Episcopalians join the world’s spirit-filled Women’s Marches
by Pat McCaughan, ENS:
Carrying signs reading “The Episcopal Church is Here” and “The Episcopal Church Cares About This,” the Rev. LeeAnne Watkins and other Minnesota Episcopalians joined thousands of marchers in St. Paul on Jan. 21, sparking “a miserable day of puddles and ice” into the beginnings of a movement.
A day later, Watkins was already heeding the Women’s March movement’s call to continue post-march local action. With the help of a professional facilitator and theater troupe, St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in St. Paul hosted a Jan. 22 intergenerational forum. It included roleplaying aimed at “elders teaching young people about what it means to respect women,” said Watkins, 50, rector for 18 years.
As elsewhere, the numbers of marchers exploded expectations. In St. Paul, for example, Watkins said that while organizers had planned for about 20,000, police estimated the crowd at about 100,000.
“It was joyful and peaceful and fun,” she said. “There were hugs as people recognized one another. There were workplace groups and a lot of young people, people in wheelchairs.
“I went because it was about marching for women … the rights of women and girls, about reproductive freedom, about immigrants in our state, about dignity for all people. It wasn’t an anti-march. It was a pro-march for all the values I hold that are informed by my faith.”
Read also: An open letter to my liberal friends by Solveig Gold, First Things
And, in a particularly apt piece written last October from a Roman Catholic perspective: A problem with deep roots: Why so many men think church is for women (Part I) (Hat Tip: Barbara Gauthier0
Related Posts
Tags
Share This
