The Women Ministers’ Empowerment Network (WMEN), a progressive ministerial alliance in the Austin area, is planning the “Coming to Voice” Conference in collaboration with WomanPreach!, a national group that nurtures female preachers and promotes Womanist/Feminist concerns for justice. In plenary sessions, workshops, and small group discussions over two days, the group will foster dialogue on issues specific to women of color in ministry, part of an ongoing project to build ministerial relationships for women of color for training, encouragement, and support. The program will also be valuable for others concerned about social justice and equity in religious organizations.

Dr. Margaret Aymer will serve as the workshop’s Wisdom Conversation Partner. Aymer, an Associate Professor at Austin Seminary, has worked at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta and is active in the Society of Biblical Literature and American Academy of Religion. She is the author of James: Diaspora Rhetorics of a Friend of God and First Pure, then Peaceable: Frederick Douglass, Darkness and the Epistle of James.

Rev. Dr. Valerie Bridgeman will serve as Lead Facilitator. Bridgeman is a Visiting Professor of Homiletics and Hebrew Bible at Methodist Theological School in Ohio and president and CEO of WomanPreach!, which is committed to training women called to preach who emerge from churches and academic institutions that can be insensitive or inhospitable to their vocation and voice. She is co-editor of Those Preaching Women: A Multicultural Collection and The Africana Worship Book.

The event is open to everyone interested in these issues, clergy and the public, and there is a fee. Registration online.

Location: University United Methodist Church, 2409 Guadalupe, Austin, 78705