Hello, - Thank you for your interest the the new learning community and year-long course
we are offering. Baptized & Ordained is launching and I want to share some great stuff to support your practice of ministry today. And invite you to join me this year for more! In this update, I have four things to share. 1) A new journal article from the Learning Pastoral Imagination Project (free access!) 2) An event in Louisville, Kentucky 9/30-10/1 honoring the growth of women and lgbtiqa+ clergy leadership in Baptist
life 3) An upcoming event at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary 9/24-26 featuring Will Willimon, and LPI co-directors Christian Scharen and Eileen Campbell-Reed 4) The launch of a new community "Baptized &
Ordained" (register by 10/1). Plus a BONUS if you join by Sunday night!
Let’s dive in. Recently we published a new article about the LPI Project in Reflective Practice. We
offer an overview of what we have been doing since 2021 with a Louisville Institute Grant. And we recap some highlights of our learning in over the course of the study since 2009. Introduction
Begun in 2009, the Learning Pastoral Imagination Project (LPI Project) is a national, ecumenical, and longitudinal study of Christian ministry. This brief
introduction shares how the study was designed, how it has unfolded over fourteen years, and several of its key questions and findings. The central concept, pastoral imagination, identifies the embodied, relational, spiritual, and integrative capacity required for the wise practice of ministry.
If you are in the Louisville, Kentucky region, I hope you will join me for this very special weekend. The
lecture series is named for one of my professors and a minister at Crescent Hill Baptist Church. William Johnson taught one of the first seminary courses I ever took. I am so honored to be speaking at the anniversary of the ordination of women as deacons at CHBC. This event also coincides with the Baptist Women in Ministry (BWIM) 40th anniversary which is also to be celebrated in Louisville, October 2-4 at Broadway Baptist Church.
What will it take for women and lgbitqa+ clergy to thrive in ministry? I started responding to that question
in a series this summer. Here is the first in that series and you can read it right now!
|
|
|
How do women thrive in ministry? Last week on Thursday, 700+ Baptists gathered in Atlanta for dinner…
|
|
Henderson Lecture at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary September 24-26
From the Continuing Education office at PTS: We are so excited for our first in-person Henderson Leadership Conference since 2019! In celebration of this chance to gather, we've reduced the registration costs to increase access to these great speakers and quality content. For those not able to join us in person – you can also attend online. Register now! https://www.pts.edu/henderson-2324 Register now! https://www.pts.edu/henderson-2324 Join us for “Looking Forward: Church, Hope, and the Future of Congregations” Sept. 24-26, and hear presenters who have been listening to pastors and congregations in hundreds of American churches and have a hopeful, Christ-centered word for small churches and their leaders! The presenters are: the Rev. Dr. Will Willimon, author, Bishop of The United Methodist
Church, and professor at Duke Divinity
School; the Rev. Dr. Eileen Campbell-Reed, visiting associate professor of pastoral theology and care at Union Theological
Seminary and co-director of Learning Pastoral
Imagination; and the Rev. Dr. Christian Scharen, pastor of St. Lydia’s Dinner Church and co-director of Learning Pastoral
Imagination.
$25 for online participation $100 for in person registration My workshop on "Finding Our Way" will be available online.
Baptized & Ordained A new learning community is launching
Speaking of the the future of church and ministry, Three Minute Ministry Mentor is launching a year-long course and learning community. We are gathering
now. Baptized & Ordained will offer you learning, support, and connection. If the life of ministry is yours, then I want to invite you to join us! Question: Do I have to be ordained to join this community? Answer: Absolutely NOT. Everyone is welcome to join. The book-in-progress is about the practice of ministry, but people featured in the book are not all ordained. And some ordained folk followed a very long and winding road to get there. When I talked with the 3MMM team recently about the process of ordination? It really
hit a nerve. Is that you, too? Well, this community is exactly for you! , we believe you are someone who cares about the practice of ministry, about what happens to women and lgbtiqa+ ministers, and you are someone who cares about how church and ministry are changing . . . That means we
think you are going to love this new community!
In the video below. You'll learn more about about the Baptized & Ordained year-long course, learning
community, and book-in-progress. We are...
- * gathering with people who share your ministry concerns and values
- * making space for your stories and experience
- * reading and meeting monthly to discuss my book-in-progress Baptized & Ordained: How Women and Queer Clergy are Changing Ministry for Good
- * giving you access to a private Facebook group
and live events to connect with others
* sharing with you a copy of Baptized & Ordained when it is published! -
Watch this video to learn more!
|
|
Stories and Questions for
your Practice of Ministry
How does one learn the practice of ministry? And bring it to life? The latest findings of a 14-year LPI study of ministry (Learning Pastoral Imagination Project), along with case studies, practical wisdom, and provocative questions fill the 50 brief chapters of Pastoral The Imagination: Bringing The Practice a Ministry to Life (Fortress, 2021). The ministers featured in the book come from many Christian denominations, ten different seminaries, multiple social locations, and together they paint a vivid portrait of the practice of ministry in the United States. Throughout the 50 chapters of Pastoral Imagination you meet many women in ministry and lgbtiqa+ ministers. The
Pastoral Imagination book also has over 200 questions for reflection. The new Baptized & Ordained community and book-in-progress is a different format, yet you will meet more women and lgbtiqa+ clergy. And you will learn more of their ministry stories in coming year. If you join the community, you will also continue to benefit from reflection questions that help you to flourish in ministry. Join the community to learn, be inspired, and form strategies for changing your own context! Join Baptized & Ordained by Sunday night September 24, and you will receive this BONUS set of questions. You can print them, share them, or just journal about them giving your ministry sustained reflection.
Let's do this work together in community, friends!
I look forward to connecting with you again soon!
|
|
|
|
|