Women’s Stories Day 2024

The Reformed Church Center Examines the Challenges Women Face

While recent church history often discusses the process that led to all of the offices of the RCA being opened to women in the 1970s, we need to remember that this work was so heroic precisely because of opposition and abuse that has happened and continues to happen to try to keep women out of RCA ministry. On Saturday, 9 March, from 1:00 to 3:00 pm Eastern Time, as part of our annual Women’s Stories Day, co-hosted by RCA Women’s Transformation and Leadership. We will look at resistance that has been faced by RCA women in ministry and discuss ways to address the abuse and move toward acceptance and healing as a church with the annual Gnade presentation “Women in Ministry—Still Speaking: Supporting Women Clergy Into the Next Century.” This is a discussion for both women and men.

Our discussion leader is Lisa A. Hansen, the 2023-2024 Hazel B. Gnade Fellow in RCA Women’s Studies at NBTS. She holds an EdD in Organizational Change and Leadership from the University of Southern California, an MS in National Security Strategy from the National War College, a DMin in Pastoral Care and Counseling from Oblate School of Theology, ThM and MDiv degrees from Princeton Theological Seminary, and a BA in Economics from the University of California in Los Angeles. A retired chaplain in the US Air Force, she currently serves as Senior Pastor of Pasadena, California, Presbyterian Church.

Click here to read Rev. Hansen’s presentation.

The response to Dr. Hansen’s presentation was given by Denise Kingdom, Pastor of Mobilization and Renewal at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville Michigan, and an RCA Missionary to South Africa where  she works with the local church and community to secure loving families for orphaned and vulnerable children in the village of Botshabelo. She has a BA in Psychology from Shaw University and an MDiv and DMin from Western Theological Seminary. She ‘s a former member of the NBTS Board of Trustees and a mother to many, especially her two biological children, Gezelle and Chris.

Devotions for the day were led by Pamela Pater-Ennis, Executive Director of Hudson River Care & Counseling, and Lynn Min, a licensed mental health counselor in New York. Both of them will also be available at the Zoom after-party to help people process their feelings about the presentation.