Wisdom’s Urgent Cry

A Faith and Feminism

Womanist/Mujerista Conference

November 2-4, 2007

San Francisco

hosted by Ebenezer/herchurch Lutheran

and co-sponsored by San Francisco

ELCA Conference

A gathering for feminist (men and women) faith seekers, church leaders, Interfaith leaders to experience and discuss the urgent implications of God/dess imagery and gender issues which transform the church, the world and our daily lives so that together we seek and speak justice.

Keynote Presenter

Dr. Jann Aldredge-Clanton

author of In Whose Image, In Search of Christ-Sophia,

Inclusive Hymns for Liberating Christians

Visionary Artist and Gallery Showing

Shiloh Sophia McCloud

Dancer

Judith Lavender Dancer

Workshop Leaders and Panelists

Mara Lynn Keller, Ph.D.,

Director of Women’s Spirituality CIIS

Arisaka Razak, RN/CMN Women’s Spirituality, CIIS

Megan Rohrer, MDiv.

Welcome Ministry Pastor-Director, SF

Mary Solberg, Ph. D.

Associate Professor of Religion, Gustavus Adolphus

Alicia Vargas, Ph.D.

PLTS Director of Contextual Education

scroll down for bios of Keynote, Artist, Workshop leaders and panel participants:

            by Artist:               Shiloh McCloud   "Paper ICONS"

            by the Dancer:     Judith Lavender Dancer

                                           the body - how we live our connection to

                                           earth, to Goddess, to life.

            by religion scholar  - Dr. Mara Lynn Keller,

Goddess, Spirituality and Minoan Crete

            by herchurch - Goddess Rosary, thealogy and ritual. 

                                     (& bead your own)

           by Dr. Gabriele Schroeder - Women's Spirituality

                 through the ages.

BIOS for

Wisdom’s Urgent Cry – A Faith and Feminism Conference

November 2-4, 2007

hosted by Ebenezer/herchurch  Lutheran Church

Helping individuals and faith communities
expand their divine images, deepening
their spiritual experience and
contributing to justice and peace.

Jann Aldredge-Clanton, PhD.  currently serves as a chaplain coordinator for Baylor University Medical Center, Dallas, Texas, where she also chairs the Interfaith Task Force and the Healing Environment Team.

She is the author of Breaking Free: The Story of a Feminist Baptist Minister (Eakin Press, 2002); In Search of the Christ-Sophia: An Inclusive Christology for Liberating Christians (Twenty-Third Publications, 1995; Eakin Press, 2004); Imagine God! A Children's Musical Exploring and Expressing Images of God (Choristers Guild, 2004); In Whose Image? God and Gender (Crossroad, 1990, 2001); Praying with Christ-Sophia: Services for Healing and Renewal (Twenty-Third Publications, 1996); Counseling People with Cancer (Westminster John Knox, 1998); God, A Word for Girls and Boys (Glad River, 1993). She has also published articles in The Journal of Pastoral Care, The Christian Ministry, and elsewhere.

Most recently Jann has published Inclusive Hymns for Liberating Christians.  The wide variety of biblical divine names and images in these hymns will contribute to belief in the sacredness of all people and all creation.  Peace and justice flow from this belief.  These hymns draw from the prophetic, liberating tradition in Scripture.  Biblical themes, phrases, and images form the foundation for all the hymns.  Predominant themes of the hymns are peace, justice, resurrection, abundant life, liberation, new creation, and partnership in relationships.  This collection includes hymns that celebrate the seasons of the church year and other special occasions.

Some of the hymns resurrect feminine divine images, like Wisdom and Ruah, that have long been buried in Scripture and Christian tradition.  Bringing feminine sacred names into worship encourages the revaluing of the feminine so that the Gospel values of liberation and equality are realized.  Inclusive Hymns for Liberating Christians will help churches and individuals in their journey toward freedom from racism, sexism, and other injustices.

For many of these hymns Jann Aldredge-Clanton draws from the rich tradition of hymn tunes, giving new expression to familiar music.  This hymn collection also includes original tunes and arrangements by composer Larry E. Schultz.  This new, vibrant music enhances the meaning of the texts.

Rev. Shiloh McCloud, Artist.  Shiloh Sophia McCloud has dedicated the past sixteen years of her life to the study and practice of art as a spiritual discipline as well as to helping equip women with the tools and understanding to develop their own creative potential. Shiloh's artwork is dedicated to providing healing images of women and family. As a leader in helping to build a Sacred Arts movement, Shiloh lives and teaches a philosophy that all art forms are tools for individual, social and spiritual transformation. Thousands of women have deepened in their creative practice through Shiloh's illustrated Color of Woman journals and her workshops. Shiloh is the founder of Cosmic Cowgirls Ink., a woman and girl owned publishing company that now produces five Color of Woman journals with dozens more on the way. Shiloh's paintings are internationally collected and her product line is represented at galleries and fine shops throughout the Unites States. She and her husband, Isaiah, own Wisdom House Gallery in Mendocino, California. "The work of a woman visionary is to the know the past, dream the future, and take powerful action in the present."- Rev. Shiloh Sophia McCloud - www.colorofwoman.com - Wisdom House Gallery PO Box 1014 -45280 Main Street Mendocino, CA 95460  http://www.wisdomhousecatalog.com

Mara Lynn Keller (Ph.D., Philosophy, Yale University, 1971) is Director of the Women's Spirituality M.A. and Ph.D. programs in Philosophy and Religion at CIIS. A wholistic philosopher, thealogian, and international lecturer, she is a scholar and ritualist of the Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter and Persephone, and has published articles on the Goddess civilization of ancient Crete, the new field of archaeomythology, and Rosen Method Bodywork and Movement. Formerly at San Francisco State University, she co-founded and directed the Global Peace Studies program in addition to teaching philosophy and women's studies.

In keeping with her goals of balancing spirit, mind, and body, she is a Rosen Method bodywork practitioner and movement teacher. As an activist for peace and social justice since the 1960's, Mara has organized and advocated for civil rights, affirmative action in higher education, women's reproductive rights, the prevention of violence against women and children, the formation of the Green Party in California, and peace for war-torn peoples around the world. Mara has been a key organizer of several important conferences, including the First International Minoan Celebration of Partnership in Crete (1992); Californians in Dialogue for the Common Good, sponsored by the California Council for the Humanities (1992); and From the Realm of the Ancestors: Language of the Goddess, sponsored by CIIS (1998); and she co-produced the Jennifer Berezan Ritual Concert, Returning to the Mother of Us All, also sponsored by CIIS (2000).

In addition, she has led educational tours for CIIS and the International Women's Studies Institute in Greece and Turkey: Aegean Women's Studies, Women Across the Millennia: 5000 Years of Women's Culture and History in Greece, and Anatolia: Land of the Mothers. She is the creator of the Women's Spirituality Journeys, and with other CIIS faculty has co-led educational tours to Greece, Turkey and other countries.

Articles by Mara Keller:

“The Eleusinian Mysteries of Demeter and Persephone: Fertility, Sexuality, and Rebirth.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, Spring 1988, Vol.4, # 1, pp. 27-54.
Part I
Part II

"The Interface of Archaeology and Mythology: A Philosophical Evaluation of the Gimbutas Paradigm" (in two parts) in Joan Marler, ed. From the Realm of the Ancestors: An Anthology in Honor of Marija Gimbutas (Manchester CT: Knowledge, Ideas, Trends, Inc. 1997).
Part I
Part II

"Crete of the Mother Goddess: Communal rituals and sacred art" in ReVision: Winter 1998; 20, 3; p. 12-16.

Goddesses Around the World. Published by Common Ground: Resources for Body, Mind and Spirit, The Woman Issue, Issue 113, Fall 2002.

Arisika Razak, RN (Registered Nurse), CNM (Certified Nurse Midwife), MPH (Masters in Public Health) has worked for over thirty years in the fields of Women's Spirituality/Women's Studies/Women's Health, Spiritual Dance, and Nurse-Midwifery. She has achieved local, national and international recognition in these fields as an educator, artist, practitioner, and author.

As an educator in the field of Women's Studies/Women's Spirituality, Ms Razak has been interviewed in the publications: New Age Journal; Women of Power; Snake Power; and Goddessing Regenerated. She is one of 18 extraordinary women featured in Cathleen Rountree's book of interviews and photographs: On Women Turning Forty, which includes Susan Griffin, Barbara Boxer, and Maxine Hong Kingston. She has articles in three books: Children of the Dawn: Visions of the New Family; Reweaving the World: the Emergence of Eco-feminism, and the introduction to Childbirth Wisdom. She has been interviewed and featured for her work in Women's Health and Women's Studies both in film and on radio. In Fire Eyes, the full-length feature film by an African woman to discuss the issue of female genital mutilation/female circumcision, Arisika discusses her work with women and their bodies, as a midwife, healer, and workshop leader. She is interviewed in Abortion: From Danger to Dignity, by Academy Award nominee, Dorothy Fadiman, on the issues poor women face when seeking, abortion, and in the nationally distributed PBS documentary Who Lives, Who Dies? , which focuses on issues of health care for the indigent.

Mary Solberg, PhD – Associate Professor of Religion, Gustavus Adolphus, St. Peter, Minn.  Solberg teaches historical and contemporary Christian theologies, and ethics and  medicine. Her teaching and research interests include constructive appropriation of Christian theological traditions; Luther; liberation theologies; God and gender; and bioethics. She also leads education, nursing, and pre-med students on January-term travel courses on health care and education in developing countries.

Among various awards, Solberg is a former Fulbright fellow and a recipient of the Daniel Day Williams Fellowship. She is the author of Compelling Knowledge: A Feminist Proposal for an Epistemology of the Cross (SUNY, 1997). She is also co-editor of several books including most recently Healing by Heart: Clinical and Ethical Case Stories of Hmong Families and Western Providers (Vanderbilt University Press, 2003). Solberg is translator of Walter Altmann's Luther and Liberation: A Latin American Perspective (Fortress, 1992); and Bishop Medardo Gomez's Fire Against Fire: Christian Ministry Face-to-Face with Persecution (Augsburg, 1990). Prof. Solberg frequently presents professional papers and has published articles and book reviews in the Journal of Hipanic/Latino Theology, Dialog, and the Bangalore Theological Forum.

Alicia Vargas, PhD  Director of Contextual Education Assistant Professor of Multi-Cultural Ministry Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary, Berkeley, CA. Chaplain and Director of aftercare program, Correctional Institutions Chaplaincy of Santa Clara County; Member, Public Church in Public Life, ELCA; Presenter, Hispanic Lutheran Identity Consultation, ELCA; Lecturer, "Christ, Convicts and the Church," Earl Lectures, PSR; Member, Word and Sacrament Discipling Team, Sierra Pacific Synod; Chair, Multicultural Commission, Sierra Pacific Synod; Member, Task Force for Building a Multicultural Curriculum, Vassar College;Member, Editiorial Board, Revista de estudios Hispánicos; Faculty Seminar on International Studies: Liberation Theology, Vassar College. 

Both Mary Solberg and Alicia Vargas have articles published in Cross Examinations.  Readings on the Meaning of the Cross Today.  Marit Trelstad, Editor.  2006, Augsburg-Fortress

Megan Rohrer, Pastor is called as minister to the homeless in San Francisco and serves as the director of the Welcome Ministry.  On Saturday, November 18th LLGM supporters from around the nation converged on San Francisco for the ordination extraordinem of Pastor Megan Marie Rohrer into the ministry of Word and Sacrament. Representatives of the calling churches and the Welcome Ministry were also on hand to commission Pastor Rohrer for ministry to and with homeless persons in San Francisco. The presence of the Holy Spirit was undeniably felt by those in attendance at this boisterous and playful worship service held at Ebenezer Lutheran Church - a proudly feminist worshipping community with a long-standing commitment to justice for people of all sexual and gender identities. In addition to Ebenezer Lutheran Church, Megan was called by Christ Church Lutheran, St. Francis Lutheran Church, and St. Mary and Martha Lutheran Church, all of San Francisco.