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September 2003
First Woman AME Bishop Kicks Off October "Preaching,
Prophesy & Practice" Series
Series Is a Tribute to the Rev. Dr. Prathia Hall
Contact: Wendy
McDowell, 617.496.6004
The
Right Rev. Vashti Murphy McKenzie, the first woman to
be elected bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church
(in July, 2000), was greeted in a reception at 5:30 pm, and then speak
as part of a panel discussion on Wednesday, October 1, in
the Sperry Room of Andover Hall. Bishop McKenzie
preached at Boston University's Marsh Chapel earlier in the
day, at 11 am.
Named at the top of Ebony's 15 Greatest African
American Female Preachers in 1997, and the author of Not
Without A Struggle, Strength in the Struggle and Journey
to the Well, McKenzie is known to be a commanding speaker
with a strong commitment to community development. In her
post, prelate over the 18th Episcopal District of the AME
Church, she presides over Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique and
Swaziland.
The other panelists at the October 1 HDS event were the Rev.
Jeffrey Brown, Pastor of Union Baptist Church in Cambridge,
and the Rev. Charlotte Pridgen-Randolph, Senior Pastor of
Wesley United Methodist Church in South Dorchester.
The Bishop McKenzie events kick off a series entitled
"Preaching, Prophesy and Practice: A Tribute to the Reverend
Doctor Prathia Hall," co-sponsored by the Office of
Ministerial Studies at HDS and the Center for African American
Religious Research and Education at Boston University School
of Theology. Hall was a renowned and beloved pastor, professor,
and civil rights leader who died in 2002. One of the first
women field leaders in southwest Georgia for the Student
Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, Hall was then ordained a Baptist minister. She became pastor of Mount Sharon Baptist
Church in Philadelphia and was the first woman to join the
Ministers Conference of Philadelphia and vicinity in 1982. She
also held the Martin Luther King Jr. Chair in Social Ethics at
Boston University School of Theology. Dr. Martin Luther King,
Jr., was quoted as saying that "Prathia Hall is the one
platform speaker I would prefer not to follow."
For more information about the series, contact the Office
of Ministerial Studies at 617.496.5711.
Other
upcoming events in the series include:
Thursday,
October 2
1 pm at
BU's Marsh Chapel — The Rev. Drs. Ray Hammond and Gloria
White-Hammond, co-pastors of Bethel AME Church in Boston
Wednesday, October 15
11 am at
BU's Marsh Chapel — Bishop Leontine Kelly, a retired
United Methodist Bishop who was the first African American
woman to be elected bishop by any major religious denomination
(1984)
12:15 pm
at HDS's Andover Chapel — Bishop Barbara Harris, first
woman Episcopal Bishop (1989)
Thursday, October 16
5:15 pm
— Co-celebration of Eucharist by bishops Harris and Kelly at
HDS's Andover Chapel
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