Moment for Mission Archive

When the statue of Eleanor Roosevelt went up on the corner of 72nd and Riverside, I went to the dedication alone. I heard this story.

A mom was patiently explaining to her young daughter why Eleanor Roosevelt was important – “She fought for civil rights, she fought racism, she cared about international women and children when others didn’t.”

“I still don’t get it,” shrugged the little girl.

“Oh, for God’s sake, she was just a good, strong woman!” said the mom.

That’s how I feel about the women in mission and church women in general. For 200 years they have fought for the rights of women and children and have kept their churches going. Besides that, they’ve tried to nurture one another spiritually. They are good and strong, and they have done their work faithfully, quietly and effectively.

200 years ago, a handful of courageous church ladies in predecessor Presbyterian churches thought women should have influence outside their homes – a radical idea. I doubt women would’ve won the right to vote, to be educated and to have access to health clinics around the world as early as they did if not for these women.

What started as a handful of little ladies who wanted to make the world a better place is a movement of millions of women connected to churches in the U.S. and around the world – women who want to make the world a better place. They have been in the forefront of many important movements: advocating for women in church leadership, for peace, and for justice issues like anti-sweatshop and anti-child labor campaigns.

The concept of mission has been transformed in the last 200 years. At first, church women’s primary focus was to send missionaries to places where male missionaries couldn’t or wouldn’t go, like to India in the late 1800s to start schools and hospitals. But lately, the concept of mission has evolved from being in “missions to” to being in “partnership with.” Instead of looking at a community’s needs, the focus is on a community’s assets.

But to me the best part of church women is their diversity. At Manhattan Neighborhood Network, when I was a producer, we always said our television crew was as diverse as any subway car. So are church women. And like the subway, we go places.

At this church, the Friday Morning Mothers’ Bible Study Group does more than gab about breastfeeding and pre-school choices (although we do a lot of that). We also, thanks to Marisol Kaminski, participated in a “moms against guns” rally. To me, faith means community.

In 1995, after I went to the women’s conference in China, I spoke to many women’s church groups. I believe church women instinctively understand and have a passion for international sisterhood.

As a New Yorker, in the tough days that followed 9/11, I drew on that international feeling of sisterhood that I experienced in Beijing to know that the world WAS definitely not a bad or fearful place, but rather a loving and activist place.

Last summer a friend of mine, Lindsay Pontius, did a performance art piece about frontierswomen at an Adirondack museum in upstate New York. At the end of the historical piece, Lindsay had all these women holding hands and almost hysterically running around in a circle proclaiming the names of every kind of pie you can think of.

Yes, pie is great. And like church women’s activism, pie first appeared on the American landscape in the early 19th century. Pie is like church women. Its power is underrated, it comes in many flavors, and it warms the soul. It tastes sweet and has been invented by good strong women from our heartland who, themselves, knew a lot about survival! But pie is not just for oneself. Women who make pie love to share it. And in feeding others, we are fed.

If you look around at church any given Sunday, you can see the daughters, granddaughters and great granddaughters of ordinary church women who, like Eleanor Roosevelt, have done extraordinary things, and they are making a difference every day.