22. “Partner. Gather Online. Support,” The Gathering, para. 1−5.
23. “Meet the Preachers,” The Gathering, para. 8−9.
2
Creating a Womanist Church
Before Rev. Kamilah Hall Sharp moved to Dallas to pursue a PhD in Hebrew Bible at Brite Divinity School, her Memphis pastor, Rev. Virzola Law, introduced her to Rev. Dr. Irie Lynne Session. Kamilah and Irie became good friends, sharing their passion for social justice and their call to preach.
Need for a Womanist Church
When Kamilah began visiting churches in Dallas, trying to find a good fit for her family, she noticed numerous churches that did not allow women preachers. Whenever someone told her of a new church to visit, she went to their website and looked at their leadership. Often she found all males in pastoral positions and when there was a woman included, she was over religious education or human resources. She could not attend a church where she would not be able to live into the call to preach that God had placed on her life. Also, she did not want her daughter to be in a church that would place limits on how God could work in her life because she is a girl. In the numerous churches Kamilah and her family visited, they very seldom heard any sermons that included social justice issues and that lifted women in the biblical text or in current times. Social justice, including justice and equity for women, was important to them, so they could not join any of these churches.
While they were still in the process of visiting churches, Kamilah’s husband, Nakia, said to Irie, “You should go be Moses.” He suggested she go plant a new church. Irie was not interested in planting a church and responded, “No, and if I were to ever do anything, we would have to do it together.” Kamilah was just beginning her PhD coursework and caring for her daughter who was in kindergarten and transitioning to a new school, so she was not interested in planting a church either. At that time Kamilah had no desire to be a pastor.
More than a year later, Irie had an idea for a Womanist Seven Last Words service on Good Friday.24 The service would include seven womanist preachers from various denominations, preaching the seven last sayings of Jesus from the cross, seven minutes each. This unprecedented and forward-thinking vision resulted in seven women gathered on Good Friday in Dallas, Texas, to reimagine, through womanist interpretation, Jesus’s seven last sayings from the cross. Each of the seven women brought messages of hope, freedom, and healing, not just for the guests, but for themselves. It was a rarity, even in 2017, for seven Black preaching women to be in one place, at one podium, on one preaching assignment.
To their surprise, the service was very well attended, with a diverse crowd, and well received. Those in attendance embraced this style of liberating preaching and inquired when and where they would be able to experience this again. People asked, “Where can I hear more of this preaching?” Irie and Kamilah responded, “You really can’t hear womanist preaching Sunday morning in Dallas.” After having this question raised several times over a few months when they preached in other places, they began to ask the question: “What would it look like to have a space where people could come and regularly experience womanist preaching?”
Beginning a Womanist Church
At this time, Rev. Yvette Blair-Lavallais, one of the preachers in the Seven Last Words service, was leaving her position at a United Methodist church. Kamilah and Irie, recognizing there is strength in numbers, invited Yvette to join them at Starbucks to begin a conversation about creating a space for womanist preaching. The idea of having three women working together to carry the load was intriguing. In this first conversation, they discussed what a space for womanist preaching might look like if they worked together. They asked questions: “Who do we envision in the space? What would the space look like? What would be important to us?” After their first meeting they took time to pray and give thought to each of these questions.
When they came back together, they decided that they wanted to create space for womanist preaching in Dallas. In this conversation, they all lifted three concerns as important: womanist preaching, social justice focus, and affirming LGBTQIA people. They agreed that a space for womanist preaching would be healing, authentic, and necessary. The space would be healing because they knew people who had been hurt by life and the church. The space would be authentic because they knew they would show up authentically and make room for others to be their authentic selves as well. In this space, people would not have to pretend to be someone other than who they were. The space would be welcoming to all people. They knew that no space like this was available to them. The space was necessary because there were many people who were being wounded by harmful interpretations of biblical texts, hurt by church, and disenchanted with Christianity.
They also agreed on three missional priorities: (1) racial equity, (2) LGBTQIA inclusion, and (3) the dismantling of patriarchy, misogyny, and sexism (PMS). Equally important, the space could not have a hierarchical framework. For this reason, each of them would have equal input and an equal vote on everything, and they would call themselves “co-leaders.” The space would not be a “church,” but a place where people could gather and worship. While this may sound like a church, they were not setting out to start a church, so there was no need for them to be referred to as “pastors.”
In order to properly prepare, they agreed to take some time to find a location and make sure all the components were in place to ensure success in creating this new space. Irie and Kamilah are both ordained in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), so Irie sent an email to the Disciples of Christ Area Minister, asking him to send a message to local churches to see if anyone would agree to offer them permanent nesting space. They were creating this space with no support from any denomination and few personal resources; hence, they did not want to incur a large overhead expense that would take away from their ability to minister effectively. There were five responses from different churches on the day the email was sent. Kamilah, Irie, and Yvette lived south of Dallas, and the churches that initially offered them space were farther north. A few days later, Rev. Ken Crawford, the new pastor of Central Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), also responded, offering them space. Irie was a member of this church, Kamilah had attended several times, and they both had preached at Central. This was the location they were hoping to get because it was more centrally located and a wonderful facility.
Now with a secure location they began to plan an inaugural service. Yvette, Irie, and Kamilah decided to have a one-hour service on Saturday. For them it made sense to have a Saturday service because there were many people who were interested in participating who worked in various churches on Sunday. Also, there are thousands of churches in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, but few offer services on Saturday. They then considered what the service would look like, and they agreed to have “Greet & Tweet,” weekly Communion, rotating and tag-team womanist preaching, and a question and discussion time called “Talk Back to the Text.”
For weeks they advertised on social media outlets. On Friday evening before the inaugural service, they set up Central Christian Church’s fellowship hall. Since they knew they were creating space for people who were hurt by church, they thought people would feel more comfortable in the fellowship hall than the sanctuary. The chairs were set up in a half circle with an aisle and the podium was on the floor with the chairs, instead of up on the stage, to prevent a hierarchical visual.
On October 16, 2017, the day of the service, they arrived and began to wait, not knowing if anyone would come. Cars started pulling up on the parking lot, and people began to come into the fellowship hall. Approximately eighty-five women, men, and children of different races attended that first service. Rev. Kamilah, Rev. Irie, and Rev. Yvette tag-team preached, and the service was complete in one hour. It was well received, so they agreed to keep going. The following week they prepared and showed up, wondering if people would come again or if it had been a one-time event. Once again people showed