | 18:57 |
beyond the boundary. | 18:58 | |
- | Oh beyond the boundaries. | |
It was considered beyond the boundaries | 18:59 | |
because, especially because of our worship. | 19:01 | |
And because we had a Milk and Honey Ritual | 19:03 | |
that was considered, | 19:06 | |
that was clearly beyond the boundaries, | 19:10 | |
that we should create something | 19:12 | |
taken right out of the Bible | 19:13 | |
and make it into a ritual. | 19:15 | |
- | Yes. | 19:17 |
- | That and the Sophia, | 19:19 |
those were the things | 19:20 | |
that really got people up in arms. | 19:21 | |
And then Nancy Chin's artwork | 19:23 | |
that happened during our discussions of the female body. | 19:23 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 19:29 |
- | That were so lovely. | 19:30 |
So lovely | 19:33 | |
and yet, | 19:34 | |
pretty offensive to men | 19:36 | |
who couldn't understand what we were doing. | 19:38 | |
The Presbyterian Layman was so ready to attack us. | 19:43 | |
I mean, we knew they were coming, | 19:48 | |
we knew they were ready to attack us | 19:50 | |
but we never expected, | 19:52 | |
I never expected that it would be as bad as it was. | 19:54 | |
Maybe Marianne did. | 19:56 | |
- | And they had been involved before | 19:58 |
in, Presbyterian Layman. | 20:01 | |
- | Yeah, and they have attacked everything more progressive. | 20:04 |
- | Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. | 20:07 |
That's really helpful. | 20:10 | |
Now were you part of the committee | 20:12 | |
that helped to establish the community? | 20:14 | |
- | I was, I was. | 20:16 |
- | I really want | |
to hear about that. | 20:18 | |
What was that like? | 20:19 | |
What was people's reactions afterward? | 20:20 | |
How did that happen? | 20:21 | |
- | Well, it was again one of those things | 20:23 |
that we hadn't planned | 20:27 | |
and it just had to happen. | 20:28 | |
I mean, there was no question. | 20:30 | |
We had to continue. | 20:33 | |
We had to fight this backlash. | 20:34 | |
We had to keep educating people. | 20:35 | |
We had to keep teaching and preaching. | 20:36 | |
It was as if we didn't have a choice. | 20:40 | |
We had to do it. | 20:43 | |
And so this lovely group of women | 20:46 | |
was meeting in the basement | 20:47 | |
of a Minnesota Church center | 20:49 | |
for a long, | 20:53 | |
for years. | 20:54 | |
I mean, I stayed on the committee for many years | 20:55 | |
until we finally | 20:58 | |
outlasted a kind of budget. | 21:01 | |
I mean, we created those, more and more conferences. | 21:04 | |
I went to every one of them. | 21:06 | |
I have the tapes from every one of them, | 21:08 | |
if you need any extra tapes. | 21:10 | |
- | Thank you. | 21:11 |
- | And we just had to keep going. | 21:13 |
We just had to. | 21:18 | |
- | So it really wasn't even a debate, so much? | 21:20 |
- | It really wasn't. | 21:22 |
It's like, it's obvious. | 21:23 | |
- | Right. | 21:25 |
- | Obvious we had to keep going. | 21:26 |
- | Yes, yeah. | 21:27 |
And then, do you remember | 21:29 | |
how it evolved into the more conferences, | 21:31 | |
faith labs, small groups, | 21:36 | |
I mean, the publications. | 21:38 | |
It was so much. | 21:40 | |
- | Yeah, there was so much. | 21:41 |
Oh that's right, our publications. | 21:42 | |
I'd forgotten about those. | 21:43 | |
- | Yeah. | 21:44 |
- | Yeah. | 21:45 |
It just kept growing | 21:46 | |
as we saw the need | 21:47 | |
to keep educating and teaching and preaching | 21:49 | |
and opening people's minds. | 21:53 | |
And there were so many people with these great ideas. | 21:56 | |
I mean, people who knew how to do publications. | 21:59 | |
People who knew. | 22:01 | |
Pam Joern was such an amazing part | 22:02 | |
of the whole conference. | 22:05 | |
The play she wrote for the conference | 22:06 | |
and then the things she did afterwards | 22:07 | |
continue to make the organization stronger | 22:10 | |
and more creative and imaginitive, | 22:14 | |
bringing in the arts | 22:19 | |
that we did from the very beginning. | 22:20 | |
I didn't mention that earlier, | 22:22 | |
the drawing on the table, | 22:23 | |
on the paper table cloths. | 22:24 | |
- | Yes. | 22:26 |
- | It was the first time I was ever exposed Cray-Pas. | 22:27 |
Now I love Cray-Pas. | 22:29 | |
I have ever since. | 22:30 | |
- | Ah! | 22:31 |
- | So I have them | |
for my grandchildren to play with. | 22:32 | |
To be able to sit and do that | 22:35 | |
while you're listening to a lecture | 22:36 | |
was very freeing. | 22:38 | |
So these creative people | 22:40 | |
kept bringing more and more of these things in | 22:41 | |
so that we could keep teaching. | 22:43 | |
- | Yes, yes. | 22:45 |
- | Keep reaching people. | |
- | Yeah. | 22:47 |
You know, you mentioned you went to | 22:49 | |
all of the conferences, | 22:50 | |
which is fantastic. | 22:52 | |
And I'm sure you don't remember every detail | 22:53 | |
of every one of them. (chuckles) | 22:55 | |
- | I certainly don't. | 22:56 |
- | I'm just won, yeah, | |
Are there any moments that stand out for you? | 22:57 | |
It's been a while, I know. | 23:00 | |
- | Yeah. | 23:01 |
- | But any moments | |
in particular? | 23:02 | |
- | Well, | |
it was always the worship. | 23:03 | |
- | Yes. | 23:04 |
- | It was always the worship and the rituals | 23:05 |
that bless Sophia. | 23:07 | |
- | Yes. | |
- | The things that we did | 23:10 |
that we continue doing | 23:11 | |
to raise up | 23:13 | |
this divine female image | 23:14 | |
and this divine female image in each of us. | 23:17 | |
- | Yes, yeah, yeah. | 23:21 |
Did you belong to a small group at some point? | 23:24 | |
- | I didn't belong to a small group | 23:26 |
but I was on these committees for many years. | 23:27 | |
(both laugh) | 23:29 | |
I don't remember how many years. | 23:31 | |
- | That is wonderful. | 23:32 |
So, how would you define Re-Imagining? | 23:35 | |
What is it or was it? | 23:39 | |
- | Did I write, | 23:44 |
Did I write anything down here? | 23:45 | |
Let's see. | 23:46 | |
I wrote down, | 23:50 | |
"It was always open to the Holy Spirit | 23:51 | |
"with an emphasis on women doing theology | 23:54 | |
"from a woman's point of view." | 23:57 | |
But it's the re-imagining, | 24:00 | |
it's the imagining part that was so important. | 24:02 | |
Re-Member, | 24:05 | |
Re-Imagine, | 24:06 | |
Re-Put Together, | 24:07 | |
Re-Create, | 24:09 | |
all these things that we did was part of that, | 24:10 | |
being open to the Holy Spirit | 24:13 | |
and realizing that women could do theology. | 24:16 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 24:19 |
Exactly, yes. | 24:20 | |
How did feminist theology affect the structure | 24:21 | |
and functioning of the community, | 24:24 | |
as you look at it? | 24:26 | |
- | Well, I think it stayed very inclusive, | 24:28 |
very open. | 24:31 | |
When you go back to the idea of the round tables | 24:32 | |
that we had at the first conference, | 24:35 | |
we carried that idea through. | 24:36 | |
When I have gone to a meeting over at Plymouth, | 24:38 | |
we've been in a circle. | 24:41 | |
So we continue that | 24:43 | |
inclusive image of the, | 24:46 | |
we're all equal contributors to the story. | 24:49 | |
- | What was it like, | 24:52 |
you mentioned you were involved in the planning | 24:53 | |
and committees and everything. | 24:55 | |
What was it like | 24:56 | |
being on those Re-Imagining-type committees? | 24:57 | |
- | It was amazing the things that came up | 25:01 |
and the ideas that came up | 25:03 | |
were just all over the place. | 25:05 | |
And I do remember there was a man on our committee | 25:07 | |
who, | 25:12 | |
I think was a man and wife | 25:15 | |
and they were both | 25:17 | |
maybe Episcopalians | 25:19 | |
and they both eventually dropped off. | 25:22 | |
And it was, | 25:25 | |
I was always curious about that. | 25:26 | |
What happened that made them drop off? | 25:27 | |
Did they know there was going to be a backlash? | 25:30 | |
Were they afraid | 25:34 | |
or were they just not interested? | 25:35 | |
I mean, I don't know. | 25:37 | |
- | Yeah. | |
This was the first. | 25:38 | |
- | The first. | |
- | Before the '93 conference. | 25:39 |
- | Yeah. | |
- | Yeah, yes, yes. | 25:41 |
- | Yeah, the, yeah. | |
The Program Committee that I joined in 1990 | 25:43 | |
had these interesting people | 25:47 | |
but some of them disappeared | 25:48 | |
and you never quite knew why | 25:49 | |
they had dropped off. | 25:51 | |
- | Right. | 25:52 |
Yeah, yeah. | 25:53 | |
- | And some of them were just always there, | 25:54 |
no matter what. | 25:56 | |
- | There were people who were involved | 25:59 |
pretty much the whole time, | 26:00 | |
weren't there? | 26:01 | |
- | Yeah. | |
Sally Hill, Pam Joern, | 26:02 | |
Marianne but she wasn't in the Twin Cities | 26:04 | |
but yeah. | 26:06 | |
Nancy Berneking, who put this together. | 26:08 | |
- | Yes. | 26:11 |
- | And who died a long time ago, already. | 26:12 |
- | I know. | 26:15 |
- | Yeah. | 26:15 |
- | Yeah. | |
- | Yeah. | 26:16 |
Well, what kind of challenges did the community face | 26:18 | |
while it was in existence? | 26:22 | |
- | Well, certainly fundraising. | 26:24 |
- | Mm-hmm. | 26:27 |
- | To have a publication, | 26:28 |
to pay rent on an office and a copy machine | 26:30 | |
and all those things that we had never planned on. | 26:32 | |
- | Right. | 26:34 |
- | It was hard, | 26:35 |
hard to raise money. | 26:36 | |
We all had to pay some money | 26:38 | |
to be members of the community. | 26:40 | |
I don't remember how much. | 26:41 | |
And some people, not me, | 26:43 | |
but some people had to do some fundraising beyond that. | 26:45 | |
And got money from, | 26:48 | |
like St. Luke Church gave some money every year | 26:50 | |
towards the ongoing community. | 26:52 | |
I don't know what other places did but, | 26:54 | |
and we had enough tie-in there | 26:57 | |
that we could do that. | 26:59 | |
I suppose the other challenge | 27:05 | |
was the women who felt frightened | 27:07 | |
and afraid to admit that they were part of this. | 27:10 | |
- | Right. | 27:12 |
- | And they were not so likely | 27:14 |
to be on and on-going committee. | 27:15 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 27:17 |
- | And some of them should have been. | 27:19 |
Would have been, | 27:20 | |
could have been. | 27:21 | |
Would have been better if we'd had more | 27:22 | |
of these voices of people who | 27:24 | |
were afraid to be named a heretic. | 27:27 | |
- | Right. | 27:31 |
- | A witch. | 27:32 |
- | Yeah. | 27:33 |
(Judy chuckles) | 27:34 | |
Yeah. | ||
Talking about this, | 27:35 | |
I just have to ask you, | 27:36 | |
what did it feel like | 27:37 | |
to be labeled a heretic and a goddess worshiper and, | 27:38 | |
(both laugh) | 27:39 | |
- | I thought, "You've got to be kidding! | 27:41 |
(both laugh) | 27:44 | |
"You can't really mean this, you crazy people!" | 27:45 | |
- | And why did you react that way? | 27:49 |
(both laugh) | 27:50 | |
- | Well, it had never occurred to me | 27:52 |
that I would be labeled as such a thing. | 27:53 | |
I mean, this sort of ordinary, run-of-the-mill Presbyterian. | 27:55 | |
(both laugh) | 27:59 | |
Never occurred to me, I'd be called a witch. | 28:00 | |
- | Yes. | 28:03 |
- | And I mean, I, | 28:04 |
It was hard for me to take it seriously | 28:06 | |
because I knew it was so absurd. | 28:07 | |
I knew we didn't worship a goddess. | 28:10 | |
- | Mm-hmmm, mm-hmm, yeah. | 28:14 |
- | So as you look at it, | 28:18 |
what aspects of Re-Imagining | 28:20 | |
were most significant to you and why? | 28:21 | |
- | Well, I would say the connections | 28:27 |
with the women I worked with | 28:29 | |
were most significant. | 28:30 | |
The ritual and worship were most significant. | 28:32 | |
And those are the parts that continue | 28:35 | |
in my daily life | 28:39 | |
and when I create a liturgy | 28:42 | |
for something that I might be doing, | 28:43 | |
there's that feminist aspect | 28:46 | |
that always is in there, | 28:48 | |
whether anyone notices or not. | 28:50 | |
- | So would you say that Re-Imagining | 28:52 |
really influenced the way you do liturgy? | 28:53 | |
- | Absolutely. | 28:56 |
- | Wow. | 28:57 |
- | Absolutely. | |
- | Could you say a little more about that? | 28:58 |
What makes it feminist? | 28:59 | |
(Judy chuckles) | 29:01 | |
- | Hmm. | 29:03 |
Well, of course, we never use the word God, | 29:05 | |
the pronoun "he" for God. | 29:10 | |
And it's amazing how people have adapted | 29:14 | |
to that, pretty well. | 29:16 | |
I remember an argument with a woman | 29:18 | |
at a church who didn't like my not using God "he". | 29:23 | |
It wasn't an argument, it was a discussion. | 29:29 | |
And she said she was really upset by this. | 29:31 | |
And I said, "Well, do you think God is really a man?" | 29:33 | |
And she said, "Well, no." | 29:38 | |
"Do you think God is a woman?" | 29:42 | |
"No." | 29:45 | |
"Well, if God is beyond male or female | 29:46 | |
"then why do we always use the pronoun he?" | 29:49 | |
And she sorta took it in | 29:54 | |
but she was troubled by it. | 29:58 | |
- | Yeah. | 29:59 |
- | I see, well certainly in the context | 30:00 |
where I am now at West Minister, | 30:02 | |
I don't see many people troubled | 30:03 | |
by inclusive language. | 30:05 | |
But that's certainly in everything that I do. | 30:06 | |
- | Yeah. | 30:09 |
- | Everything. | 30:10 |
- | And is it mostly using the term "God" | 30:11 |
instead of he or using feminine? | 30:13 | |
Or how's it usually work out? | 30:16 | |
- | It's interesting. | 30:20 |
I've taught my grandchildren, | 30:21 | |
when I pray with them at night, | 30:23 | |
to say the Lord's Prayer, | 30:25 | |
"Our God who art in heaven." | 30:27 | |
At St. Luke they say, | 30:28 | |
"Our Mother and Father who art in heaven" | 30:29 | |
in their worship. | 30:32 | |
We say, most of us in most context, | 30:36 | |
say, "Our Father who art in heaven" | 30:39 | |
but in my mind it's always | 30:41 | |
either "Mother and Father" or "Our God" | 30:43 | |
even if I say "Father". | 30:45 | |
- | Yes. | 30:47 |
- | That language is always with me. | 30:48 |
But it's also all the images of women in the Bible, though. | 30:51 | |
The mother hen protecting her chicks under her wings. | 30:54 | |
The one who brings water. | 30:58 | |
All those feminine images that people | 31:00 | |
had ignored for a long time, | 31:02 | |
hadn't even noticed were there. | 31:03 | |
- | Exactly. | 31:05 |
Yeah. | 31:06 | |
- | There all there. | |
- | Yeah, they are. | 31:08 |
- | Even in that patriarchal language and culture. | 31:10 |
Those images are there. | 31:13 | |
I don't ever forget those. | 31:17 | |
- | And I think you're already talking about this | 31:19 |
but I wonder if you want | 31:21 | |
to say a little bit more | 31:22 | |
about how Re-Imagining affected your view | 31:23 | |
on theology or liturgy, | 31:25 | |
the church? | 31:28 | |
- | Well the church is slow to change | 31:31 |
but I'm happy to be in a community | 31:34 | |
that is very open to feminist theology. | 31:37 | |
I had a wonderful experience | 31:43 | |
as an interim pastor | 31:45 | |
where I was an interim associate pastor | 31:49 | |
with a woman head of staff. | 31:51 | |
And I love to put this in the record, | 31:54 | |
- | Please. | 31:56 |
- | We used to joke | |
about the fact that there wasn't | 31:57 | |
even a steeple on the church, | 31:59 | |
there wasn't a phallic symbol anywhere | 32:00 | |
and we were doing just fine. | 32:01 | |
(both laugh) | 32:03 | |
- | And so that really, | 32:07 |
the church was responsive and welcoming. | 32:08 | |
- | But it was this same church | 32:12 |
where I had this conversation with this woman who didn't | 32:13 | |
like inclusive language. | 32:15 | |
- | Ah, yes, yeah. | |
- | So they adapted. | 32:19 |
They adapted. | 32:22 | |
Now when I'm a bible study leader at West Minister, | 32:23 | |
there are still some women | 32:26 | |
who only use the male pronoun | 32:27 | |
and I don't correct them. | 32:29 | |
Somebody did once, | 32:32 | |
and I was stunned rudely. | 32:34 | |
I didn't like it. | 32:36 | |
But -- | 32:39 | |
- | I think I know why, but say, why? | 32:40 |
Why don't you correct them? | 32:41 | |
- | I think if your image of God | 32:45 |
has always been "God he" | 32:47 | |
and you haven't figured out a way | 32:49 | |
to open up that image, then why take away | 32:51 | |
that sense of security you have for "God he"? | 32:54 | |
You're talking about an 85 year old woman | 32:56 | |
who says "God he." | 32:59 | |
Why would I change that? | 33:00 | |
I don't use that myself | 33:03 | |
but why would I correct her? | 33:05 | |
And it really was rude when this other woman | 33:08 | |
did correct her. | 33:09 | |
- | Sounds like a pastoral concern. | 33:11 |
- | Yeah, it was. | 33:12 |
- | Yes, yeah. | |
What specific contributions | 33:16 | |
do you think Re-Imagining made | 33:19 | |
to theology and liturgy? | 33:20 | |
- | I think it changed the whole world. | 33:23 |
I really do. | 33:26 | |
You know, I can really only speak to how it changed things | 33:29 | |
in the Progressive Presbyterian Churches. | 33:32 | |
But I know that the ripples were much wider than that. | 33:35 | |
I don't know what really, ultimately happened | 33:39 | |
with the Methodists. | 33:41 | |
I think it made it easier | 33:42 | |
for gay and lesbian people to be, | 33:46 | |
to feel part of the church. | 33:48 | |
I think that was one of the things | 33:50 | |
that was nudged open by Re-Imagining. | 33:52 | |
Now, probably trans-gender people, | 33:57 | |
that same kind of opening | 34:00 | |
I think is there for trans-gender people. | 34:01 | |
We have a seminary student at West Minister | 34:03 | |
who considers herself "Z" | 34:04 | |
which I hadn't heard before. | 34:06 | |
- | Yeah, yeah. | 34:08 |
And so despite the backlash. | 34:10 | |
- | Despite the backlash. | 34:12 |
- | It still moved things forward. | 34:14 |
- | It did. | 34:15 |
Absolutely, moved things forward. | 34:16 | |
- | Yeah, yeah. | 34:17 |
So looking back on it, | 34:21 | |
what do you think is the greatest legacy of Re-Imagining? | 34:22 | |
- | The greatest legacy is | 34:30 |
that a lot of people had figured out | 34:32 | |
that women can do theology. | 34:34 | |
From a female point of view. | 34:37 | |
From a point of view of a person with a uterus. | 34:38 | |
- | Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. | 34:41 |
Yes, yeah. | 34:42 | |
- | I think that's it. | 34:44 |
I think that's the bottom line. | 34:45 | |
- | Right. | 34:47 |
- | And not only can do theology, | 34:48 |
but need to do theology | 34:49 | |
cause so much has been done | 34:52 | |
just from a male point of view | 34:54 | |
in our Christian history. | 34:56 | |
And all of our theology | 35:01 | |
until rather recently was all done by men | 35:03 | |
who never thought about what it was like | 35:05 | |
to be created in the Divine Image with a uterus. | 35:07 | |
- | Mm-hmm, exactly. | 35:10 |
Yeah. | 35:13 | |
So what does Re-Imagining mean today? | 35:14 | |
And I don't just mean the Re-Imagining Community | 35:17 | |
but what do you see needs to be re-imagined | 35:18 | |
in the church, in society? | 35:21 | |
- | Well, there's still a lot | 35:23 |
that needs re-imaging. | 35:25 | |
- | Yes, yeah. | |
- | There's still a lot. | 35:26 |
I wish the words of institution | 35:31 | |
for our communion service were. | 35:35 | |
I wish we could take out the blood of Christ part of that, | 35:39 | |
that could be re-imaged in a much better way. | 35:43 | |
I tend to fudge when I do communion. | 35:48 | |
I don't like to use those words, | 35:51 | |
even to say "the cup of the new covenant | 35:54 | |
"in Christ's blood." | 35:59 | |
I don't think that's really very helpful. | 36:02 | |
- | Yeah, | 36:04 |
say some more about that. | 36:05 | |
- | to saved people. | |
Those images of Christ's blood, | 36:08 | |
I understand were very important | 36:11 | |
in the beginning of the Church | 36:15 | |
and then there's the weird part | 36:18 | |
about the Catholics thinking that that was, | 36:19 | |
becomes literally Christ's blood. | 36:22 | |
I mean, that's creepy to me. | 36:24 | |
And I know other cultures | 36:27 | |
that have been involved in blood | 36:28 | |
and | 36:31 | |
drinking the blood of the whatever, | 36:34 | |
and it's creepy. | 36:36 | |
And I think it's hard for my children's generation | 36:38 | |
to get their head around that at all. | 36:44 | |
And so, thinking, "Well, this sounds like canibalism to me." | 36:46 | |
So I wish we could, | 36:51 | |
I really wish we could change that part of it. | 36:52 | |
- | Could I ask then, | 36:55 |
this sounds really interesting. | 36:56 | |
So re-imagining that the, | 36:57 | |
for example the Eucharist, | 36:59 | |
what does a re-imagined Eucharist look like? | 37:00 | |
- | I don't know. | 37:02 |
I haven't tried to create that, | 37:04 | |
but I think it could be done. | 37:06 | |
I think it could be done. | 37:09 | |
I'll think about that some more. | 37:12 | |
- | Good, good. | 37:13 |
I have a really specific question | 37:14 | |
for you. | 37:16 | |
- | Okay. | |
- | And you already know about this, | 37:17 |
that we're working on the website. | 37:18 | |
- | Right. | 37:19 |
- | And I'm just trying to get ideas from people | 37:20 |
about what would be helpful to have in it, | 37:22 | |
and how we could spread the word, | 37:24 | |
who would benefit from it. | 37:26 | |
Any suggestions, ideas you have, | 37:27 | |
we're eager to hear them. | 37:29 | |
- | It would be lovely if Pam Carter Joern's play | 37:32 |
were on the website. | 37:37 | |
- | Great idea. | 37:40 |
- | And | 37:41 |
now I've forgotten, | 37:44 | |
which one. | 37:45 | |
There was one called, | 37:46 | |
"I've prayed 'Our Father' for too long." | 37:47 | |
- | Yes, it was "Simple," | 37:49 |
was it "Simple Gifts," | 37:51 | |
The 1993 one? | 37:52 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | About the Shakers? | 37:54 |
- | Yeah. | 37:55 |
- | Yeah, yeah, yes. | |
The one you're thinking of? | 37:56 | |
- | Yeah. | |
- | Yes. | 37:58 |
- | But also the one before that, | 37:59 |
I though she wrote. | 38:01 | |
Maybe someone else wrote it, | 38:01 | |
called "I prayed 'Our Father' for too long" | 38:02 | |
but I went to it with my husband, | 38:05 | |
my ex-husband, and another couple. | 38:06 | |
We two women were both crying at the end of it | 38:10 | |
and both of our husbands were looking at us like, | 38:15 | |
"What's the deal?" | 38:17 | |
They didn't get it at all, either one of them. | 38:19 | |
They both became ex-husbands. | 38:22 | |
- | Yes. | 38:26 |
- | So, yes. | 38:27 |
The things that Pam has written | 38:28 | |
have been so pivotal, I think, to the whole movement. | 38:30 | |
And I think as much of that | 38:33 | |
as we can on the website as possible, | 38:34 | |
would be wonderful. | 38:36 | |
- | That's a great idea. | |
People haven't mentioned that before | 38:38 | |
but I think you're right, absolutely. | 38:39 | |
Good. | 38:43 | |
- | And I think it would be fine to put on the website | 38:43 |
about my testimony | 38:45 | |
about if the church hadn't re-imagined itself, | 38:46 | |
it would have died out as a group of Jewish fishermen. | 38:48 | |
- | Mm-hmm. Good, good. | 38:51 |
Yes! | 38:52 | |
(both laugh) | 38:53 | |
- | That's my favorite line ever. | 38:54 |
- | It is. | 38:54 |
That is great. | 38:55 | |
- | Absolutely. | 38:56 |
- | Well, Judy, is there anything we | 38:59 |
haven't talked about that you would like to add? | 39:00 | |
- | I would like to add | 39:20 |
that I'm grateful for the backlash. | 39:23 | |
- | Oh, say some more about that. | 39:25 |
- | Because it allowed us to continue | 39:26 |
and to keep growing and learning | 39:30 | |
and expanding our vision of what was, | 39:32 | |
what's in this created world for us. | 39:35 | |
- | Mm-hmm. | 39:37 |
- | So I look back and I think, | 39:39 |
"Thank God there are all those people who were upset | 39:41 | |
and made us continue." | 39:46 | |
Cause we really had to. | 39:49 | |
- | Yes. | 39:50 |
That's great. | 39:52 | |
And a great place to end, | 39:54 | |
I think. | 39:55 | |
- | Okay. | |
- | Thank you, so much. | 39:56 |