Ordained Women in Travail~ Our History

A Review Approaching the 43rd Anniversary of the Philadelphia Ordinations of Eleven Women as the First Women in the Priesthood of the Episcopal Church on July 29, 1974

 

On the 43rd anniversary of the Philadelphia Ordinations, it's time again to speak to history and let the speech be overheard. This is a section of my archival website essay with letters and links created three years ago, on the Fortieth Anniversary of the Philadelphia Ordinations in which eleven ordained women in the diaconate broke the barrier against women in the priesthood. Having to break through institutional intransigence, we proceeded in due process to the full extent of the canonical requirements, and at the last step we were blocked by the unwillingness of our individual diocesan Standing Committees to give us their final endorsement for ordination to the priesthood, because "it had never been done." That position demonstrated that no Standing Committee as a body had the courage or imagination to break with custom, a situation all too familiar to women in the history of the human family. 


It wasn't a matter of breaking Canon Law as there was none prohibiting women in the priesthood. It simply hadn't happened yet, and people froze with fear at the prospect of what seemed a fundamental change in custom, that women should take a radical step toward sacred equality. I for one didn't view becoming a priest as attaining a position of power, but simply as fulfilling a deep desire to be a Eucharistic celebrant and a priestly minister of the Sacraments of Reconciliation and Anointing, which I could not do as a deacon confined to the sacraments of Baptism and Marriage, leaving the Sacraments of Confirmation and Ordination to the bishops.
 

We presented ourselves as having been proven and endorsed as fully prepared and competent candidates for both the diaconate and the priesthood, and we "Philadelphia Eleven" ordained deacons were ordained to the priesthood by three highly respected and courageous, retired or resigned bishops at the Church of the Advocate on July 29, 1974. The following year, on September 7, 1975, four more women deacons were ordained to the priesthood at the Church of St. Stephen and the Incarnation in Washington, D.C.

Here are pictures of the beautiful French Gothic Church of the Advocate at 18th and Diamond Streets in the City of Sisterly and Brotherly Love. Note how contemporary art blends beautifully with traditional. You can click on the first picture and see it enlarged, and see all the rest from the single frame enlargement page for full effect, then click Esc at the top left of your keyboard to return to the text here. For some reason, a few of the pictures appear slightly larger on this page.

We Eleven present ourselves, kneeling at the altar rail. Bishop Edward Welles stands behind the rail, flanked by Church of the Advocate Senior Warden and cross-bearer for the service, future deacon, priest and bishop, Barbara Harris, and Bishop Tony Ramos who had come from Costa Rica to support his brother bishops as they ordained us. He had also gone to seminary with several of the ordinands and was present to support them as well.

It was while we were standing or kneeling at the altar rail that a loud metallic sound suddenly went through the church. It sounded like a gun shot. There were a few moments of anxious silence. Knowing a person can be shot and not realize it right away, I looked down to check myself for blood, and then the women to my right and left. Our white vestments were not bloodstained. The service resumed. Two thoughts were in my mind. First, that we might have been shot, since we were aware of bomb threats before the service, and the Philadelphia Police had found a stink bomb already planted when they searched earlier that morning. My second thought was dismay that I would think such a thing, but then I realized it wasn't a far-fetched fear since it was less than a month after Alberta King, mother of Martin Luther King, Jr., had been shot to death while on the organ bench of her church. Afterward we were told that the alarming noise was made by an NBC camera that had fallen over onto the stone floor of the transept.

 It was strengthening (mostly) to know

that St. Joan of Arc was with us!

This is the official church banner of Christ the Advocate, 

perfect for the racially integrated parish.

This is the Second Wave ordination of women to the priesthood~ Betty [Rosenberg] Powell, Alison Palmer, Diane Tickell and Lee McGee, and they are known and celebrated as the Washington Four~ September 7, 1975, at the Church of St. Stephen and the Incarnation in Washington, D.C. Their ordaining bishop was George Barrett.

During the Philadelphia service, two male priests who raised formal protest represented the psychological mindset of priesthood as power, which was not to be shared with the inferior and unworthy, meaning women. Decades earlier, Anglican theologian Dorothy Sayers articulated the obvious and ludicrous question such an attitude raised: "Are women human?" From the rejection by strangers, friends and family members, from the obscene and hateful letters, phone calls and physical and verbal attacks in personal encounters we endured from that day forward, transparent misogyny shouted the answer to that question in the direction of the Church: No. Women are not human. What other reason could there be but that absurdly wrong one for denying us ordination to the priesthood and episcopate? 


The real reason was the male refusal to share power, according to a perception of priesthood not as a form of being-in-service, but as having image-building power over others. Those men who objected tried to quote Scripture to justify themselves. One of them shook his fist at our bishops saying, "you break the bond between Adam and Eve by trying to turn stones into bread," then sweeping his hand in our direction to make it clear that we Eleven were the stones in his oddly mixed metaphor. They made it clear that they perceived ordination as advancement up the ranks, and priesthood as entitling them to vertical power over others, whereas we perceived it as a form of power, that is the ability to serve God effectively with and in others, which is the essence of all forms of Christian ministry. How could the Church ever be balanced and whole while allowing only male members to lead by an idea of power that was not even Christian? Exclusionary power over others is exploitation. Exploitation has no place in the teachings and example of Christ. His power was in co-operative community, not domination and oppression. The power of the community is integrative power, and within the circle, leadership is flexible and by consensus. 

The excerpts below in the section, "Our Words," contain the most important part of the essay collage to me, the importance of accurately honoring those past heroes who suffered and sacrificed themselves through many generations as ordained women in the diaconate who were treated ambiguously and disrespectfully by the Church between 1855 and 1970, many of them living with a strong sense of vocation to the priesthood which could not be fulfilled in their lifetimes, before the door to the priesthood was finally opened to women deacons in 1974 by the Philadelphia Eleven with a strong second push in 1975 by the Washington Four.

(Click Control and F to open a search box in the lower left corner and type in "There was a section here" to lead into and explain the beginning of that section called "Our Words" which is most important to me~ if you don't have time or energy to read more. Thank you.)


After two years of enforcing a strategy of trying to make us invisible while persecuting those male priests who recognized and opened their doors to us, the voice of the institution made its declaration. In 1976, the governing body of the Episcopal Church, its trienniel General Convention, gathered in Minneapolis where my husband and I lived at the time. That year, General Convention effectively recognized the first fifteen women priests by formally endorsing women in all three Holy Orders as deacons, priests and bishops, as well as in the first order of Christian service, the lay ministry shared by our common baptismal commitment to Christ's continuing service to the needs of the world, spiritual and temporal. 


It should be noted here that while American women achieved the secular vote in 1920, it took another half century for Episcopal women's ecclesiastical suffrage to be realized. The bicameral General Convention of the Episcopal Church with the then all-male House of Bishops on one side and the House of Deputies on the other, consisting of male priests and laymen, had refused admission to women as Deputies elected by their individual diocesan conventions. Only in 1970 did the House of Deputies finally open its doors after decades of women's presence on the outside, and women were seated at last with full voice and vote. It was they who first had called for a vote on women priests, after successfully eliminating the discriminatory Canon Law on deacon"esses" and legislating one canon for all deacons to end many oppressive discriminatory practices against women in the diaconate, including a requirement that they remain celibate and wear special garb resembling a nun's habit, which created all sorts of confusion about their role in the Church. 


The presence of many laywomen in the House of Deputies at the 1976 General Convention strengthened the movement forward toward full integration. The Holy Spirit was perceptible during the September vote to endorse women in all Orders of ministry. 

I had been called back to the voting room after attempting to leave early to prepare dinner for the Philadelphia and Washington priests and their spouses and our bishops and their spouses and a few special supporters who'd been invited earlier in the day, and also because I didn't believe the vote would go in women's favor if the "Vote by Orders" was called for, which had defeated us in the two prior conventions, and I couldn't bear to experience the third great loss. But Sam Ford who had previously been a reporter for a Minneapolis television station had taken a job with a national news network, CBS I believe, had sent Phil after me. Phil caught up with me in the hallway, keys in my hand, before I reached the door. He said I had to come back. Sam wanted to film me live on national news during the vote. 

The room was very quiet as deputies were already voting after the President of the House had led a short prayer for guidance. Sam asked me what I thought was happening. A great calm had come over me and I heard myself say, "We have prayed together, and I believe that the vote will be guided by the Holy Spirit. It will be Yes." I took in what I heard as if someone else had said it. It was said with quiet, steady conviction, which did not conform with my fears, and I marveled at that. Perhaps that was how some kinds of prophecy happened. We tell the truth beyond our knowing of it and before our feeling of it. 

I had given up trying to leave again and took my seat beside my husband in the Visitor's Gallery, where our local supporters in the Minnesota Committee for Women's Ordination to the Priesthood were gathered together. When the votes were called for and counted and the numbers read out, Yes, No and Divided, I wrote down the numbers. The outcome was Yes. I was stunned. I kept looking at what I had written and just stared at the paper, amazed and unable to move while everyone else around me was standing, cheering, applauding, crying, and laughing. Finally, my husband pulled me to my feet. I still couldn't clap or vocalize, but I trembled in silent thanksgiving. 

Then I did have to rush out to the parking lot with Diane Tickell, one of the Washington Four who had offered to help me. At the grocery store, I tore my shopping list in half and we took off with two shopping carts. I hadn't planned to go to Convention at all that day. I dressed in our day-off clothes and expected we'd go to a movie as usual, then go shopping and be home in time to cook. I'd called Katrina Swanson and told her to pass the invitation along. Then the phone rang and Katrina called back and told Phil that the Vote was scheduled that day, and for right after lunch, and we had to come downtown Right Now. I was shocked when Phil told me, but he insisted that I change my clothes and put on my best formal black clericals and white clergy collar.  That's why I had no food in the house and Diane and I had to take care of that before everyone showed up hungry.

We arrived at Wisdom House on Raleigh Avenue to find my husband, Phil Bozarth-Campbell, and Bishop Bob DeWitt playing two of Phil's guitars and singing. They saw us come in and put away the guitars to help. As we unpacked food, Bishop DeWitt asked what he could do in the kitchen. Phil had started to vacuum for some reason, and Bob took over the vacuuming and worked deftly around the cooks. Phil got out plates, napkins, silverware, glasses, and prepared ice water in pitchers. We got the pasta and sauce on the stove and Diane made salad and prepared garlic bread. 

We hugged people just coming, visited, feasted and debriefed. We were all more or less in shock, but deeply grateful to God, relieved, happy, and wondering what would come next for us. Our diocesan bishops had planned a meeting the following day to figure out how to recognize our priestly ordinations retroactively and officially, and they decided that each bishop should come up with his own plan. One by one, we 15 were "regularized," which was extraordinarily strange, but we submitted to it for the sake of our local supporters who were unaware of the insulting implications of the word and its enactment. 

In the Diocese of Minnesota, Jeannette Piccard and I were required by our diocesan bishop to sign the Oath of Conformity ("I promise to conform to the doctrine, discipline and worship of the Episcopal Church," etc.) for the third time while standing in the choir on the outside of a closed communion rail, which the bishop then opened to us after we signed, so we could enter the sanctuary and concelebrate Holy Eucharist with him. 

I bent over the communion rail on which the document was balanced, took the bishop's pen and signed with my right hand, while my left hand was behind my back for the congregation to see that my fingers were crossed. While I had gone past the notion of conformity during the 31 months since our ordinations when we'd been ignored by the institutional authorities and kept in limbo, I had thought through how I could sign the Oath before the Philadelphia Ordinations with integrity. It was by understanding that while I was not conforming with the Church's past unjust discipline (practice) or tradition (habit) of excluding and denigrating women, I was conforming with the spirit of justice that Christ preached and lived by, as did the Church most of the time. Upholding an imbalanced ministry was not in conformity with the Mind of Christ. 

I vowed to conform to the justice that was in the Mind of Christ and motivated the Church in its best imitation of Christ. I repeated that understanding privately as I signed the document, though strictly speaking it was in itself a punitive and unjust act to require us to do it. 

Afterward, I rhetorically asked Bishop McNairy if our three-times-signed oath made us bishops, since only bishops signed it for the third time. We'd already signed ours twice, prior to our diaconal and priestly ordinations. He looked at me but had no answer. 

Here's a lovely picture a friend took of the three of us at the altar. I'm in the colorful chasuble on the right, Jeannette Piccard is on the left, Bishop Philip McNairy is in the center. The Very Rev. Douglas Fontaine, Dean of the Cathedral, is on the far right. That looks like my Phil kneeling on the right, but I don't remember for sure. St. Mark's had been his home church growing up, and was still the spiritual hub of his family. He'd received a grant for his living expenses while in seminary from the congregation. He was also ordained to the diaconate there in June of 1973. It very likely was Phil. He knew that Jeannette and I would need moral support, so I'm sure he would have cleared his schedule for our sakes.

This picture below was taken just before or after the service. Chester Talton, Jeannette's rector at the Parish of St. Philip in St. Paul where she served as assistant priest, stands next to her. He later went on to become the Suffragan Bishop of the Diocese of Los Angeles, which made us proud. The looks exchanged between Jeannette and Bishop McNairy usually inspire a giggle. Click on the image to enlarge for a better view.

My seminarian husband Phil beside me after my ordination to the diaconate at St. Stephen's Cathedral in Portland, Oregon, in my home Diocese of Oregon, September 8, 1971, four days before our wedding. St. Stephen's, built in 1890, was the cathedral until that function was transferred to the new and larger church of St. John the Baptist on the campus of Oregon Episcopal Schools in 1973, and then to its more centrally located current home at Trinity Cathedral in Northwest Portland in 1993.

Since January of 1977 when other women deacons were officially freed to do what we had done as a front guard mission, thousands of women priests have entered and enriched sacerdotal service in the Episcopal Church. 

Thanks be to God! 

Women in ministry are no more near perfection than men or women in the human family generally, but at least they now have an equal chance of striving for excellence of service in their ministries, and of proving themselves worthy, or of bearing the consequences that failed men have borne for wrongdoing in Church or Society. We are, after all, honest-to-God real live human beings.  

Here are a few more pictures and stories about the people involved. 

Photo by William F. Steinmetz for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

  
Ordinations to the Priesthood of the Episcopal Church at the Church of the Advocate, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, July 29, 1974, the Feast of Saints Mary and Martha. Left to right: Alison Cheek, Suzanne [Sue] Hiatt, Marie Moorefield [Fleischer], Alla Bozarth[-Campbell], Betty Bone Schiess, Jeannette Piccard, Merrill Bitner, Emily Hewitt, Carter Heyward, Katrina Welles Swanson and Nancy Wittig. Our ordaining bishops are Bishop Robert DeWitt (standing and facing us in profile in the foreground), who had resigned his position as Bishop of the Diocese of Pennsylvania to free himself for this prophetic action for justice, retired Bishop Edward Welles of Western Missouri wearing the mitre (tall hat), who was the father of Katrina van Alstyne Welles Swanson, one of the ordinands, and retired Bishop Daniel Corrigan, known and respected as a great Civil Rights activist and long-time champion of justice. Bishop Corrigan is seated in front of the other two bishops, asking us to affirm our faith and calling according to the form in the Ordination Rite of The Book of Common Prayer. Standing next to Bishop Welles and wearing dark-rimmed glasses is Bishop Antonio (Tony) Ramos of Costa Rica, who had been a seminary classmate of several of the ordinands and came to support them and his brother bishops whom he knew would receive attacks from many of the other bishops for taking this prophetic action, as did we women.

Time Magazine, August 12, 1974

Bishop Daniel Corrigan who had ordained Jeannette Piccard, Sue Hiatt (if my memory serves) and me to the priesthood earlier in the service stands at the altar. Bishop Antonio Ramos who came as a supportive presence for the women and for his brother bishops who ordained us stands on the right. Holding a chalice, Alla Bozarth [then Bozarth-Campbell] stands below Bishop Corrigan. In front from left to right, Merrill Bittner, Emily Hewitt and Marie Moorefield [Fleischer] giving Holy Communion to the people at the altar rail. 
 

The text on the frontal cloth over the altar is Galatians 3:28~

"There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, 

nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."

 
On the 25th anniversary we entered the nave from the narthex at the rear as is customary, instead of from the transept up front because of the death threats the church had received before the service. 

Bishop Barbara Harris follows the Church of the Advocate Banner and is honored by the congregation as she walks down the nave in the procession. She preached a galvanizing sermon on the same theme as her regular column in The Witness Magazine before her call to be ordained and consecrated a bishop~ entitled, "A Luta Continua~ The Struggle Continues." The tall gentleman to the right of the banner is Newland Smith, long-time librarian at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary from which my husband Phil Bozarth-Campbell graduated in 1973. With Newland's gentle and knowledgeable help I used the seminary library  in preparation for my ordinations and also for my doctoral degree research.




These little children the colors of the human family led us through the nave, following the music and drummers ahead of them. This is my favorite photograph in the series. It was taken by Carolyn Prescott.

Here I am with the Rev. LouAnn Pickering who had accompanied me from her Church of St. Gabriel the Archangel in Portland, Oregon. We have just crossed the threshold into the nave. Photo by Carolyn Prescott.

At the beginning of the first part of the Eucharistic Rite, the Liturgy of the Word, most of us members of the Philadelphia Eleven and Washington Four who were present stood facing the congregation as from left to right we each read an assigned passage from the tenth anniversary commemorative poem commissioned by The Witness Magazine, "Passover Remembered." Washington Four priest Betty Powell was present and in the front row of the congregation. Eldest of us at the time, Betty Bone Schiess, had come but left when the humid heat of summertime Philadelphia approached 100 degrees.

Left to right, Lee McGee of the Washington Four, Sue Hiatt, Katrina Swanson, Marie Moorefield Fleischer (whose husband, Robert Fleischer, was a renowned Harvard University astronomer), Merrill Bittner, Carter Heyward, Alison Cheek, Nancy Wittig, Emily Hewett and Alla Renée Bozarth [at the time known as Alla Bozarth-Campbell]. 

The eleventh chair at the end which appears empty on my left was draped with Jeannette Piccard's bright red hot air balloon stole in honor of her first career as a scientist, who with her Swiss husband Jean Piccard, invented a hot air balloon that could ascend into the stratosphere. As pilot of the balloon on its initial flight, Jeannette officially became the first woman in space in 1934, and was a frequent lecturer at NASA. While Jeannette piloted, Jean navigated while he stayed down in the gondola of the balloon with their pet turtle, Fleur de Lys, who officially became the first non-human animal in space that day. It was October 23, 1934, and they ascended 57,579 feet. Of the Philadelphia Ordinations, comparing them to the space flight 40 years earlier, Jeannette would say, "That day I flew higher." You can see pictures of Jeanette and Jean Piccard in their balloon on this page, which is also linked at the end of this site and the Fortieth Anniversary site. You can click on it here or later. "Passover Remembered" is also on this site. http://allabozarthwordsandimages.blogspot.com/p/the-philadelphia-ordinations-and-what.html

Feeling called to the priesthood since she was eleven years old, Jeannette Piccard was first among us to be ordained to the priesthood at 79, by Bishop Corrigan, who was at one time a parish priest in the Diocese of Minnesota, and who also ordained me and, if my memory is correct, Sue Hiatt, because all four of us had Minnesota connections.  Though raised and a young adult in Minnesota, Sue Hiatt had lived and worked on the East Coast for years, but Jeannette and I were still canonically resident in the Diocese of Minnesota, though we lived on different sides of the Mississippi River. We were the farthest west of the Eleven, and we were the two with Ph.D. degrees who were the bookends of the Eleven as the eldest and the youngest. Dr. Piccard left us for Paradise in May of 1981 at the age of 86 after serving 7 years as a parish priest. The chair with her stole beside me represents her presence among us as honored elder in the Great Communion, already transcended into the Larger Realms but remembered and among us in spirit. Sue Hiatt followed her in 2002 and Katrina Swanson in 2005. Eight of the Eleven remain, Betty Bone Schiess now the eldest at 93, and I still the youngest at 70, and three of the Four remain. Diane Tickell of the Diocese of Alaska priest, who was the farthest west of the 15, completed her Earth journey in 2002. 

At the Kiss of Peace in the liturgy, Emily Hewitt, the tallest of us, embraced me, the smallest, and I said to her, "I'm so proud of you Emily." She returned the compliment, but I truly am in awe of my sister Eleven plus Washington Four priests for their extraordinary human valor, intelligence and rich, well-rounded lives. 

Emily Hewitt made good use of her time waiting for the Church to decide what to do about our priestly ordinations. She attended Harvard Law School to serve as a bivocational priest, making most use of her talents, skills and interests. She graduated with honors and served as a legal aid lawyer, but her reputation for brilliance led to advancement in Washington D.C. as General Counsel of the United States General Services Administration from 1993 to 1998.  She served as in-house White House counsel, and later was  appointed by two presidents as Judge and then Chief Judge of the Court of Federal Claims. She had already spent some years as a seminary professor with an advanced degree in religion and education, and a Chicago Theological Seminary doctor of ministry degree focusing on liberty of conscience. Emily Hewitt married an Assistant Attorney General of the United States. In addition, her Wikipedia page has this entry: "Hewitt is an accomplished long distance race walker. She won a U.S. national race walking medal in 1987 and has won many national masters medals. She has walked more than a dozen marathons including the Boston, New York and United States Marine Corps Marathons. She is also an avid hiker of the National Park trails of the American West."

Among the 15 of us Philadelphia and Washington priests, there were four seminary professors, seven parish priests, a Canon to the Ordinary [bishop in charge] of her diocese, and three psychotherapist pastoral counselor priests. One of the parish priests, Alison Palmer, is also a retired diplomat with the United States State Department who served on dangerous missions in Africa and Vietnam and has actively fought for justice and equity for women in government as well as the Church. Among her reflections on being one of the Washington Four priests, Alison wrote, “I was a Foreign Service Officer in the Congo and Vietnam during the war, but I never felt more danger than when I kneeled to be ordained [to the priesthood.]” That day began for her when she received a 4am threatening phone call (there were bomb threats at both the Philadelphia and Washington Ordinations). She didn't invite her family members to attend because she feared for their safety. 

One of the psychotherapist priests is also a poet and prose writer and founder of an ecumenical feminist spirituality, arts and healing center where she serves as priest. That would be me, and what a joy it has been and is. Many of us are writers with published books, and some of us have lectured internationally. In her retirement as a seminary professor, Carter Heyward, who had her horses Red and Red's daughter Feather stabled nearby in Cambridge through her teaching years, has created a new ministry by founding an equine therapy ranch in her home state of North Carolina called the Free Rein Center.  

The more I learn about my sister priests, others of the Fifteen and those ordained since then, the more admiration and yes, even awe, I feel toward so many of them. Letting you know some of these details about these women isn't meant as bragging, but because I am so filled with admiration and gratitude for them that it spills out of me. I want to share the celebration of God's gifts to us all. This doesn't mean that we don't have instances of mediocrity or sin among us, because we are human and flawed, but having to prove ourselves more than most aspiring clergy did before women became ordained in the mid-19th century until now, we often feel the pressure to excel, not only in accomplishment, but in integrity. But like everyone else, even among the accomplished, there can be moments of tragic failure.

And still we strive, and dance in thanksgiving.

Here is a spontaneous post-communion dance at the 25th anniversary of the Philadelphia Ordinations, on July 29, 1999, at the Church of the Advocate~ with the visiting choir of St. Thomas singing, and in response, Alla Bozarth breaks into celebratory dance. First and third photographs below are by Carolyn Prescott of White Stone, Virginia. I was sent the second, the Gospel-dervish picture, by a generous member of the congregation whose name I do not know. 

Dancing toward the Promised Land

I, Miriam, took my tambourine

and finger cymbals with me

out of the land of slavery

with its daily insults and petty

exemptions, and so remain always

ready to dance on the long, long journey,

dance at every victory, beginning with

surviving the Passover, then the strange

occurrence when the Red Sea dried beneath

our feet as we ran, safely passing over the narrow

strip onto the Sinai Peninsula, all the way out

from the land of longing toward the storied memory of Home.

I danced to the song that spilled out of me,

loud up to Heaven, rejoicing on hopeful feet,

rejoicing with arms flying through warm air like wings,

and water followed me all the way through

the great desert, to keep the people faithful and alive.

God knows it may take a long time to return.

It’s been five hundred years, after all.

A long time gone, but our stories keep it alive

in our hearts. I wonder if I’ll live to see it from

the mountains across River Jordan. I wonder

if I’ll be an old woman, and dance down

the side of Mt. Nebo with arms wide open,

heart fluttering strong, leading the way

with cymbals and songs into the Promised Land.

Alla Renée Bozarth

My Blessed Misfortunes, copyright 2011.

For more about the background to the Philadelphia Ordinations and what followed, you can read the excerpts below and then go to the Fortieth Anniversary website and the various links there, including the original Ordinations site, or go directly to my Philadelphia Ordinations web page and see the entire historical and philosophical documentation. The links will be shown below and at the end also.

The Fortieth Anniversary page shows historical photographs and tells about some of the people deeply involved. At the end, the page flows into the Philadelphia Ordinations site with more details about the deep history of the ordination of women deacons and priests in the Anglican Communion. Links to both sites also appear at the bottom of this page in case you choose to read the excerpts from the anniversary page here, and prefer to visit the documentary sites later.

http://philadelphiaordinationsanniversary.blogspot.com/

The Rev. Alla Renée Bozarth, Ph.D
 
Excerpt from the Fortieth Anniversary pages.

A Letter to the Planning Committee for the Celebration of the 40th Anniversary of the Philadelphia Ordinations

Long Distance Runner poem and reflections for Philadelphia Ordinations 40th anniversary

Originally sent to the Rev. Beth Hixon and the Rev. Dierdre Whitfield, priests and planners of the Philadelphia Ordinations 40th anniversary events along with the Very Rev. Dean Katherine Ragsdale at EDS.

I noticed that a period had been dropped in transmission in the poem, "Long Distance Runner," at the end of  "Through graceful teamwork together, we have changed history." I guess the period was dropped to remind us that we're not done yet.

The poem is at the bottom of the letter.

Dear Sisters~

I've been thinking about all of you and plans for the coming celebrations in July and October. Since I promised to stay in touch, it seemed to me that you might enjoy the poem I just wrote, embedded below, "Long Distance Runner" ~ an unlikely reference to what every woman goes through in creating new models where only (or mostly) men had been before. It's more than that, though~ it's the sort of thing that anyone who's ever been a change agent can relate to. And certainly, everyone in ministry has her or his own metaphoric descriptors for it, from short order cook to crisis manager.

Because of the similar title of my poem to the movie, I've just looked up an analysis of what Tom Courtenay demonstrated in the 1962 Tony Richardson film,  The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, from a 1959 short story by Alan Sillitoe. {What an apt name for the author of such a title! My poem came from a visit a few years ago to the local podiatrist because I had a silly toe that was trying to distance itself from its neighbor to the right and crowd into its neighbor to the left~ The doc said nothing seemed wrong with the bones. It's since straightened itself out a bit, but what it was doing was widening the front of the foot to give it more strength and balance. Not a bad plan, even if the result was disconcerting. For a while my right foot middle and "ring" toes could give the Vulcan "V" greeting!} The story and movie describe the degradation and frustration of a young man living in poverty amid the pressures of the post-war welfare state created in England to support and raise the lifestyles of the working poor. The boy is sent to a prison reform school for robbing a bakery, and there he discovers how moving his body in long distance running can be an emotional outlet. The institution exploits his emerging talent and puts him in a falsely competitive role in a race with a prestigious upper class public school, turning him into a competitive class commodity. In the end, he refuses to be exploited and maintains his integrity by stopping short of the finish line, allowing others to go through, even though it was obvious to all that he had achieved the goal. In this way he maintains his personal integrity, his freedom and independence, and goes against the artifices of social status and rivalry. His understanding of running evolves into a pathway of dignity and strength that inspires others, though in the end his actions seem contrary, until it becomes clear upon reflection that he chose not to be a puppet of the institution but to retain his independent values and his sense of humanity regarding the rights of others as well as his personal freedom.

The boy represented the social stranglehold that improved life style created while leaving the people as powerless as ever. The Wikipedia page does a good job of analyzing the social impact that institutional powerlessness combined with apparently better conditions can create, as if the working poor would be anesthetized by access to modern appliances into believing that their role in society had risen, when in fact they were forced to live where they lived and their freedoms remained unimproved.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Loneliness_of_the_Long_Distance_Runner

All of this was tied tightly together by the increased enforcement of gender roles and the keeping down of women lest they pose a threat to the male work force, or worse, to government powers. The Angry Young Men of the era, Sillitoe among them, preserved sharp gender roles and maintained a deeply misogynist point of view. The post-war surface changes sharpened materialism and neglected deeper justice and wellness needs, keeping class barriers firmly in place.

Though unstated in the story, in reality it was only as women began to take charge of their communities and use political office to create justice and education for all the people that things began to shift to a deeper vision of social justice and the long road toward its achievement. We are all still on that road and nowhere near its goal, given not only the Millennial Development Goals as a model, but keeping the deeper issue of pandemic misogyny ever in mind as cause for the ongoing oppression of women, even in countries that seem to be giving them equality by placing them in high office, yet without radically changing their difficulties in daily life and among their coworkers. Incidents of sexual abuse in the military demonstrate this problem most visibly, but the same is true on local police forces and throughout the work force on all levels, as well as within the secret lives of families.

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori set the Millennial Development Goals as guidelines for Christian mission, both at the beginning of her term of office and during Lent of 2012, with emphasis on equality for women and education for everyone as primary. Perhaps now would be a good time to turn to them again in the ecumenical dialogue among women in ministry that the Philadelphia and Cambridge commemorative events will host. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Development_Goals

I found Chariots of Fire with its historical focus and high caliber of people involved, especially Harold Abrahams and that holy man of China, Eric Liddell (now on our Episcopal Calendar of  Saints), to be more directly inspiring and enjoyable, a very different approach to running, and the balance between individual contributors and teamwork. My poem feels more aligned with their story than with the alienation of The Loneliness . . . story, but I think there are important lessons for us to consider in the latter. Not so much has changed on a social-psychological level since the angry young men of post World War II and the contemporary testosterone and drug-driven domestic terrorists who take automatic weapons into schools, malls, churches and movie theaters, or rig a homemade pressure cooker bomb for the Boston Marathon to effect their own versions of Armageddon. 

I didn't have any of this in mind when I wrote the poem below. It's the title of the poem, the words spoken to me in a literal sense that made no sense, but found immediate metaphoric resonance for me, that today (after I wrote the poem) led me to look up the earlier film I'd seen years ago. I had found it very disconcerting to watch, and reading the Wikipedia analysis gives me a better understanding of context that adds meaning to the actions of the story. I think that my poem and its unintentional but inevitable association with the complexities of the post-war story in The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner can be interpreted as a reminder to all of us that our personal ministries are only a small part of the global picture. This means that we should celebrate them no less vigorously and gratefully, but do so very seriously as well, with regard to where we are on the spectrum of transforming the face of the earth into a place of social justice and health, in keeping with the ethical teachings and living example of Christ.

Even though the United States and Europe appear to have better social structures than third world countries, even here in the West, domestic abuse, poverty, the suffering of children, dangers and difficulties in education and basic inequities in the workplace still exist. In countries where it is against the law for women to drive or learn to read and write, or where the State appropriates the work lives of women without addressing deeply ingrained misogyny, massive populations of humanity remain unaffected by our efforts toward enlightenment. As Bishop Barbara Harris reminded us from the pulpit of the Church of the Advocate at the 25th anniversary of the Philadelphia Ordinations  [her sermon is in the second half of this page and also here: tributetobishopbarbaraharris.blogspot.com] ~we have to keep our sleeves rolled up and our eyes and ears open, and keep nudging the world to acknowledge its social and psychological injustices and to heal them.

It is deeply important for us to be aware of each other's efforts, and to draw courage and inspiration from our mothers and sisters in history. Here are a few other inspiring women to encourage us onward: http://allabozarthwordsandimages.blogspot.com/p/women-trees-and-sacred-earth15-women.html

Alla Bozarth Words and Images Welcoming Light in... Beginning with the poem, Gynergy~ Tribute Poem for Dr. Wangari Maathai Celebration of Dr. Aung San Suu Kyi Poem, Circle of Fire  Poems, The Black...

I must say that I have never felt lonely in ministry or the call to challenge injustice, for there are so many of us running together now. The age of the solo pilot is over. Jeannette Piccard enjoyed the shift from being a solitary target as a hero to a member of a courageous team force. Sue Hiatt loved to remind us that "a moving target is harder to hit," even if it is large, prominent or made of an intelligent and inspired multitude. [To read about my foray into my personal ordinations archives in 2006, and more deeply in 2011, type the first few words of "Digging Down into the Dusty Past" in the Search box.]

Now back to the subject at hand. While taking pictures of my garden today, it occurred to me that I should write about what the poem describes, so here it is. Though very personal, I'm fairly sure you'll be able to relate to it. It's embedded below, hot off the soul.
 

Loving Blessings and ever yours in Christ,

Alla

Long Distance Runner

         "You were running a good race." Galatians 5:7

He looked at the x-rays. He held my feet in his hands and studied them.

Presently, he said, “In your life, you have been a long distance runner.”

Though shocked, I said, “I have.”

What did he mean, this scientist?

What did I mean in hearing his words?

I meant, Yes. I have run hard

for long distances of space and time.

I have run hard to achieve personal goals

and apply them in concert with others through history.

Through graceful teamwork together, we have changed history.

We have won our victories, but they are small, 
small compared to what remains to be done 
in the wide world to create true justice with Earth, 
justice for children, justice between men and women,
between the races and nations, justice between the wealthy
and those in need, justice of dignity for everyone and all species,

justice for the healing of waters, justice for food distribution,

justice of respectful and harmonious, enriching diversity 
for different visions and versions of faith, and justice for right balance

in human thinking, acting, feeling, believing, working, 
creating and re-creating, justice for positive relationship 
with Creation and all creatures for our mutual well being and joy.

In reality I began to argue with the doctor, dismayed 
that he could think that my small feet, though well grounded 
with the strong high arches of the dancer, could have
undertaken any form of athletics when that avenue was
closed to me by compromises of stamina, strength and
balance from infant stroke injury, but then I decided 
that it would be banal and unwise to argue, and simply accepted 
the statement as if he were a prescient prophet after the fact
who saw poetically into the depth and meaning of things, 
and not merely a podiatrist. 

And I thanked him 
for telling me another side of who I am.

                                        Alla Renée Bozarth

Learning to Dance in Limbo, copyright 2014

Carter Heyward responds and Alla replies:

"I thanked him for telling me another side of who I am." Your words to the podiastrist, dear sister, make me mindful of how your poems often affect me! You (and Janine Lehane [coeditor with Carter of the writings of Sue Hiatt in The Spirit of the Lord is Upon Me], I should add!) and all of our great poets like Adrienne Rich and Mary Oliver tell us much about who we are, and quite a bit that we may not have realized until now.

“The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner” is one of my all time favorite films.  I saw it in college, in about 1963 or 64, at least ten years before our ordination, and it resonated deeply in my 18 or 19 year old self.  I saw it then, and remember it now, as a story of someone who defied the social pressures to compete and conform.  True its context was postWorldWar II England and its characters, male, male, male.  But my female self in 1960s USA (before the Vietnam War resistance had really taken off, but right in the midst of the Civil Rights struggle) evidently made connections with the hero of this powerful film.  A bit like the hero of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” the very male (and very macho!) Jack Nicholson character who appeared at about the same time, in the early or mid 60’s I believe ….  

Interesting to me how these very male, and often sexist, figures did, in my youth, touch and inspire me to be an uppity woman — perhaps not so much to imitate them as to “borrow” their energy and non-conformist ethics in order to join them in resisting the sexist, racist, greedy principalities and powers that attempted — and still attempt — to shape and control all of us.

Thanks, as always, Alla, for giving us voice!

Love,

Carter
_____________ 

Dear Carter,

You express it eloquently, Carter. I had the same experience with both those movies, I think primarily because they showed the insanity of the competitive gain system, the utterly soul-killing traits of narcissistic materialism and robotic rigidity and conformity, a culture deeply unfriendly to creativity and the soul ~ and to Christ and Christ-like values. Both anti-heroes in these movies were wounded yet courageous and valiant in their ways of resisting soul-death. I think that's why we were both so inspired by them. God knows that in the Churches there are people pushed toward hierarchical advancement for deep ego need reasons, having nothing to do with Christ-like service to others, including the service of courageous leadership. Narcissism-making families that deny acceptance to their children unless they can be used to enhance the prestige of the family~ those are the Petri dishes that grow the cultures of the ego-and-rule-based and ruthless climb to the top, where alone one finds acceptance and praise. "You're nothing if you're not best. Now prove yourself." And yet we have broken bishops who find they are not nurtured and blessed by power, but pressed into self-destructive rebellion later in life, too often involving hurtful behavior toward others . . . because power of this sort is empty victory and defeats the soul's growth in God.

Dr. Charles Willie's theme from our ordinations sermon stays with me: We are called to practice tender loving defiance. I quote this so often. This is more than adolescent rebellion at any age. It is going against the toxic current in order to begin cleaning up the river, one more time. It is a process that must be repeated over and over again through history, as new areas are identified where integrity is missing.

Describing power simply as the ability to act effectively, Rollo May speaks of five kinds of toxic or life-giving power in his classic Power and Innocence: Exploitation as power over, manipulation as power under, competition as power against, representational power (such as practiced by elected leaders entrusted with the needs and will of the people) or nurturing power (such as parents of young children should practice) as power for~ and finally, integrative power as power with. Christians in service to others need to strive together for integrative power, power with others, who may together sometimes practice power for those who have no access to effective action in their own behalf. 

Because we're human and immature, even the best of us will make mistakes, ego will continue to intrude, we'll slip, but we need to stay mindful of those spiritual growth-serving kinds of power as our goals, and continue to ask for forgiveness from God, ourselves and each other if we fall short or miss the mark, and keep on returning to and striving for right relationship within our communities, and between our own egos and souls, our fragile and often  unwise surface selves and our core Selves where Spirit and Wisdom live.

Love again and always,

Alla

There was a section here about the invitation I received for the 40th anniversary celebration of the Philadelphia Ordinations, which referred to "Forty Years of Women's Ordination," to which I objected because it negated the more than hundred years of women ordained to the diaconate, who were finally fully and unambiguously recognized as ordained deacons in 1970, the first General Convention in which women deputies were seated and finally given voice and vote, for which they had petitioned for nearly 40 years. The first thing those wonderful lay women did was eliminate the old sexist canon on women in the diaconate, and the next thing they did was to call for a vote on women in the priesthood, which required no canonical change since there was no canon referring to it. Apparently it was so far beyond imagination that it never occurred to anyone to bother to forbid it. I've removed the invitation from here because the link to it has expired. My response to it is the text below the article from The Oregonian, September 9, 1971, about my ordination to the diaconate. To read, click on the image to see it in single frame, and use the magnifier or your Zoom function. Our Words Dear Friends, It's lovely to see this announcement [of the fortieth anniversary celebration]. I'm so glad that the focus on this anniversary's commemorations has expanded to include and celebrate ministries of all women, beginning with our shared baptism welcoming us into the family as general practitioners of faith, and then the pastoral diaconal ministry, the sacramental priestly ministry, and the overseeing episcopal ministry that some of us have been called into as specialists in the community.  Along these lines of distinction, I have a request which is important and not a mere point of semantics. It's a matter of consistency and accuracy in the language we use to describe historical events. This  has to do with the consequences in interpretation caused by the omission of the essential phrase, "to the Priesthood." We are not celebrating 40 years of women's ordination. To imply that would be to negate the generations of ordained women in the diaconate, whose ministries have blessed the Episcopal Church since the second part of the nineteenth century. Those women endured hardships and were rarely acknowledged as clergy, though their ordinations by laying-on-of-hands and the title "The Reverend" before their names should have clarified their identity as deacons. Because the sexist suffix was arbitrarily and wrongly added to the neutral gender word, deacon, the impression was given that they were something else~ not laity, not clergy, and not nuns, though the blue habit that they wore gave that misleading impression, compounded by the fact that they were the only ordained non-monastics in our church who were required to be celibate.  Their already challenging and isolated ministries in places not offered to men with families were difficult enough without adding confusions to how they were to be regarded.  Such a simple thing as the phrasing of an invitation can rub salt in old wounds. I, who knew and admired several of the older women deacons and knew the stories of many more, feel that sting of misrepresentation and negation in their behalf.   We need to be mindful of the language we use, lest we blot out the reality of an entire force of ordained women in our Church. My request is simply to add the phrase, "to the priesthood." That will allow for acknowledgment of the hundreds of heroic women ordained to the diaconate since the late 1800s, but only recognized fully with the elimination of the sexist canon on women in the diaconate in 1970, when the first women deputies to General Convention called for a vote to eliminate the sexist and discriminatory word, "Deaconess" in Canon Law and let one Canon on the Diaconate include all deacons, not just the men. Women who had already been ordained for thirty or forty years breathed a sigh of relief and gratitude. Those uncomfortable blue habits, along with mandatory celibacy, were finally cast aside with gusto. I remember the joy of those older women deacons I knew when they could at last claim their place in the Church without obfuscation or compromise. And I heard more than one younger member of their era joyously exclaim, "I can get married!" Imagine that.  Writing this takes me back to a discussion I had with my Bishop in the Diocese of Oregon as a young woman  of twenty-something. I had made a comment about how shameful it was that the Episcopal Church didn't ordain women. Bishop Carman corrected me on the spot: "We do too ordain women! Some of the finest clergy I've worked with have been ordained women!" Then he went on to tell me about the "deaconesses." I was to have become the first woman ordained in the Diocese of Oregon in 1970, but Bishop Carman under advisement from the diocesan canon lawyer required me to wait an extra year and not be ordained until the changes made by General Convention just that summer had been fully instituted, "to avoid confusion" as to under which canon I was to be ordained. Bishop Carman enlightened me on several levels, first by opening the door wide to everything that unfolded leading to both my ordinations, second by telling me stories about the wonderful ordained women he had known and been privileged to work with years earlier, and telling me about some of the unfair and bigoted treatment they were subjected to, and with what wisdom and grace they endured it. Hearing about them was preparing me for what was to come in my own life, though I had no clue of what that might be. When Bishop Carman told me I'd have to wait another year for ordination, I was miffed, feeling the first small sting of what he'd been telling me his friends had experienced. I'd passed my canonical exams with honors and was ready right then, but later I realized that if I hadn't waited that extra year, I, too, might have been called "Deaconess," which would not have sat well with me, any more than being called "Mrs." did, especially after I'd worked hard taking double course loads at Northwestern to fulfill my academic goals and earned my doctor of philosophy degree in record time. Women in theater arts have noted for years that being called an actress automatically means a demotion in prestige and pay. Those who refer to themselves and require others to refer to them as actors have a better chance of getting good roles and receiving at least near equity pay, because the accurate neutral gender word, actor, gives them psychological equality in the minds of both sexes as members of their profession.   The same is  true for those who serve tables. It's a cliche among food critics to illustrate inequity between men and women by the standard that a restaurant with a staff of [male] waiters is generally considered a better class of restaurant than one with a staff of waitresses [sic]. All of them are servers, and the classiest restaurants are those in which the server introduces himself or herself as such.  Let's put this in context of the times, which in many ways were not unlike our own. Discontent and violence were in the air. Civil Rights were coming to include women, who were not adequately or evenly represented in decision-making areas of society.    In the early winter of 1969, I'd taken the train out from Portland to Chicago and arrived not long after the summer of '68 mayhem during the Democratic Convention. Across Lake Shore Drive from Seabury-Western Theological Seminary and sharing campus grounds with Northwestern University, Garrett Seminary (Rosemary Ruether's later teaching domain) had been one of the areas of conflict between the Chicago Police and some of the Students for a Democratic Society along with some of the Yippies when the school had offered them hospitality. The atmosphere was hot with conflict and would remain so for years as the Civil Rights Movement, the Peace Movement and the Women's Movement were rapidly and simultaneously rising to boiling point.  At the time of the Kent State tragedy and the campus Moratorium in the spring of 1970, I was studying black literature and drama. James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, LeRoy Jones, Mari Evans, Nikki Giovanni, Chinua Achebe~ and Maya Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings had come out the year before, the year that three black people I knew in Chicago were murdered during my first nine months in town. One of them was a woman. None of their murders was properly investigated by the police. I was studying hard at Northwestern but somehow managed to be involved in the general turbulence of the times in that particular city at the hub of it all. I was also preparing for ordination. With that as background, here's how I wrote about the "deacon vs. deaconess" canon law matter and the frustrating delay in my ordination, placing them in the larger everyday perspective~ (from my first poetry collection, Gynergy, 1978, which came out at the same time that Paulist Press published Womanpriest): Menace to Mankind Hey, Sister Womanperson, do you know that they have tried to degrade us with suffixes? I mean, are you on to the system of the English language that's been used to put us down? They call us poetess actress songstress authoress sculptress benefactress patroness stewardess prophetess sometimes priestess (try mini/stress) more likely laundress seamstress huntress temptress (add your own, ad infinitess) It's the fakey esses meant to make us less and compromise us that do us in, betray us, 'cause esses ain't real, esses is false, in English, they ain't no such thing 'cept where you want to distinguish men from menesses, which we do seem to be, don't we, to the proper society of manunkind ~ Back to General Convention 1970 and the women's call for justice and more opening of doors to women in the Church, so that those whom Holy Spirit was calling might be able to respond, and new ministries unfurl to the Godly Winds. Before calling for a vote affirming the ordination of women to the priesthood and episcopate, the matter of the women deacons having been treated badly had to be addressed, and the canonical ambiguity which had provided formula and license for the double standard had to be erased.    They were doubly-disenfranchised as women for not being admitted into the policy-making body of General Convention as either lay or clergy deputies, since the discrepancy between prejudicial canonical practice versus the sacramental ordination rite they had undergone had not been talked about nor the language corrected~ and not only were women not allowed to be deputies to Convention, but deacons were also not allowed.  At that time, all women and all deacons were categorically denied voice and vote in Church policies, including those which pertained to them. For decades there was a running joke among the older women deacons that the Church had "ordained and set them apart" in Holy Orders (according to the ordination rite), and then set them aside. While they could function as deacons liturgically, the odious demand of celibacy, the blue habit, and exclusion of ordained women from liturgical committees, standing committees and ecclesiastical courts had to be dealt with and stopped. Who would do that for them? The laywomen!    Overlooking women in the diaconate before 1970 also overlooks the efforts of laywomen to be admitted with full voice and vote to the House of Deputies. Their determination through forty years of persistent petitioning ultimately resulted in legislative consent to their demand to be allowed to serve Christ and the Church with the dignity and authority of adult members, who happened to constitute the majority of members as well. Fifty years after secular society had granted suffrage to women, the male-only rule was discarded in the House of Deputies, finally giving Episcopal women the right to vote. Suffrage made miracles happen.     Thanks to the intelligence of the laywomen during their first days as deputies, after 1970 the double standard could no longer be supported by blatantly sexist canons.    All of this is to show how very much our words matter, and how important it is to be aware of them from another person's point of view. Every time the phrase "women's ordination" is used presumably referring to women's ordination to the priesthood, it implicitly (and once again) negates those fully ordained women on whose shoulders we women deacons and priests now stand. I feel the need, as one who was blessed to know and have learned from many of the women who were ordained before 1970, to speak out in their behalf (and in my own behalf as a deacon forever after the order of Phoebe) whenever I see the inaccurate use of the term, "women's ordination" in a context when what is obviously meant is "women's ordination to the priesthood." We need to keep  correcting ourselves. We need to say and print the whole phrase so that it really says what it means, or we once again negate the fact that ordained clergywomen served Christ in our church for three or four generations before they were unambiguously recognized and cheered on in 1970. The purpose of the canonical change in 1970 was primarily to take care of that, not to allow women to be ordained as deacons but to acknowledge that they had been ordained as deacons and make sure that they would be able to continue to be, without the anachronistic canonical language that had pressed down their predecessors.    Among those women, after all, were deep inklings of vocations to the priesthood, frustrated for the duration of too many lifetimes. We owe it to those who were also called to priestly ministry and suffered unfulfillment to remember them, and to thank them.  We celebrate the callings of all women to ministry, and we celebrate the ordinations of women past, present and to come, in all three orders of ministerial specialty, as we celebrate the general, inclusive ministries of all baptised women in the first and foremost of Holy Orders, the laity.     Thanks to our spiritual foremothers, including those who went before us as ordained servants of God, those women in the diaconate whose ministries were full of grace, humility, love and pain, as they carried the full burden of sexism. Thanks to the laywomen who took care of stopping that in 1970. Since then, those of us women ordained in the Episcopal Church before and after 1970 have only ongoing cultural misogyny to contend with, as do all women, and not equivocal church language reinforcing it as well. I feel protective of both the integrity of how we use language and the integrity of how we regard those women I remember so fondly who, in their 70s and 80s and still active in the diaconate both pastorally and liturgically, would often refer to their ordinations as the turning point of their lives, the sealing of their alliance with the Holy Spirit in responding to the needs of others.    I don't want them forgotten or negated by terminology we use that implicitly excludes them without our being aware that it's doing so, and certainly not intending it. The omission also excludes the diaconal/pastoral portion of every ordained ministry, for priests and bishops still spend most of their time engaged in teaching, preaching and healing, according to the model of the ministry of Jesus, and all of them are functions of the diaconate. My favorite part of the ordination rite for deacons is the mandate to interpret the needs of the world to the Church. In a way, we deacons are representing the world as we remind the Christian community of its call to serve the needs of the world, and also to be very specific about what those needs are. Deacons are missionaries to the Church, sent by the suffering Christ in the world to alert the community of faith about the details, both of the nature of the need and of our response to it. Looking at the picture of the eleven of us deacons standing at the Church of the Advocate altar rail moments before we experienced the laying on of hands that would confer our participation in Christ's priesthood, in all honesty my primary response is pain~ for by omission of the definitive words, "to the priesthood," the statement {"the 40th anniversary of women's ordination"} is saying something that is not true and that would be deeply hurtful to my friends of long ago who were ordained in the earlier or middle part of the last century~ the Rev. Frances Zielinski, the Rev. Winona McGee, the Rev. Janet McIntosh, the Rev. Maggie Dunlap, the Rev. Phyllis Edwards and those many whose names I can no longer bring to conscious mind~ and if they are not hurtful to contemporary deacons such as my friends the Rev. Penny Berktold, the Rev. Barbara Mraz, the Rev. Kay Knapp, the Rev. Betty Noice and the deacon in all of us priests and the bishops, too~ the incomplete phrase nevertheless is an implicit exclusion. We don't any of us want that. The caption below the picture also needs the last words added, "to the priesthood." And in the "About" section, last sentence after the names: "became the first women to be ordained [to the priesthood] in the Episcopal Church," and the first sentence of the next paragraph: "They were ordained [to the priesthood] at the Church of the Advocate . . ." After all, we all were already ordained.  Love and Thanks in Christ~ Alla, your sister deacon and priest   Note: This long letter on the ministry of the diaconate as fundamental to all ordained Episcopal clergy, with brief reflections on how women have been historically impeded in all four Holy Orders of ministry including the laity, ordained by baptism~ was an attempt to bring awareness of how arbitrary misogynist customs have deprived the churches and the world of the gifts and Grace-infused powers of women. It was graciously and thoughtfully received by the anniversary events planning committee. Appropriate changes were made where things hadn't already gone to the printer, for which I'm deeply grateful.  Recently I found an account of the night of my husband Phil's ordination to the priesthood at St. Christopher's Episcopal Church in Roseville, Minnesota. While there are inaccuracies (for instance, I don't think that the Rev. George Parmeter was present, though he had been in Phil's class at seminary), it also includes details that I find moving which I do not remember.  The blog owner, the Rev. Elizabeth Kaetan, cites her source as the first issue of RUACH, the official publication of The Episcopal Women's Caucus, in May 1974. I was standing in cassock and stole in the doorway to the nave. Jeannette joined me right after the procession. Others came to join us as the service progressed. This was something that Phil and I had planned together, for the sake of the integrity of his being ordained to the priesthood while I, who had already been a deacon for three years, was forbidden to join him in the conferral of priestly ministry. To understand the significance of this paragraph it may be necessary to use the link and scroll down to the full article: "The Bishop gave the Kiss of Peace to the newly ordained priest, Philip, who started back toward his wife. Stopped by someone on his way, he was startled to see the Bishop, walking tall, march past him. The Bishop stepped aside to let Philip be the first to kiss his wife and then he, too, gave her the Kiss of Christ's Peace. The formal Eucharist had ended." http://telling-secrets.blogspot.com/2009/06/herstory-iv-spirit-of-god-that-dwells.html  For what remains, I've decided to include this letter and link so that others who might not know about this aspect of Episcopal Church history and the evolution of policy might get a glimpse of the past, its problems and heroes, and the ever-slow process of our individual and collective enlightenment.   That "Dusty Past" is described in real time as it unfolded in my autobiographical book telling of family, friends and teachers of significant influence in my emerging vocation, through the ordinations and into chapters of reflections on Christian feminist theology  ("God is a Verb"), the nature and meaning of partnership and Church ("We Are the Church"), with poetry interwoven throughout. To order, go here and click "Books" in the left margin menu:  http://bearblessings.com/

See the cover of the first edition of Womanpriest here, with samples of Bear Blessings Soul Cards which shows the art of the website owner, Susan Lind-Kanne and her selections from my poetry. http://allabozarthwordsandimages.blogspot.com/p/book-covers-of-most-popular-titles.html  About the books:  http://allabozarthbooks.blogspot.com/ Also:  http://www.interviewwithallarenéebozarthaboutwritingandpoetry.com/ To read more about the Philadelphia Ordinations and see pictures, with historical background about ordained women in the Anglican Communion before us~ and note the link to the Fortietch Anniversary pages at the top of the page~  http://allabozarthwordsandimages.blogspot.com/p/the-philadelphia-ordinations-and-what.html To find the poem I wrote preparing for the 35th anniversary of my ordination to the diaconate as first woman ordained in the Diocese of Oregon, click Control and F at the same time or in quick succession and type "Digging Into the Dusty Past" in the search box that opens in the lower left corner. You will probably be directed there after typing the first word. Thank you so much for coming to this page today! God bless you through and through, with well-being, wisdom and light. https://bearblessings.com/  For this card or wall hanging: https://bearblessings.com/products?keywords=prayer+for+luminosity  A Prayer for Luminosity I pray that you will be tuned to recognize all of God’s sweet surprises for you throughout your life, and when Luminous Presence appears, you will feel the great joy of gratitude. I pray that your life will give you more joy than sorrow, that pain will be small and fleeting, and that you will learn ways to turn pain into blessing. I pray that in hard times you will be able to recall the beauty that shines among prickles and thorns. I pray that you will find the beauty within you to respond to the beauty outside you. I pray that you will know every day how fully love embraces you. I pray that you will live and move and be in Grace, and that this Grace will give you the power to give, and the freedom to receive. I pray that you will grow in wisdom. I pray that you will create your own ways to celebrate the Mysteries, and to be happy. Alla Renée Bozarth From the poetry collection in progress, The Frequency of Light ©2008 ______________________________________ I found this fine summary article from Sojourners a few minutes ago and feel that it's well worth sharing: https://sojo.net/articles/i-never-felt-more-danger-when-i-kneeled-be-ordained