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Breaking Barriers: Women in Ministry Leadership Roundtable · Future Christian

• 0:07
  >> Paul: Welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. Your
• 0:10
  source for insights and ideas on how to lead your
• 0:12
  church in the 21st century. At the Future
• 0:15
  Christian Podcast, we talk to pastors, authors and
• 0:19
  other faith leaders for helpful advice and
• 0:21
  practical wisdom to help you and your community of
• 0:24
  faith walk boldly into the future. Whether you're
• 0:28
  a pastor, church leader, or a passionate member of
• 0:30
  your faith community, this podcast is designed to
• 0:34
  challenge, inspire and equip you with the tools
• 0:37
  you need for impactful ministry. And now for a
• 0:39
  little bit about the guest for this episode.
• 0:44
  >> Loren: Welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. Today we
• 0:47
  have a special roundtable episode on Women in
• 0:49
  Ministry Leadership featuring four participants,
• 0:53
  including our very own Martha Tatarnic. Let me
• 0:57
  read through our guest bios. First, we have
• 0:59
  Reverend Tabitha Johnson, who is a pastor in the
• 1:01
  Christian church Disciples of Christ. She has
• 1:04
  served as a pastor and chaplain for over 20 years.
• 1:07
  She's a graduate from the University of Missouri,
• 1:09
  Kansas City and Central Baptist Theological
• 1:11
  Seminary. She's co editor and contributor to the
• 1:14
  book Still A Journey through perinatal
• 1:17
  bereavement. A 2017 gold medal winner in the
• 1:20
  Illumination Book Awards, she currently serves as
• 1:24
  a Senior Pastor at Shawnee Community Christian
• 1:26
  Church in Kansas, where she serves joyfully
• 1:29
  alongside people who love Jesus and one another.
• 1:33
  Her greatest love besides her family and her
• 1:35
  church, uh, are coffee and starting home
• 1:37
  improvement projects in her home that someday,
• 1:39
  hopefully, she will finish. Tabtha lives with her
• 1:43
  spouse Corey and their children in the Kansas City
• 1:45
  metro. We also have the Venerable Sheila Van
• 1:48
  Zwick, Archdeacon of Lincoln Deanery and the
• 1:52
  Rector of Church of the Transfiguration. Sheila
• 1:56
  was born and raised in St. Catharines, Ontario and
• 1:59
  was raised in the Christian Reformed Church. She
• 2:01
  began attending an Anglican church in her 20s and
• 2:05
  started seminary at 40. She worked in retail for a
• 2:09
  number of years and was the manager of Shoppers
• 2:11
  Drug Mart. She's been ordained for 17 years and
• 2:14
  worked in churches in Oakville, Hamilton and now
• 2:17
  St. Catharines, Ontario and has been at
• 2:20
  Transfiguration for six years. Also we have the
• 2:24
  Reverend Canon Catherine Morgan. Cathie graduated
• 2:28
  with a Master of Divinity from Trinity College,
• 2:30
  University of Toronto. She is ordained in the
• 2:33
  Diocese of Niagara where she has had the privilege
• 2:36
  of serving in rural small town and city parishes
• 2:39
  for 29 years. Currently she is the Rector of
• 2:42
  Church of the Resurrection in Hamilton. In her
• 2:45
  free time, she loves to sing, enjoy puzzles, and
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  is the proud parent of an adult son. Um, last but
• 2:52
  not least, we have our very own Martha Tatarnic,
• 2:54
  co host and regular contributor to the show. A
• 2:58
  reminder before we start today's conversation
• 3:00
  Please take a moment to subscribe to the podcast,
• 3:03
  leave a review and share Future Christian with a
• 3:06
  friend. You can connect with Loren, Martha and
• 3:08
  Future Christian on Instagram. We appreciate your
• 3:12
  voice and how we faithfully discern the future of
• 3:15
  the church.
• 3:26
  Welcome to the Future Christian Podcast. This is
• 3:28
  Loren Richmond Jr. And today I'm pleased to be
• 3:30
  hosting a, uh, Women in Ministry roundtable
• 3:33
  discussion with a whole host of wonderful guests.
• 3:37
  First we have the Venerable Sheila Van Zandwyck,
• 3:41
  then Reverend Canon Catherine Morgan. The Reverend
• 3:45
  Canon Martha Tatarnic, who you all should know.
• 3:49
  And soon, uh, to be joining us, having some
• 3:51
  technical issues, the Reverend Tabitha Johnson.
• 3:54
  So, hello everyone. Welcome to the show. Thanks
• 3:57
  for being here.
• 3:59
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Thanks for having us, Loren.
• 4:00
  >> Cathie Morgan: Great.
• 4:02
  >> Loren: Let's go. I guess based on how I'm seeing you on
• 4:05
  screen. Cathie, is there anything else you want
• 4:07
  our listeners to know about?
• 4:08
  >> Cathie Morgan: You don't even know where to start. Um, I've been
• 4:11
  privileged. I've been in the same diocese, have
• 4:13
  had a chance to minister in both, uh, small
• 4:15
  parishes, country parishes, as well as city
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  parishes. I've done lots of volunteer work, uh,
• 4:20
  from the diocese and in the community, which is
• 4:22
  lovely. Which is also how I know some of these
• 4:24
  wonderful colleagues in ministry through some of
• 4:27
  the, um, things that we've done together. Um, I
• 4:32
  getting up there in years. I be 29 years. I've
• 4:34
  been 29 years ordained. And I feel at some point
• 4:36
  in time I should know what I'm doing after that
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  long a time. But it's, it's been a real gift and a
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  real blessing to have to have had the journey that
• 4:44
  I have with good colleagues, good friends and
• 4:46
  wonderful parishes.
• 4:47
  >> Loren: Awesome. Sheila, how about you?
• 4:50
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Um, I think. Are we talking call or just giving
• 4:54
  people general ideas about me?
• 4:57
  >> Loren: Yeah, general ideas about me decorating my.
• 4:58
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: House and doing gardening.
• 5:00
  >> Loren: Yeah, there you go.
• 5:01
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Yeah, right. That is kind of my, uh, that is where
• 5:04
  I like to be is working at home. And I love a good
• 5:08
  renovation project, whether it's indoors or
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  outdoors. Um, I spend time with. I've got a
• 5:14
  brother who lives close by. Spend time with him
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  and his girlfriend and they're great pets. In
• 5:18
  fact, I was pet sitting the other night. So I'm a
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  dog and cat aunt. So yeah, that's a good thing.
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  But yeah, I love ministry, love, uh, all the
• 5:27
  people that I work with and the opportunities have
• 5:30
  been given. It's good stuff.
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  >> Loren: Awesome. Awesome. And I guess everyone should know
• 5:34
  the, you know, the famous Martha Tatarnic. Martha,
• 5:37
  anything else need to know about you?
• 5:40
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Cathie hinted at. Cathie, Sheila and I do all work
• 5:44
  together in the Anglican Church in the Niagara
• 5:46
  region. Um, and we're excited to be joined by
• 5:49
  Tabitha today as well for, like, a, uh, non
• 5:53
  Anglican perspective on the question of women in
• 5:56
  ministry. But, yeah, I'm really grateful that
• 5:59
  Cathie and Sheila were willing to join us from
• 6:02
  Niagara today.
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  >> Loren: Absolutely.
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  Well, let's get into that. Sheila, like you
• 6:06
  mentioned, kind of your call story, how you first
• 6:11
  were drawn into ministry and, and how that shaped
• 6:15
  you.
• 6:16
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Do you want me to start?
• 6:17
  >> Loren: Go for it.
• 6:19
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Um, so for me, it was kind of interesting because
• 6:22
  I was raised in the Christian reform tradition and
• 6:25
  women are not. At the time that I was going there,
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  women were not allowed to lead churches, be
• 6:32
  ministers, um, at all. So I had no familiarity
• 6:36
  with women in the priesthood or in the ministry
• 6:39
  at, um. And so I think that it's one of the
• 6:42
  reasons it took me a little while to kind of hear
• 6:44
  my call. I really didn't hear until I was in my
• 6:47
  30s. And by that time I had been attending an
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  Anglican church probably for about a little over
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  10 years, I would say. And, um, one day I had
• 6:57
  someone. I had been leading a Bible study for
• 7:00
  years. I'd been, you know, gone to church since my
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  baptism, you know, two months after my birth. So
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  I, um, always been involved and engaged with the
• 7:09
  church and ministry and my faith life. And so I
• 7:12
  was leading this Bible study for quite a while,
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  and this one woman kept saying, I think you should
• 7:15
  be a priest. And I kept thinking, really? I don't
• 7:19
  think you've got that right. Um, and so it took me
• 7:22
  a little while to kind of see myself in that role
• 7:26
  and to even begin to think about it. But literally
• 7:30
  the day that I thought, oh, it just clicked and
• 7:35
  realized that that was what I was called to. I
• 7:37
  went and spoke with someone who was very wise, and
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  they said to me, well, you know, what do you think
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  the gifts of a priest would be? And I said, well,
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  this, this, this, and this. She said, do you have
• 7:47
  any of those gifts? And I said, I kind of have
• 7:50
  them all. She's like, then maybe, Shelley, you
• 7:52
  should be a minister. I'm like, well, maybe I
• 7:54
  should. And I really, once I said yes to the call,
• 7:58
  recognized you, uh, know, how strong it had been
• 8:01
  in my life and how much it meant to me. And, yeah,
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  has been fabulous going forward from there.
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  >> Loren: Awesome.
• 8:07
  Thanks for sharing that. Cathie, how about you?
• 8:11
  >> Cathie Morgan: So we started feeling a call to ministry when I
• 8:13
  was still just a teenager, which was a very
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  strange thing for me. I was painfully shy as a
• 8:20
  young person. It's hard to Believe. But I couldn't
• 8:23
  even make eye contact. If I had known you most of
• 8:25
  my life, I couldn't make eye contact. And so I
• 8:27
  started kind of feeling this call to kind of be
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  involved and engaged with people. Um, I was
• 8:32
  involved a little bit in my church as a teenager
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  doing a few things liturgically, but kind of, um,
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  did quite a bit of work with, uh, the minister at
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  the time. And he would take me to people's houses
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  because, again, needed somebody else to go do some
• 8:45
  of those visits. He didn't feel comfortable all
• 8:46
  the time going alone. And so you got so that you
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  could kind of talk to people and kind of walk with
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  them. And to realize that that was part of what I
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  was feeling. The call to do is to be a part of
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  people's lives in a very real and a very
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  meaningful way. Not just superficially or not just
• 9:00
  kind of liturgically, but to be able to kind of
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  walk with people and journey with them and to
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  remind them that they weren't alone in all of
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  that. And so I kind of came out of my shell when I
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  was about 18, and all of a sudden could talk to
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  people and make eye contact and all those kinds of
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  things. But, um, some of that was kind of enforced
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  and held up by the people around me. Would never
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  have thought of this kind of idea on my own. But
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  as I said, there were people kind of encouraging
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  me and mentoring me and, you know, pushing me out
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  of my comfort zone, uh, to kind of fulfill and to
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  use the gifts that I had been given. So it was. It
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  was a wonderful. A wonderful kind of affirming it
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  from the community.
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  >> Loren: Martha, I don't know if I've ever heard this story
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  from you, so I'm. I'm especially excited to hear
• 9:41
  your perspective on this.
• 9:43
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, I also was a teenager. I was about 15. And,
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  um, I experienced that sense of call as being
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  extremely inconvenient because I had other very,
• 9:57
  uh, firmly laid out plans for myself. I've always
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  been pretty type A, and I had my life mapped out
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  for myself in a way that did not include ordained
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  ministry in any respect. But, um, I just started
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  to get this niggling sense that this was what I
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  was supposed to do. And I. I fought against that
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  m. For a time until it really felt like kind of a
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  surrender to it. Like, okay, am I going to spend
• 10:26
  my whole life doing something else when I know
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  this is what I'm supposed to do? Um, but I think
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  the thing that I've been thinking about so much
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  lately, Loren, with that call Is, um, you know,
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  because we've had some different, uh, guests on
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  our podcast lately, particularly I'm thinking
• 10:50
  about the documentary around the Philadelphia 11.
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  And. And I'm interested in, like, Sheila's note,
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  too, in terms of growing up in a church where
• 11:00
  there weren't women in leadership. Like, I'm
• 11:03
  really realizing over 20 years into ministry and
• 11:09
  almost 30 years since I started to discern that
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  call, like, what a privilege it was to grow up in
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  a church where women had always been in ministry
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  and how much more that, like, that imagination,
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  um, is, like, unfettered, because you see it as a
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  possibility. And I think for Sheila, or for some
• 11:36
  of those trailblazing women in the Anglican
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  Episcopal Church of England, um, who had to
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  really, like, speak back against those voices that
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  said, we don't do this, um, uh, I find that quite
• 11:54
  amazing. So I've been feeling a lot of gratitude
• 11:58
  as I sort of consider that, uh, privilege of
• 12:02
  growing up in a church where women had been
• 12:04
  ordained longer than I had been alive.
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  >> Loren: Well, that's a.
• 12:08
  That's a question I feel like I should ask off the
• 12:12
  jump is how do y' all think. How did being a woman
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  affect that call, discernment? Like, do you. Do
• 12:21
  you think it was harder for community,
• 12:23
  recognition, those sorts of things?
• 12:28
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: I think for me, it wasn't. I don't think it was
• 12:34
  harder. I think it was just harder for me
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  personally to see myself in it. And it's true,
• 12:40
  Marta. Like, I've heard conversations and read
• 12:44
  stories about people, and, uh, sometimes it's
• 12:48
  women, sometimes it's people who are poor,
• 12:50
  sometimes it's minorities and how much we're
• 12:53
  starting to recognize if we don't show them
• 12:57
  opportunities at a young age, then they just don't
• 13:00
  even envision it. And really, if you don't
• 13:02
  envision it, it's not going to happen. So, I mean,
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  I just. It just. I didn't even recognize. I kind
• 13:09
  of had those blinders on. Right. And that, you
• 13:13
  know, that I needed to think about that and
• 13:15
  experience it. It was one of the things. Marian
• 13:17
  Vincette was, um, one of the people involved in my
• 13:21
  onboarding as an. As an orden ordinance to go
• 13:25
  through the ordination process. And she kind of
• 13:27
  recognized that in my first few interviews, even
• 13:30
  still, after I had already accepted it, to say, I
• 13:33
  think I need you to go and work with, um, a female
• 13:36
  priest who's been a priest for a while and spend
• 13:39
  some time with them so that you get a better sense
• 13:42
  of envisioning yourself in that role. Um, and so
• 13:46
  that's what she did. I had the privilege of
• 13:48
  working with, uh, Reverend Dorothy Hewlett, who
• 13:51
  was just wonderful. Spent, you know, four months
• 13:53
  with her and just seeing how she was in that role
• 13:58
  as a priest, but as a female priest, what that
• 14:02
  kind of looked like, what she kind of worked
• 14:05
  against and what she had to bring to the table as
• 14:09
  that m. I learned a great deal from her about
• 14:13
  pastoral care. Watching her walk into a hospital
• 14:17
  room with a sick person, it wasn't just a sort of
• 14:21
  standing there very piously at the bedside, you
• 14:24
  know, reading this 23rd Psalm or something. She
• 14:27
  would walk right in, often, hug them. How are you?
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  Do you need anything? I watched her feed people
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  pudding because they weren't able to, you know,
• 14:37
  that, that, that was part of what she brought as a
• 14:41
  woman to ministry, I think, was that comfort and
• 14:45
  knees around offering that kind of stuff.
• 14:48
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Mhm.
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  >> Loren: Well, thanks for sharing that. Cathie, why don't
• 14:52
  you share and then, uh, we're welcoming in Tabitha
• 14:55
  here. Here in a moment.
• 14:57
  Or Tabitha, while you're getting dialed in,
• 14:59
  Cathie, why don't you share about how you feel?
• 15:02
  Um, any thoughts on that same question?
• 15:06
  >> Cathie Morgan: Because I've been at this a little bit longer. My
• 15:08
  early years in ministry looked a little different
• 15:10
  and what that process looked like was different.
• 15:12
  Um, I had the love and the support of my home
• 15:15
  parish, but that was a long time in coming because
• 15:18
  girls just didn't participate, you know, a little
• 15:20
  bit. It was a little country church and a little
• 15:22
  church and girls just didn't do stuff like that.
• 15:24
  Like you weren't allowed to be involved in certain
• 15:27
  things. Like there was a role for women and a role
• 15:29
  for men. And so that was also why this call to
• 15:32
  ministry was so strange because girls just didn't
• 15:34
  do that. I, um, know when I was early in the
• 15:37
  process, uh, I was, we were all required to jump
• 15:42
  through the same hoops. But the expectation is
• 15:44
  that the men needed full time jobs because they
• 15:47
  had a wife or a family to support. Well, I was
• 15:50
  married at the time and so I could do a halftime
• 15:53
  job or didn't need a job as urgently as some of
• 15:55
  the other ones. And in fact, for the first 10
• 15:57
  years of my ministry I was in part time positions
• 15:59
  because of that. So, uh, you know, some of that
• 16:03
  came with time and it certainly changed over time.
• 16:06
  But I think being a young woman in ministry was,
• 16:08
  uh, there were extra hurdles and there were a
• 16:10
  little higher hurdles at times. Just because it
• 16:12
  was still wouldn't say it was on the early edge of
• 16:15
  it because we've been doing it for almost 50 years
• 16:17
  now. But there were certainly still things, uh,
• 16:20
  kind of there were times when it was holding me
• 16:22
  back because I was a young women trying to go into
• 16:24
  ministry. Ordained full time rectorship ministry.
• 16:28
  Not a priest associate or a youth worker or.
• 16:31
  >> Loren: Yeah, yeah, yeah, thanks for sharing that. Let's
• 16:35
  welcome in Tabitha here.
• 16:36
  Tabitha. We're discussing kind of our folks's uh,
• 16:40
  call stories and then how you discern that call
• 16:43
  and then especially talk, talking about, uh, how
• 16:47
  that might have been more challenging or some
• 16:49
  additional hurdles you might have had to navigate
• 16:52
  as a, as a woman.
• 16:54
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Oh, wow. Uh, what a great question. So I've always
• 16:58
  been fortunate to be surrounded by, in ministry.
• 17:05
  Um, you know, when I, in my childhood we didn't
• 17:07
  really go to church and so professionally though,
• 17:15
  and I experienced a call to ministering. Uh, I
• 17:19
  started at a church who had a woman minister,
• 17:24
  director of children's education and the senior
• 17:26
  pastor was a woman. I'm fortunate to be in a
• 17:30
  denomination disabled place that is incredibly,
• 17:33
  uh, of women in the country. I am surrounded by
• 17:38
  colleagues that are women that have foster
• 17:42
  positions. Um, but I will say the church that I
• 17:46
  started at, um, attending in high school in our
• 17:52
  church, they had ordained women since. But good
• 17:58
  luck finding a woman as a pastor, uh, of anything,
• 18:05
  but maybe a children's pastor. And not that
• 18:08
  there's anything wrong with that because I adore
• 18:11
  our children's pastor. I think she's amazing. Uh,
• 18:14
  that was the limit. Be a pastor as long as you
• 18:18
  still supported a man's role. And the men were the
• 18:22
  senior pastors. Women could be youth pastors, they
• 18:26
  could be children's pastors, they could be
• 18:29
  chaplains and the denomination would ordain women,
• 18:35
  uh, without any trouble. But finding a church and
• 18:39
  being a senior pastor, I didn't know any women or
• 18:42
  senior pastors who preach on the regular. So it
• 18:48
  wasn't until I already felt a call to ministry and
• 18:52
  started working at a church that I experienced in
• 18:56
  those leadership positions. And honestly, since
• 19:00
  then as both the chaplain and as a congregational
• 19:03
  minister, I've been incredibly fortunate to face,
• 19:09
  um, where we have women clergy for years, so to
• 19:13
  speak. Absolutely delight and really enrich my
• 19:19
  experience. It's really challenged me better
• 19:23
  minister because I have all of these. One example
• 19:28
  in our denomination, the last two general
• 19:31
  ministers and president and women. Um, and so I'm
• 19:37
  in a strange position where church that formed me
• 19:42
  didn't have that. But the church that I moved as a
• 19:47
  professional has nurtured my call and.
• 20:02
  >> Loren: Yeah, yeah, awesome.
• 20:05
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah, I mean, thanks for sharing that it's great.
• 20:08
  And I've also been a chaplain in health care, of
• 20:11
  course, healthcare, you know, had a lot of women
• 20:16
  positions. I served in the military. That was
• 20:20
  mostly, I wasn't a chaplain. I, um, and so that
• 20:27
  maybe was a, ah, place where I experienced some
• 20:30
  um, in the nursery. Um, but even still it was,
• 20:37
  mhm. You know, basically I'm in a position where I
• 20:44
  am reaping benefits, had to fight and who had to
• 20:52
  struggle, um, who faced challenges. I'm.
• 21:08
  >> Loren: Yeah, yeah. Well thanks for sharing that. Martha.
• 21:12
  Why don't you jump in here, share about how you,
• 21:15
  how navigating that call experience for you as a
• 21:19
  woman was more or less challenging.
• 21:22
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, I mean I think that I was pretty naive
• 21:26
  actually in going into ministry because I like
• 21:30
  just was raised in a church where women in
• 21:33
  ministry seemed like a normal thing. Um, I, I have
• 21:39
  the interesting experience of being married to
• 21:42
  another Anglican priest and we were ordained about
• 21:46
  a year apart from one another. So Dan began in
• 21:49
  ministry about a year, year and a half before I
• 21:52
  did. But I think that was the real like wake up
• 21:56
  call for me was just seeing the authority that was
• 22:00
  granted to him when he walked into a room that was
• 22:06
  not accorded to me. My very first day on the job,
• 22:11
  um, at St. Jude's in Oakville as an assistant
• 22:15
  curate. Um, and I was wearing a collar and doing
• 22:19
  all of the things. But um, one of the women came
• 22:24
  up to me. We were hosting vacation Bible school
• 22:27
  and she came up to me and scolded me for taking
• 22:30
  the scissors. Like because she didn't realize that
• 22:35
  I was the new assistant curate. Like I was, she
• 22:39
  just thought I was a member of the youth group.
• 22:41
  Um, let me tell you, nobody ever scolded Dan for
• 22:45
  taking the scissors from the newsletter table at
• 22:50
  ah, his first parish. Right. Like, um, but there's
• 22:54
  an upside to that. Like there's an upside to
• 22:57
  having to earn your authority with people. I think
• 23:01
  Sheila, you kind of named it a bit in referencing
• 23:05
  our colleague Dorothy. Like there is a way in
• 23:09
  which you can be, um, easy with people. Um, that
• 23:14
  has a lot of upsides. And I think that you
• 23:18
  establish authority just by being a good leader.
• 23:23
  You know, you don't have to, you don't have to um,
• 23:28
  pull any punches or pull rank. Like uh, and people
• 23:33
  don't necessarily place you on a pedestal just
• 23:36
  because you wear a collar and have a title. If you
• 23:40
  want people to respect you, then you have to earn
• 23:43
  it. And that's I think actually a pretty good
• 23:46
  thing in ministry.
• 23:48
  >> Loren: So there's an interesting Dynamic here in that
• 23:52
  Martha, um, Sheila and Cathie all work within
• 23:56
  Canadian, uh, Anglican tradition. And then Tabitha
• 24:00
  and myself, Tabitha here on the panel work within
• 24:05
  the Christian Church of Christ. We don't wear. In
• 24:08
  our clergy tradition, we don't wear collars.
• 24:11
  So I'm curious, uh, Tavtha mentioned something
• 24:13
  already that I want to play off of. Uh, a, do you
• 24:18
  think, like, uh, having representation, having
• 24:22
  mentors, you could look to whether it was growing
• 24:24
  up or in your early form of ministry, was that
• 24:28
  helpful? And then B, like, do you think having
• 24:31
  that, like, symbolic authority of a caller or lack
• 24:34
  thereof would have been helpful or was not
• 24:37
  helpful? So, Cathie, why don't you start? And then
• 24:39
  Tabitha, you can. You can talk about, like,
• 24:42
  thoughts about call or lack thereof, I suppose.
• 24:48
  >> Cathie Morgan: Been some wonderful mentors. Um, Sheila mentioned
• 24:51
  Marian Vincent. I was a student with her when she
• 24:53
  was still in parish ministry and was one of my
• 24:55
  presenters at my ordination. And she had a
• 24:58
  beautiful way of just being authentically herself.
• 25:01
  And so as I was kind of trying to navigate a
• 25:04
  system that didn't quite know what to do with me,
• 25:06
  it was lovely to have that wonderful example of
• 25:09
  somebody just being 100 authentically who she was.
• 25:13
  And she could chair the meeting. She could go into
• 25:15
  the nursing home and untangle the wool while she
• 25:17
  visited and do everything in the middle. And so it
• 25:20
  was a lovely gift to see somebody who didn't try
• 25:23
  to fit into a mold or cookie cutter. Uh, she just
• 25:26
  was who she authentically is in ministry. And so
• 25:30
  it was. And she'd just been named archdeacon and
• 25:32
  so had some responsibility and just again, took
• 25:37
  that on as herself. She didn't again try to fit
• 25:39
  into any kind of a cookie cutter model and just
• 25:42
  kind of claimed her authority and modeled that
• 25:45
  authority and just modeled being authentic in the
• 25:47
  midst of that. And so that was a beautiful gift as
• 25:50
  a young student, trying to kind of define who I
• 25:52
  was and figure all this out. It was an absolute
• 25:55
  gift to have somebody like her to walk with for a
• 25:58
  period of time and to be inspired by her. She
• 26:00
  still, um, inspires all of us. I think I can say
• 26:03
  that quite clearly. The three of us who still have
• 26:06
  the opportunity to minister with her, um, that.
• 26:08
  That's a real gift. And I forget what the second
• 26:11
  part of the question was.
• 26:12
  >> Loren: Like the collar, do you think, like, having that
• 26:14
  kind of, like, external. I don't know what the
• 26:18
  word is. Like, do you think that helps?
• 26:19
  >> Cathie Morgan: It's a symbol. It's a symbol. It did help, um,
• 26:22
  because when I was first ordained, I had just
• 26:24
  turned 26 and I looked very young. And so to. At
• 26:28
  least. Even if people didn't always see that,
• 26:30
  like, I. Like a nice, full collar. So the nice
• 26:31
  round one, people thought I had a turtleneck on
• 26:33
  underneath something. So it didn't always work.
• 26:36
  >> Loren: Yeah.
• 26:36
  >> Cathie Morgan: Um, but, you know, it did help a little bit, and
• 26:39
  it was more helpful, I think, when I went into
• 26:41
  things like hospitals, um, it was an easy symbol.
• 26:44
  If you didn't always have your badge with you or
• 26:46
  even if you did, uh, um, it was helpful. Uh, I did
• 26:49
  a lot of funerals. There was a funeral home around
• 26:50
  the corner close to my first parish, did a lot of
• 26:53
  funerals. And so somebody they didn't know walking
• 26:55
  in. It was a symbol that people understood and
• 26:58
  recognized. And so, um, you know, I certainly. I
• 27:01
  used to joke. I used to have clerical pajamas. I
• 27:03
  wore them all the time when I was first ordained
• 27:05
  and now less so. But there are times when having
• 27:08
  that outward symbol and it. It kind of helps
• 27:10
  identify you, maybe if you're in somewhere that
• 27:12
  people don't know you or unfamiliar or need to be
• 27:15
  able to quickly spot who is the one that we need
• 27:18
  to turn to or connect with. And so, you know, I.
• 27:22
  And then when I go to somewhere new, I tend to
• 27:23
  wear it a lot for a little while, then I back off
• 27:25
  a little bit. But it was. Especially in the early
• 27:27
  days when I was. As I said, I looked very young as
• 27:29
  well. And so it was a handy symbol to have.
• 27:32
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah.
• 27:33
  >> Loren: Tav, how about you? Like, I'm. I'm just thinking,
• 27:35
  as Cathie was saying all that, like, I'm messing
• 27:37
  with my collar, because when I was, gosh, early
• 27:41
  30s, working my first solo pastorate, like, I wore
• 27:43
  a tie a lot because, again, I was working in the
• 27:46
  United Church of Christ tradition. Oh, we may have
• 27:49
  just lost Tabitha.
• 27:51
  >> Tabitha Johnson: We did.
• 27:51
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Yeah.
• 27:53
  >> Loren: Well, let's have this. Martha or Sheila, while
• 27:55
  she's getting back online, any thoughts on this,
• 27:58
  um, mentorship or representation or, you know,
• 28:04
  clerical callers?
• 28:06
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, I mean, I think that I, uh, would agree with
• 28:08
  Cathie. I felt like I really relied on the caller
• 28:12
  when I was first ordained. And, um, I found that
• 28:17
  less and less important. Important as. As I went
• 28:20
  on and just kind of established who I was in the
• 28:23
  community without needing it. Um, but, you know,
• 28:27
  statistically, like, we know that representation
• 28:32
  matters. We just. We know it. Like, we. Malcolm
• 28:36
  Gladwell has done really interesting research on
• 28:40
  how people are, um, judged when they're sort of
• 28:46
  the. The poster girl of, like, uh, women's
• 28:52
  advancement versus when there's a team of women
• 28:57
  who are in leadership together. And lo and behold,
• 29:01
  you know, you can be judged on your merits as a
• 29:04
  person and a leader, not as like a representation
• 29:07
  of an idea. Um, I think that, like, I think we're
• 29:14
  about 50 years into the ordination of women, um,
• 29:19
  in the Anglican Church of Canada, and yet our
• 29:22
  bishop right now is the first female bishop of
• 29:26
  Niagara, um, the archbishop of Canada, we call
• 29:31
  them the primate. Um, the person who just retired
• 29:36
  was the first female primate of Canada. Like, they
• 29:40
  are continuing to be those trailblazers who I
• 29:45
  think in a lot of ways get judged against a
• 29:49
  different, ah, set of principles that hopefully
• 29:53
  then paves the way for it to become just a
• 29:57
  normalized thing where you, you see women as
• 30:04
  people who are leading. And, um, and I certainly
• 30:11
  think I have been the benefactor. Is that right? I
• 30:16
  have benefited. I have benefited from, um, from
• 30:21
  the women who like, were sort of out there alone,
• 30:26
  um, in order to not feel so alone. And at the same
• 30:29
  time, I think I've had to do some things alone.
• 30:31
  Like when I was, um, when I was pregnant with my
• 30:35
  first child, there weren't other women in the
• 30:39
  church in this part of the world who were trying
• 30:42
  to lead churches and have babies. Like, Cathie was
• 30:46
  a number of years ahead of me on that, and I sort
• 30:50
  of felt like I was by myself in that experience.
• 30:55
  Um, and I had to navigate what that looked like.
• 31:02
  And hopefully each of the little things that we
• 31:05
  navigate will make it less lonely for the women
• 31:08
  who come after us.
• 31:10
  >> Loren: Well, let's come. Let's explore that idea of
• 31:13
  sacrifices that a woman had to make that a man
• 31:16
  might not have to make. But before we do, we got
• 31:19
  Tabitha back.
• 31:19
  Tabitha, we're talking about kind of those
• 31:22
  external representations. Like, did you, when you
• 31:25
  were new in ministry, did you wear anything extra?
• 31:27
  Like, I was explaining, like, I would wear a tie
• 31:31
  when I was young in ministry at a solo pastor,
• 31:33
  just because, like, I wanted to try to like, look
• 31:35
  the part for my much older congregation.
• 31:40
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Well, you, uh, know, we were talking about having
• 31:43
  a collar and things like that and our, you know,
• 31:46
  tradition, uh, bear collars. I have a couple of
• 31:51
  women colleagues who do bear a collar for
• 31:53
  precisely that region to go back. I, I haven't
• 32:05
  done that. And, um, you know, I think in some ways
• 32:08
  it would have made things a little bit because I,
• 32:11
  I have a face where I looked much younger than
• 32:13
  what I was. And so I, I would often end to where
• 32:21
  maybe age isn't to, uh, be automatically be a
• 32:29
  force. And I do think that that external
• 32:35
  representation with that I have kind of A little
• 32:43
  bit of maybe, ah, maybe not quite forceful
• 32:47
  presence. But you certainly, um, tend to know who
• 32:54
  I am pretty quickly. Um, so that, that is
• 33:00
  something that if I could go back and change
• 33:02
  things, it might be something that I would utilize
• 33:04
  to make it a little bit easier. You know, when I
• 33:06
  was in cp, my chaplain training, that's something
• 33:09
  that I quite a bit is claiming my authority as
• 33:13
  said.
• 33:14
  >> Loren: Yeah.
• 33:17
  >> Tabitha Johnson: You know, not just in a hospital room, but that,
• 33:19
  that, uh, certainly helped me have gone back
• 33:25
  parish ministry. Um, yeah. Certainly not a tie,
• 33:31
  though.
• 33:37
  >> Loren: Sheila, let's start with you on this. Like, Martha
• 33:41
  brought it up. I'm sure you've all talked about it
• 33:43
  to some extent already. I mean, Cathie, you
• 33:46
  mentioned the idea of like, being expected to take
• 33:49
  like a halftime call. Sheila, do you want to start
• 33:52
  with sacrifices that you've had to make or perhaps
• 33:55
  you've seen others have to make, other women have
• 33:57
  to make that a man would not have to make?
• 34:01
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Yeah, I think for myself, um, because I'm not
• 34:05
  married and I didn't have kids, so I didn't have
• 34:09
  to do that. But. And I mean, Martha, a, uh, bit
• 34:13
  with your kids, but they were already a bit older.
• 34:15
  I have colleagues that have young kids, and I do
• 34:20
  see this struggle that when I look at other male
• 34:24
  colleagues with kids of the same age, I don't see
• 34:27
  that same kind of struggle happening. So the worry
• 34:33
  about taking time off and how they will be
• 34:36
  perceived and whether that will be kind of a black
• 34:40
  mark against them because my child is sick and I
• 34:43
  have to take another day off because. And I think
• 34:46
  that that's not just in ministry, I gotta be
• 34:48
  honest. I think that's across the board in the
• 34:50
  industry. It's really kind of sad in this day and
• 34:53
  age that still goes on that, you know, this whole
• 34:58
  sense that you're not supposed to have both, or if
• 35:02
  you do both, you're supposed to be somehow perfect
• 35:04
  and your children never get sick and you're
• 35:06
  wonderful. So I have seen that happen, um, for
• 35:09
  other people, um, other colleagues, uh, within
• 35:13
  ministry and without, I would say, um, I think,
• 35:17
  you know, for myself, um, I think so. Interesting.
• 35:22
  It kind of does tie in with the whole collar
• 35:24
  thing.
• 35:25
  >> Loren: Yeah.
• 35:25
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: So I don't wear one very often because I was
• 35:28
  raised in a tradition where you're right, the
• 35:30
  minister wore a tie and even that, not all the
• 35:34
  time. Right. So not kind of seeing that. And being
• 35:37
  somebody who always liked fashion growing up and
• 35:40
  so. And was very individual of my fashion, I
• 35:43
  actually did wear ties and bow ties in high
• 35:46
  school. Yeah. It was all of that bag of potato
• 35:48
  chips. So at least I thought. But, but uh, as
• 35:52
  someone who liked to express yourself in how they
• 35:55
  dressed, I'm like, you want me to wear what with
• 35:58
  what? Like, and the, the, the lack of femininity.
• 36:02
  In fact, I even. And I was interested by the
• 36:04
  response. I just said to somebody that I have a
• 36:07
  dress that I quite love, but it's very, it's
• 36:10
  longer and it's very floral. It's basically
• 36:12
  sunflowers and flowers all over it. It's very
• 36:15
  feminine. And I said, you know, I've never worn
• 36:18
  this to work to church on a Sunday because I don't
• 36:23
  know that it sends the right message. And it made
• 36:26
  me think so, like, what message should I be
• 36:29
  sending? Or doesn't it send? Or is that just in my
• 36:32
  head? And they kind of looked at me. Now it was
• 36:34
  another woman, but she's like, uh. She kind of
• 36:37
  didn't get even what I was saying. She's like, why
• 36:38
  didn't you just wear it? I'm like, well, isn't
• 36:41
  that interesting? Like, do I. Even if I don't wear
• 36:45
  the collar and I don't wear mine very often. I am
• 36:48
  also a woman of a certain age who deals with hot
• 36:51
  flashes on a regular, ongoing basis. Wearing a
• 36:54
  shirt like this does not help that. So I think
• 36:57
  that that was one of the things that I kind of,
• 37:00
  ah, as trivial as it sounds, but in some ways it
• 37:04
  was. I felt part of my own expression of who I was
• 37:09
  was being taken m away a bit from it. And it's why
• 37:12
  I've never. I do wear them, uh, like Cathie says,
• 37:16
  it is very handy. Funerals, hospital visits, all
• 37:19
  that. People know who you are, they know why
• 37:21
  you're there and what you're doing. And that's
• 37:24
  really important. So I definitely do that. But I
• 37:27
  found more often than not if I wore it outside of
• 37:30
  church, you just get odd looks. And the best is
• 37:34
  being in a Catholic hospital.
• 37:36
  >> Loren: Yes.
• 37:37
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: And that was one time in an elevator with three
• 37:40
  adorable little Italian nona grandmothers who you
• 37:43
  could just see never spoke a word of English, but
• 37:46
  were looking and talking and looking and talking.
• 37:49
  And I thought, oh yeah, honey, you just gotta be
• 37:51
  in the Anglican Church, that it's okay. Also the
• 37:54
  number of times people see me in that and ask if
• 37:57
  I'm Catholic. At which point I realized we're
• 38:00
  doing a very poor job educationally, uh, about the
• 38:03
  different denominations in the world with everyone
• 38:05
  across the country. But yeah, as, as funny as that
• 38:08
  sounds, there. There was that sense that I Felt
• 38:11
  with that I had to give up a little of who I was
• 38:14
  and that then I just wouldn't.
• 38:16
  >> Loren: So, Cathie, let me ask you a question. Kind of
• 38:20
  playing off what Sheila just said here. I mean, if
• 38:23
  you want to respond to the whole sacrifices thing
• 38:25
  too, and working part time, that's fine. But I'm
• 38:27
  like, this is again, like something that I. I
• 38:31
  mean, I've had people compliment my suit, but I've
• 38:33
  never been like, if I'm wearing a. I was wearing a
• 38:35
  suit, but I've never had somebody be like, oh,
• 38:37
  Loren should be really wearing that to church.
• 38:44
  >> Cathie Morgan: Uh, I wore a lot of suits because that was kind of
• 38:46
  the thing. You wore suits with your clergy collar,
• 38:48
  um, or kind of a dress shirt, Like a shirt. So,
• 38:51
  not to mention, my mother occasionally commented
• 38:54
  that you're at the minister and you're wearing a
• 38:55
  skirt above your knees. It wasn't that far above
• 38:58
  my knees, but she was horrified. The first time I
• 39:00
  went to talk to the bishop about a call to
• 39:02
  ministry, you wore a mini skirt to talk to the
• 39:05
  bishop. Like, she was just horrified. And again,
• 39:07
  it was like an inch. It was not well above my
• 39:09
  knees. It was an inch above my knees when I sat
• 39:12
  down. Um, no, not very often. Uh, sometimes you
• 39:15
  had to think what you were doing or where you
• 39:17
  were, because I'm just, you know, my first church,
• 39:19
  it was a little country church, and, um, you might
• 39:21
  have to shovel snow before, help clear the
• 39:23
  sidewalk before the first service, because if I
• 39:25
  didn't do it, the 85 year old with a bad heart
• 39:27
  would.
• 39:27
  >> Loren: Right.
• 39:28
  >> Cathie Morgan: So you had to think of, what can I wear? So that
• 39:31
  if I needed to do that, I was prepared. So, you
• 39:34
  know, you wore your heels. Your heels were in a
• 39:36
  bag and you wore your, your warm boots or your,
• 39:38
  your flat shoes or, or whatever. But, uh, no,
• 39:41
  there hasn't been too much. Sometimes people would
• 39:43
  comment. I got a lot of comments when I was
• 39:45
  pregnant about, uh, the baby and the. Oh, you're
• 39:49
  so much bigger than we saw you last Sunday. Thank
• 39:51
  you. Thank you very much. That was a bigger issue.
• 39:56
  There were more kind of comments about what I was.
• 39:57
  Oh, that's so cute you found something to wear
• 39:59
  with your collar. Um, but there was more comments,
• 40:02
  I think, when I was pregnant and more padding of
• 40:04
  the belly. Oh, the back door. Shake your hand, pat
• 40:07
  the belly, walk out. Shake your hand, pat belly,
• 40:09
  walk out.
• 40:10
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Sorry to bug you. Is there actually maternity
• 40:13
  collar shirts?
• 40:14
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Well, my, uh, mom made me one like I. Because I
• 40:18
  couldn't find one.
• 40:19
  >> Cathie Morgan: They laughed at me when I Asked about that when I
• 40:21
  was pregnant, so.
• 40:23
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Right.
• 40:24
  >> Tabitha Johnson: No.
• 40:26
  >> Loren: See, And I feel like we're getting in some good
• 40:28
  stuff here. I mean, not good stuff, but the real
• 40:31
  meat of this conversation. Right? Like this, uh,
• 40:35
  this kind of, like, I don't know, policing or. Or
• 40:37
  control or. I can't think the right word of
• 40:40
  access, maybe that's the word, uh, to women's
• 40:43
  bodies, I suppose.
• 40:44
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Tab.
• 40:45
  >> Loren: Do you want to jump in here with anything? And
• 40:46
  then.
• 40:46
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Martha, I. I do, because what I was sitting here
• 40:50
  thinking is, um, I can't wear anything too sexy.
• 40:56
  You know, I think about that when I buy clothes.
• 40:59
  You know, we're in a tradition where we have a
• 41:02
  robe and we have a stole, and so I can wear those
• 41:05
  on Sunday. I happen to be in a church right now
• 41:09
  where I don't robe, uh, and I don't use my stole.
• 41:14
  Throughout my career, I have thought, can I wear
• 41:17
  this on Sunday? Can I preach in this? Is this
• 41:20
  appropriate to preach in? Is this too sexy to
• 41:23
  preach in? And, um, I would imagine that probably
• 41:28
  our male counterparts don't think about, is this
• 41:32
  too sexy? Am I going to get comments about this?
• 41:36
  Does this. Does this, uh, neckline go too low? Uh,
• 41:41
  are the sleeves too high? Is the, uh, skirt too
• 41:44
  short? You know, Now, I often preach in Jeep, but
• 41:48
  I still think too tight.
• 41:50
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, I actually have.
• 41:54
  >> Tabitha Johnson: And I don't think the, you know.
• 41:57
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Public commentary m. My clothing, my clothing.
• 42:01
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Choices, um, and years ago, pretty astonishing.
• 42:07
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Over the course of a couple of decades. And, you
• 42:11
  know, I've said it a few times already in this
• 42:13
  podcast, but I went into all of this so naively,
• 42:16
  and I, I have been really surprised by the
• 42:21
  permission that people often feel to. To make
• 42:24
  comments on. On your weight, on your silhouette,
• 42:28
  on the shortness of your skirt, on, um, uh, like,
• 42:33
  before I got pregnant, people guessing if I might
• 42:37
  be pregnant. Um, the, you know, we started this
• 42:41
  conversation around sacrifice and like, I don't
• 42:44
  want to sound like I'm sour grape scene at all,
• 42:47
  because their ministry has been full of joy and
• 42:50
  blessing. And I believe that I have experienced
• 42:55
  wonderful things as a woman, specifically in
• 42:58
  ministry. But, um, but, yeah, like, I had to deal
• 43:03
  with maternity leave policies that, like, weren't,
• 43:08
  um, up to date. And so when I got pregnant, like,
• 43:13
  in two different dioceses, there was no maternity
• 43:16
  leave policy in place that could help me. And I
• 43:19
  was just at the mercy of my local congregation in
• 43:22
  both cases, which were extremely generous to,
• 43:26
  like, help me navigate that for my new family. Um,
• 43:30
  I got told that I wasn't. I didn't have enough
• 43:35
  experience for jobs that then went to men who had
• 43:40
  less or the same amount of experience that I had.
• 43:43
  And, like, the Anglican Church is a pretty, um,
• 43:47
  closed circle. And I would hear whispers in back
• 43:50
  rooms. Well, they didn't want to hire you because
• 43:53
  they were worried you were going to get pregnant
• 43:55
  and need a maternity leave. And, like, you know,
• 44:01
  the. The each of those, like, realities that I've,
• 44:07
  um, hit up against have been shocking in their own
• 44:11
  way, because I just wasn't anticipating that kind
• 44:16
  of thing going into it. And, um. And I think that
• 44:21
  as Tabitha was sort of getting at, like, I don't
• 44:25
  think that men worry about whether somebody's
• 44:29
  gonna think that they look too sexy.
• 44:32
  >> Loren: No.
• 44:33
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: I will say the one thing that I have found talking
• 44:35
  to male, and it wasn't an Anglican church. I can't
• 44:41
  remember the denomination was summerwear. Like, if
• 44:45
  they chose to, you know, be in jeans, you know,
• 44:49
  even, like, during a work week, if they weren't,
• 44:52
  like, is, I wear jeans, nobody comments on me. But
• 44:56
  I've talked to male pastors who said that. Or
• 44:59
  shorts in the summer, like, gone.
• 45:00
  >> Cathie Morgan: The pastor, in short, interesting.
• 45:02
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Like, it's cut. But, I mean, you're right, it's
• 45:04
  much less than what we do.
• 45:09
  I would say the one thing as I am still single is.
• 45:12
  Is dating is very interesting. When you are an
• 45:16
  ordained, if you're a guy, you are, like, you're
• 45:20
  desirable because women and other men, depending
• 45:25
  on your sexual preference, um, think that, you
• 45:28
  know, you're in a stable job, you're somebody who
• 45:31
  is, you know, faithful as a Christian, um, is
• 45:35
  giving, is loving. But when you're a woman and you
• 45:38
  are a minister, you're weird. Thank you. And, I
• 45:42
  mean, I am anyways. But let's be honest.
• 45:45
  >> Martha Tatarnic: I didn't mean you specifically, but it is.
• 45:48
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: They don't know what to do with it because you are
• 45:51
  in a leadership role, which they're not so sure
• 45:55
  about. And what does that mean? And how Christian
• 45:59
  are you going to be? And I don't know that men,
• 46:02
  when they date, when they are ordained, if they
• 46:04
  run into that same.
• 46:06
  >> Martha Tatarnic: That's interesting. Yeah.
• 46:07
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Idea, right?
• 46:09
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah.
• 46:10
  >> Loren: Yeah. Uh, I can't say I've had to navigate that,
• 46:13
  thankfully. Cathie, anything from this
• 46:17
  conversation that you want to respond to here?
• 46:20
  >> Cathie Morgan: No, it's just. It's interesting that we're not
• 46:22
  that far apart in ministry and how long we've been
• 46:25
  ordained and engaged in the church. And yet it's
• 46:27
  interesting to see how far we've come in such a
• 46:29
  very short period of Time, um, that Sheila's
• 46:32
  experience just a couple years after Martha and a
• 46:34
  couple years after me was so different. Um, and
• 46:37
  good. And different in a good way. Different, but
• 46:39
  yet some things haven't changed. Yeah, I did a
• 46:42
  funeral where most of the family was Catholic when
• 46:44
  I was pregnant, and they just. It just blew their
• 46:47
  poor heads because they could kind of wrap their
• 46:49
  head around a female cleric. But I was like seven
• 46:52
  and a half months pregnant doing the funeral, and
• 46:55
  they're just like, just one M. Thing too many to
• 46:57
  try and get your head around. Um, yeah, yeah, but
• 47:02
  as I said, it's, It's. It's interesting. I think
• 47:04
  some things, like I've known male colleagues who
• 47:06
  get comments about their hair or facial hair,
• 47:08
  maybe not about what they're wearing, but, you
• 47:10
  know, that beard looks a little scruffy. It
• 47:11
  should. Maybe it's time to shave it off or shape
• 47:13
  it up a little bit or, you know, looks like you're
• 47:15
  getting close to a haircut time. There's been
• 47:16
  comments like that, less about what they're
• 47:18
  wearing, but have certainly heard them kind of
• 47:20
  comments that they do get, those kinds of
• 47:22
  comments, which is different. But. Yeah, but
• 47:25
  again, it's not. None of us are. Are walking away
• 47:27
  unscathed. I did shave. You feel entitled today.
• 47:30
  >> Loren: So.
• 47:31
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, thanks, Loren. Yeah, noted.
• 47:34
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah.
• 47:35
  >> Loren: Well, um, Cathie, since you're hinting at it here,
• 47:38
  let's. Let's talk about that. Where do you see the
• 47:41
  most progress for women in the ministry today? And
• 47:44
  where do you think change is still needed?
• 47:50
  >> Cathie Morgan: Oh, my goodness. Um, I think there has. There has
• 47:53
  been a lot of change in that people are journeying
• 47:56
  into ministry. Like both Martha and I came in as
• 47:58
  young women, did this kind of straight through,
• 48:00
  did our undergraduates, did our master's degree
• 48:02
  and went into ministry. I think there's a lot more
• 48:04
  information for folks to come in when it makes
• 48:06
  sense for them. Lots of folks maybe weren't able
• 48:08
  to do the schooling or were, uh, fought the call a
• 48:12
  little longer than she and I did. And so folks are
• 48:14
  coming to ministry with a lot of life experience
• 48:17
  again, bringing who they are and I think are
• 48:19
  welcomed and received, uh, wonderfully. Last, um,
• 48:22
  couple of ordinations, we've had more women than
• 48:25
  men ordained the last couple of ordinations that
• 48:28
  we've done here in the church. And Martha and I
• 48:30
  are both part of the candidates committee process.
• 48:32
  And I think we see more women in that process than
• 48:34
  men.
• 48:36
  >> Martha Tatarnic: A lot of times in waves, though, like, there are
• 48:39
  still waves where, like, we don't see a woman in
• 48:43
  those Interviews for like a couple of years. Like
• 48:47
  I, uh, comes and goes, you know, Like I, and I
• 48:52
  know I've been part of another diocese where we
• 48:56
  really had to make a concerted effort to just
• 48:59
  plant those seeds for women. Because you have to
• 49:03
  be intentional. I think about it in a way that um,
• 49:06
  maybe we don't always realize because again, we
• 49:11
  kind of get used to the idea that women can do
• 49:13
  these things. But we, we do have to keep being
• 49:19
  intentional about making sure that that is a
• 49:22
  narrative that women actually see as possible.
• 49:25
  Sorry, Cathie.
• 49:26
  >> Cathie Morgan: Uh, that's okay.
• 49:26
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Didn't mean to interrupt.
• 49:28
  >> Cathie Morgan: No, that's quite all right.
• 49:29
  All right. But as I said, we've, we've seen folks
• 49:31
  kind of come into ministry and bring who they are.
• 49:33
  Again, they're not fitting in some sort of cookie
• 49:35
  cutter mold about what clergy should or shouldn't
• 49:37
  be like. Because I think there was some pressure
• 49:39
  that you could be women in ministry as long as you
• 49:41
  kind of look like, kind of did it like how the men
• 49:43
  did it.
• 49:44
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah.
• 49:44
  >> Cathie Morgan: Or tried to do that as much as possible. That was
• 49:47
  kind of your way in. You could be a woman in
• 49:48
  ministry, but you to kind of try to do it as much
• 49:51
  like the guys as you could. And I, I certainly see
• 49:54
  that, um, that pressure being taken off and, and
• 49:58
  the guys too, like people in ministry bring who
• 50:00
  they are and there's not cookie cutters either.
• 50:02
  Um, I think there's a diversity in that. I think
• 50:05
  we still need some equity. Uh, you know, you still
• 50:08
  oftentimes, if there are part time ministries,
• 50:10
  it's women being ex, Leading them, being expected
• 50:13
  to take them regardless of what their situation is
• 50:15
  at home. You still see women kind of accepting
• 50:18
  those kinds of roles and not pushing for a full
• 50:20
  time or um, some of those bigger parishes. Um,
• 50:23
  Martha has one of the large kind of quote unquote,
• 50:27
  cardinal parishes in the diocese. Um, but that's
• 50:30
  not been reflected in some of the other large
• 50:32
  parishes. Um, many of us, I'm quite happy in the
• 50:35
  parishes that I'm in, but it should be a person's
• 50:39
  choice about what kind of ministry they feel
• 50:41
  called to. And you still see, um, and not just in
• 50:45
  our diocese, but in other dioceses as well. Like
• 50:47
  there's still that stained glass ceiling. People
• 50:49
  can, can go so far and, and you, you see some
• 50:52
  exceptions, but for the most part it's still men
• 50:55
  in a lot of those traditional kind of big
• 50:57
  parishes. Um, I kind of wish they could see what
• 51:01
  you've done in, at St. George's and, and the
• 51:03
  ministry and the way that's changed and evolved
• 51:06
  over the years to realize that it's, it's a good
• 51:08
  thing to kind of open up understanding of what
• 51:11
  ministry could look like. Because I think the, uh,
• 51:13
  ministry that St. George's has now is very
• 51:15
  different than it did 10 or 15 years ago. And
• 51:17
  that's a good thing, that everything continues to
• 51:19
  change and evolve, that we bring who we are to
• 51:21
  ministry and so to find ways, because it's, it's
• 51:25
  tough. A lot of. And a lot of the women who are in
• 51:27
  process are having to do this part time because
• 51:29
  they still have families at home where they're
• 51:30
  still supporting, uh, supporting the family
• 51:33
  income. And it's hard. And so it's taking them a
• 51:35
  lot longer because they're having to do this part
• 51:36
  time as well.
• 51:38
  >> Loren: Yeah. Sheila, anything to add there?
• 51:41
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Yeah, uh, like I would say that oftentimes women
• 51:44
  do come in a little bit later after they've raised
• 51:47
  their family because they may have heard a call at
• 51:50
  some point. But you're right, either the trying to
• 51:52
  get back to school thing doesn't work, or taking
• 51:55
  the time off or, you know, just family
• 51:58
  responsibilities means that they do go into it a
• 52:01
  little bit later. I would say that, uh. Yeah, you
• 52:04
  definitely, you definitely do see that happening a
• 52:07
  little bit. But yeah, at the same time, I would
• 52:09
  say, interestingly enough, both of the churches
• 52:12
  that I have been a rector at, I think they
• 52:16
  purposely hired me because I'm a woman, because
• 52:20
  they had had females in leadership, one of them
• 52:23
  for a long time. In fact, I don't think they can
• 52:26
  really remember what it was like having a guy in
• 52:28
  charge. And so, you know, and I think that's
• 52:31
  important. Important then because I think part of
• 52:33
  it isn't just the leadership of the diocese of the
• 52:37
  church. It is the people in the pews. Right. It is
• 52:41
  helping them. Because I know other churches that
• 52:43
  would, yeah, really struggle with, still at this
• 52:47
  day and age, having a woman. They do it. But there
• 52:49
  would be. They'd have a few more struggles.
• 52:52
  Whereas, you know, I was really blessed in the
• 52:55
  churches that I was in that they had had, yeah,
• 52:58
  great women in leadership for a long time who led
• 53:00
  them extremely well and created just phenomenal
• 53:05
  environments, did so much around things that,
• 53:07
  yeah, they were, um, more than happy to, uh, have
• 53:11
  another woman come in.
• 53:13
  >> Loren: Yeah.
• 53:14
  Well, I gotta ask one more hard question here, and
• 53:16
  I suppose it's hard because I'm kind of nervous to
• 53:20
  hear the answers. So what impact have male
• 53:25
  colleagues had on your journey in ministry? And
• 53:28
  how can men be stronger allies? So, um, Martha,
• 53:33
  you want to go that first?
• 53:36
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Um, I've been really lucky to um, have a lot of
• 53:43
  really great male colleagues who openly define as
• 53:46
  feminists. I've had a number of male colleagues
• 53:51
  and associates here at St. George's um, you know,
• 53:55
  people who essentially report to me. I mean my
• 54:00
  current colleague, um, is a co rector, but my
• 54:04
  previous male colleagues reported to me. And um,
• 54:08
  and they made a really like. They were extremely
• 54:12
  clear about being happy about that. And um, they
• 54:17
  were extremely clear in their messaging to the
• 54:20
  congregation and to people who might be um,
• 54:24
  tempted to come to them thinking that they were
• 54:27
  the person in authority to say actually she's the
• 54:29
  boss. Um, and, and like kind of delight in that
• 54:34
  because they were people who were just fiercely
• 54:37
  ah, committed to feminism, um, in just a really
• 54:44
  like natural sort of way. It was, it's been really
• 54:48
  lovely. And, and I think that that does make a big
• 54:53
  difference. I think that um, I think that's what
• 54:57
  male colleagues can do as allies. I will say that.
• 55:02
  And I think it takes a while to move this dial. I
• 55:04
  think that um, the Anglican Church of Canada as a
• 55:09
  whole is probably still locked a little bit in
• 55:11
  tokenism, um, in sort of electing women to
• 55:17
  positions of higher power in the church or you
• 55:21
  know, having women in um, different places of
• 55:25
  authority in the church and then patting
• 55:26
  themselves on the back and thinking that the job
• 55:29
  of uh, equality is accomplished and it's not like
• 55:36
  it is an ongoing uh, sort of um, need to again
• 55:46
  insist that women get to be um, leaders and get to
• 55:52
  be judged as leaders as people and as people who
• 55:56
  bring um, their own unique set of gifts to the
• 56:01
  table as people. Um, like don't assume that just
• 56:06
  because it's a woman that therefore they're
• 56:10
  maternal and nurturing and you know, going to be a
• 56:14
  certain kind of leader. I know lots of hard
• 56:17
  headed, calculating um, women who uh, which is
• 56:22
  great. Like you know, there's not like one way of
• 56:26
  being a female leader. There's not just one soft,
• 56:30
  gentle way of being a female leader. Uh, so I
• 56:33
  think the more that men can just be on board with
• 56:37
  recognizing who we are as people, the more that
• 56:40
  we're going to get past that tokenism.
• 56:43
  >> Loren: Yeah. Cathie, how about you?
• 56:47
  >> Cathie Morgan: It has come a long way. There have been some
• 56:49
  wonderful male colleagues that I worked with,
• 56:51
  whether it was my rector when I was a curate, kind
• 56:54
  of making sure that I wasn't seen as less than,
• 56:57
  that we were equals and that there were
• 56:59
  opportunities given to me because I was the curate
• 57:02
  that needed those opportunities. Not just because
• 57:04
  I was the new young curate. Um, and there were
• 57:08
  occasions and I didn't mind if somebody needed a
• 57:10
  token female at the table. I was quite happy to be
• 57:12
  there because there weren't very many of us around
• 57:14
  it those days, but to make sure they were making
• 57:16
  sure that we were represented. So when there was
• 57:18
  a, uh, diocesan service like it in those early
• 57:21
  days, it was a little bit of tokenism. But I, you
• 57:23
  know, I do it because we needed to see it, we
• 57:24
  needed to be a part of it, and we needed to see
• 57:26
  it.
• 57:27
  >> Martha Tatarnic: That's true.
• 57:27
  >> Cathie Morgan: And some of that became less than. Like, it's.
• 57:29
  It's not as necessary because there's enough women
• 57:33
  in ministry that they, you know, we need six
• 57:35
  people to do a service, and here are the six
• 57:36
  people.
• 57:36
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Who are doing it.
• 57:38
  >> Cathie Morgan: Um. Uh, so I think more and more of that have had
• 57:41
  some. I've worked with. I, uh, was original dean,
• 57:43
  which means you kind of chair some local clergy
• 57:46
  meetings. I worked very well with the male
• 57:48
  archdeacons, and we kind of divvied up. These are
• 57:50
  your skills, These are mine. And there was a total
• 57:52
  respect for what I could bring to the table and
• 57:54
  what they needed from that role. And so it's been
• 57:58
  lovely. And I think people were less concerned in
• 58:01
  the early days. Like, we have to watch what we say
• 58:03
  now. No, you just treat everybody with the dignity
• 58:05
  and respect and mind your P's and Q's. Um, it
• 58:09
  doesn't matter whether it's me or your experienced
• 58:12
  male cleric. So I think a lot in those early days,
• 58:14
  there were folks who kind of made sure we were
• 58:16
  pushed a little bit to the front to make sure we
• 58:18
  were seen and included. And I think that's less
• 58:20
  and less necessary. Um, in Niagara, anyway. Um,
• 58:24
  there are other places where you still need. You
• 58:26
  need that. A little bit of that tokenism, because
• 58:29
  that. That sense of, of course they've got gifts
• 58:31
  to bring to the table. Of course we'd include
• 58:33
  them. Of course we'd ask. Isn't the default, um,
• 58:36
  you know, when we see that, especially when you're
• 58:38
  doing stuff, uh, when you have opportunities to do
• 58:40
  stuff on a national level. I am always very
• 58:42
  grateful for the diocese that I work in and for
• 58:45
  the way that what I bring to the table is
• 58:46
  respected and valued. Because I still see that in
• 58:49
  colleagues that. That is not the case. Female
• 58:52
  colleagues, if that is not the case. So there's.
• 58:53
  There's work to work to be done. Um, but it's come
• 58:57
  a long way from where it was.
• 58:59
  >> Loren: Yeah.
• 59:00
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah.
• 59:01
  >> Loren: Thanks for sharing that.
• 59:02
  Uh, Sheila, how about. How about you?
• 59:05
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Yeah. Ah, I have been, uh. Actually, uh, I have
• 59:08
  found the male colleagues, um, since I've been
• 59:12
  ordained pretty much across the board. Really.
• 59:16
  Good. Very. And so I worked in the retail sector
• 59:20
  and including in management for many years before
• 59:24
  I got here. And that was a nightmare there. I was
• 59:28
  not treated in any way, shape or form as though I
• 59:32
  had a brain, as though I had anything to
• 59:34
  contribute. In fact, the last job I had, where I
• 59:36
  was manager, I was eventually let go for no
• 59:40
  reason, which means they offered me a lot of
• 59:42
  money. And I had already decided I wanted to go
• 59:44
  into the ministry. So I was good with that. So
• 59:46
  they hired another guy right after me, who was a
• 59:48
  man, um, and then sadly, he died about five years
• 59:52
  later, and they discovered he'd been bilking them
• 59:54
  for tens of thousands of dollars for years. And I
• 59:57
  thought, well, isn't it a good thing you hired a
• 1:00:00
  guy? Because that's. But I would say that, um, in
• 1:00:04
  our diocese, and I have colleagues in other
• 1:00:09
  dioceses, and yeah, sometimes there is definite
• 1:00:14
  struggles, and I've. I've colleagues who are, like
• 1:00:16
  me, archdeacons, so they're middle management, um,
• 1:00:20
  who still struggle with some of the male
• 1:00:23
  colleagues that they have, I think. But I. I find
• 1:00:26
  I was ordained with two other, um, male clerics,
• 1:00:30
  and we are friends this day. They have my back
• 1:00:33
  110%. I think they're great for that. I think that
• 1:00:38
  tokenism does need to go out the door. I think
• 1:00:41
  that our. Our bishop, being a woman, I think
• 1:00:44
  having her in, uh, in the House of Bishops, which
• 1:00:48
  is all the bishops from across Canada getting
• 1:00:50
  together, she is a very strong voice for that, for
• 1:00:54
  being a leader, for somebody who has ideas, who
• 1:00:56
  takes on, um, roles in leadership. And I think
• 1:01:00
  that that has been a very good thing for the House
• 1:01:04
  of Bishops as a whole to kind of take note of and
• 1:01:08
  to start to make sure. Because it is predominantly
• 1:01:11
  male.
• 1:01:12
  >> Loren: Yeah.
• 1:01:13
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Like decidedly dominantly male. So we need more
• 1:01:17
  female voices up in that. Up in that, uh, level
• 1:01:22
  to, uh, to continue.
• 1:01:24
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Yeah.
• 1:01:24
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: The important work. And I think, you know that
• 1:01:27
  there are, um. Yeah, there. There are always going
• 1:01:30
  to be some men who are either intimidated by you
• 1:01:35
  or just don't know how to deal with you. But I
• 1:01:38
  think for the most, what I've noticed in Niagara
• 1:01:41
  is that they're. They're pretty good. They're
• 1:01:43
  solidly on board with women in ministry and in
• 1:01:46
  leadership and see us as being a huge asset. In no
• 1:01:50
  way. They see us other ways.
• 1:01:57
  >> Loren: And I'm looking at the time and for sake of time,
• 1:02:00
  we should roll on into some. Some closing
• 1:02:02
  questions here.
• 1:02:03
  Let me. Let me take a moment. Just to reintroduce
• 1:02:07
  for our guests who are. Who we're talking to. We
• 1:02:10
  have the Venerable Sheila Van Zandwyck. I just
• 1:02:14
  want to say the venerable.
• 1:02:15
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Again, frankly, Sheila, I wanted on a T shirt. I
• 1:02:19
  haven't been able to get that yet.
• 1:02:20
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Ah, yeah, you should.
• 1:02:22
  >> Loren: Uh, we have the Reverend to. Cannon, Kate. Oh, my
• 1:02:25
  goodness. The Reverend Cannon. Catherine Morgan.
• 1:02:27
  It's the cut and the cut going together that's
• 1:02:29
  killing me. So my apologies. We have the Reverend
• 1:02:33
  Canon Martha Chitarnik, and unfortunately, due to
• 1:02:36
  technical errors, no longer with us, the Reverend
• 1:02:38
  Tabitha Johnson, who has been with us in spirit.
• 1:02:41
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, I'm sure she's with us in spirit.
• 1:02:43
  >> Loren: Yeah, she's with us in spirit. So, uh, these
• 1:02:45
  closing questions that are loosely based on our
• 1:02:48
  regular set of closing questions, which, uh,
• 1:02:51
  inspired by Martha, I've kind of tweaked these for
• 1:02:53
  our custom conversation here. So these, uh, are
• 1:02:57
  kind of meant to be quick hitters.
• 1:02:58
  So if you became the first female pope, what is
• 1:03:02
  your first official act? Cathie?
• 1:03:08
  >> Cathie Morgan: No, because I certainly do not aspire to any kind
• 1:03:11
  of role like that. I don't know. I think just, uh,
• 1:03:15
  an, uh, equality to. To. To be able to find a way
• 1:03:18
  to kind of. To build some. A little bit more
• 1:03:21
  equality into their ministry. I know in some
• 1:03:24
  pockets of the world that that's not an issue,
• 1:03:26
  but. But to kind of raise up so that both that
• 1:03:29
  everybody's gifts and everybody's called to
• 1:03:31
  ministry and that what everybody brings to the
• 1:03:33
  table that God has given them is valued and
• 1:03:35
  respected and honored. Um, I think that would be.
• 1:03:38
  Not that that's something you can kind of
• 1:03:40
  institute or wave a magic wand, but to see that
• 1:03:43
  what everybody brings to the table, the gifts that
• 1:03:45
  they've been given, are equally respected and
• 1:03:47
  valued and appreciated.
• 1:03:49
  >> Loren: Yeah. Uh, Sheila, how about you?
• 1:03:52
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: Um, not just to ordain women that would be in
• 1:03:55
  there too, but also to allow priests to marry.
• 1:03:58
  I've always found that in the Catholic Church, um,
• 1:04:02
  that. That is just one of the things that I see no
• 1:04:06
  reason for, nor do I find it helpful. I think that
• 1:04:10
  being in a loving relationship gives your ministry
• 1:04:14
  great strength. I mean, yeah, I do it singly, and,
• 1:04:18
  uh, I often wish I wasn't. It is the reality of my
• 1:04:22
  life. But there are times when I think, boy, it'd
• 1:04:24
  be great to come home to a partner who was there
• 1:04:27
  for me. Right. So definitely allowing them to get
• 1:04:31
  married. Have women, um, priests and they can have
• 1:04:33
  all the kids they want if that's what they like to
• 1:04:35
  do. And apparently they do.
• 1:04:38
  >> Loren: Cool. Uh, Martha, how about you?
• 1:04:40
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Well, just for the sake of adding to the list of
• 1:04:44
  things we're going to do, I would implement equal
• 1:04:46
  marriage.
• 1:04:47
  >> Loren: Okay, There you go. There you go. Okay.
• 1:04:52
  Uh, what gives you hope for the next generation of
• 1:04:56
  women called into ministry? Let me start calling
• 1:05:03
  names here.
• 1:05:10
  >> Sheila Van Zandwyck: I think, uh, for me, it isn't necessarily just in
• 1:05:16
  ministry. I think what gives me hope is to see how
• 1:05:22
  our society is getting better about being
• 1:05:24
  intentional in helping young women be whatever
• 1:05:30
  they want to be. So helping them see themselves as
• 1:05:34
  a soccer player, as a professional hockey player,
• 1:05:38
  as, um, a computer tech guru, as a NASA scientist,
• 1:05:44
  as a priest, as whatever they want to, kind of.
• 1:05:50
  Because there are certain industries that have
• 1:05:53
  been very, um, male focused that, you know, it
• 1:05:57
  gives me hope to see, um, you know, the. The world
• 1:06:01
  kind of working to try and give women this insight
• 1:06:05
  that they're. They have all these fabulous gifts.
• 1:06:07
  And. And my hope would be that the church also
• 1:06:11
  creates that opportunity and awareness for, for
• 1:06:14
  young women as well.
• 1:06:16
  >> Loren: Okay, well, Tabitha, we have Tabitha back here.
• 1:06:18
  So, Tabitha, what gives you hope? What gives you
• 1:06:21
  hope for the next generation of women in ministry?
• 1:06:25
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Oh, what gives me hope for the next generation of
• 1:06:28
  ministry? I mean, women, uh, are so. I see so many
• 1:06:33
  young clergy women who are so eager and so
• 1:06:37
  enthusiastic. And we all know that the church as
• 1:06:40
  an institution and in society is facing incredible
• 1:06:44
  challenges right now. And a lot of us are
• 1:06:48
  frustrated and wondering what's next? And of
• 1:06:51
  course, none of us know what, what's next? And,
• 1:06:53
  uh, what's that going to look like? But I see
• 1:06:56
  young clergy women who are so excited about being
• 1:07:01
  three, so enthusiastic about what the future is,
• 1:07:05
  and, and they make me excited and they make me
• 1:07:09
  eager about what possibilities are. I see women
• 1:07:14
  who are dreaming, uh, new dreams for the church.
• 1:07:18
  And it is so refreshing. It's so refreshing to
• 1:07:21
  hear. Here's what I love about the church. Here's
• 1:07:25
  what I'm dreaming about the church. Here's where I
• 1:07:28
  see God taking us. Instead of, you know, uh,
• 1:07:31
  these. These ideas of we don't know what's going
• 1:07:35
  to happen, the church is dying, um, you know,
• 1:07:38
  everything that's wrong with the institution. And
• 1:07:40
  of course, there is a reckoning that is happening
• 1:07:42
  right now. It's a reckoning that's been coming for
• 1:07:45
  a long time, and it's completely appropriate. And
• 1:07:49
  at the same time, it's like a song, right? Where
• 1:07:52
  there's lament and there's praise and there's
• 1:07:55
  celebration and there's joy, and it's all mixed up
• 1:07:58
  together. Um, and so, um, I think that is a
• 1:08:04
  wonderful thing about young women who are still
• 1:08:08
  seeking call in all of these challenges that we're
• 1:08:12
  facing. And so hopeful and so refreshing.
• 1:08:18
  >> Loren: Yeah, great answer. Great answer, Martha. Cathie.
• 1:08:23
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Yeah, Um, I feel hopeful when I look at my
• 1:08:28
  daughter. Um, I feel hopeful with just a twinge of
• 1:08:34
  a downer in it as well. But, um, I, I really
• 1:08:40
  respect how much, like, she and her friends don't
• 1:08:44
  take for granted the rights that they have, don't
• 1:08:48
  take for granted the, um, the opportunities that
• 1:08:52
  they have. They do live in a time and place,
• 1:08:55
  unfortunately, where they see women's rights
• 1:08:59
  rolled back, um, in different parts of the world
• 1:09:04
  in a pretty alarming way. But. So that's the, the
• 1:09:08
  downer part. But the up part of that is like, just
• 1:09:13
  putting fire in their bellies that, like, they
• 1:09:17
  want to continue to fight for this. Like, this
• 1:09:19
  fight is worth it. It's worth, um, matters. It
• 1:09:24
  gives us in the church such a, ah, more holistic
• 1:09:29
  picture of who God is and how God works. Um, and
• 1:09:33
  in the world, it. And in the church, it just means
• 1:09:37
  that, like, we get so many more gifts brought to
• 1:09:41
  the table. So let's continue to, like, let's not
• 1:09:44
  sit back and think this is one and done. It's not.
• 1:09:48
  It's not one and done. We have to keep speaking
• 1:09:50
  up. We have to keep fighting. We have to keep
• 1:09:52
  saying this matters. And I just love looking to
• 1:09:58
  her and her friends and seeing that, that fight in
• 1:10:02
  them, like, they know it. They know this is worth
• 1:10:04
  it.
• 1:10:05
  >> Loren: Yeah. Thank you, Cathie.
• 1:10:09
  >> Cathie Morgan: We're at a point in the end, well, and we've hit
• 1:10:11
  this point several times in the last 20 years,
• 1:10:13
  that we can't be doing things the way we've always
• 1:10:15
  done things. And so I think when you, especially
• 1:10:18
  when you've got women who have, um, brought some
• 1:10:21
  life experience, uh, it'd be greater if we had
• 1:10:23
  more young women going into college. Wouldn't it
• 1:10:25
  be great, Martha, not to be still some of the
• 1:10:27
  younger women in the room?
• 1:10:28
  >> Martha Tatarnic: I know, I know. Two decades later. My God.
• 1:10:31
  >> Cathie Morgan: It's been too long. It's been too long.
• 1:10:34
  >> Martha Tatarnic: But it does allow me to feel like I'm drinking
• 1:10:36
  from the fountain of youth, I will say, but, like,
• 1:10:39
  that's the, that's the only good thing about it.
• 1:10:42
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Go ahead, Cathie.
• 1:10:43
  >> Cathie Morgan: Um, but as I said, we can't be doing things the
• 1:10:45
  way we've always done that. We need to be finding
• 1:10:47
  new Ways of engaging new partnerships, new ways of
• 1:10:50
  engaging our communities. And I think it's really
• 1:10:52
  wonderful that, uh, as women are coming into
• 1:10:54
  ministry, they're bringing the skills and the, the
• 1:10:57
  outside of the box thinking and the creativity
• 1:11:00
  that there's ways that we can honor where we've
• 1:11:02
  come from. But there are new ways and different
• 1:11:04
  ways of moving forward. And I think women bring a
• 1:11:07
  lot of those gifts. We've had to fight some of
• 1:11:09
  those battles. We've had to look, do things kind
• 1:11:12
  of outside of the box to get to where we are. And
• 1:11:14
  so it would be lovely. Continue to see women in
• 1:11:16
  ministry kind of bringing their authentic selves
• 1:11:19
  and, you know, let's try it this way and let's do
• 1:11:21
  it this way and bringing some of that passion and
• 1:11:23
  some of that joy and some of that, you know, we're
• 1:11:26
  being faithful to who God has called us to be. So
• 1:11:28
  let's just get down to it and let's. It might not
• 1:11:30
  look the way it's always been, but it's still
• 1:11:32
  faithful. It's still of God, and it's still kind
• 1:11:34
  of spreading the good news, but we're just going
• 1:11:36
  to do it a little different way. And so to be able
• 1:11:38
  to encourage people to keep bringing those gifts
• 1:11:40
  and that ministry and that passion. Um, because
• 1:11:43
  you're right. After, you know, Tabitha, after a
• 1:11:45
  while, you do kind of get curmudgeony. I've been
• 1:11:46
  ordained long enough. I feel like cranky person in
• 1:11:49
  the back of the room sometimes. But it is so
• 1:11:51
  lovely. People who still have that joy and that
• 1:11:53
  excitement, you're like, nah, just wait till the
• 1:11:55
  charge gets all of them. But it's, it's, it's
• 1:11:58
  catching and it's. And it gives me. It means that
• 1:12:01
  I don't always have to be the cranky one in the
• 1:12:02
  back room while in my day. But it's, but it's
• 1:12:06
  lovely to see that and to see people, um, honoring
• 1:12:09
  that and welcoming that instead of kind of
• 1:12:12
  begrudgingly accepting it. But to really welcome
• 1:12:14
  that, we need to be doing things in new ways. And
• 1:12:17
  that's part of how we're.
• 1:12:18
  >> Tabitha Johnson: We're.
• 1:12:19
  >> Cathie Morgan: We're bringing that fresh air and that new energy
• 1:12:21
  into the church is with people who bring who they
• 1:12:24
  are authentically, um, into ministry and to
• 1:12:27
  celebrate that. And I think we're going to see.
• 1:12:29
  Continue to see more and more of that as we
• 1:12:31
  continue to adapt and adjust moving forward.
• 1:12:34
  >> Loren: Awesome. Okay, well, uh, Tabitha, I got to give
• 1:12:37
  you this one because this is the most important
• 1:12:38
  question, and you weren't here for it. If you were
• 1:12:40
  the first female pope, what is your first official
• 1:12:43
  act?
• 1:12:45
  >> Tabitha Johnson: Oh, to allow queer clergy.
• 1:12:48
  >> Loren: Okay, she's concise at least, right?
• 1:12:52
  >> Tabitha Johnson: To allow queer. Queer clergy. You know, uh, I am
• 1:12:57
  in a denomination that has not completely moved
• 1:13:03
  past, uh, some of the struggles of the past, but I
• 1:13:08
  am in a church. You know, our polity is such that
• 1:13:13
  each congregation gets to choose what they want to
• 1:13:15
  do whatever, uh, the general church decide. And so
• 1:13:19
  the general church is open and affirming that we
• 1:13:22
  still have congregations that are not. But I
• 1:13:24
  happen to be in a congregation that is unabashedly
• 1:13:29
  open and affirming, says, you know, all of God's
• 1:13:34
  people have right not just to exist, but to feel
• 1:13:37
  accepted and to know they are beloved by God. And
• 1:13:40
  by golly, when they walk through these doors of
• 1:13:43
  this church, they are going to feel that, if
• 1:13:46
  nothing else, they are going to feel accepted and
• 1:13:49
  loved by God. And so to be in a place where we
• 1:13:55
  deny the gifts that queer clergy bring, I, uh,
• 1:14:00
  think is a shame and I think is a sin of the
• 1:14:04
  church. Uh, not just the Catholic Church, but all
• 1:14:08
  institutions that do so. Uh, and so, um, even
• 1:14:12
  before saying women should be clergy, which you
• 1:14:15
  think maybe that would be first on my list. Uh, m
• 1:14:20
  a queer folks, uh, who are involved in loving
• 1:14:26
  relationships because we already know they're a
• 1:14:29
  queer clergy. And classic church, right?
• 1:14:31
  >> Loren: M. Um.
• 1:14:33
  >> Tabitha Johnson: And so they can be open and be who they are and
• 1:14:37
  say, this is who I am. I'm God's beloved and I
• 1:14:40
  have a call and I'm going to live into it. Why
• 1:14:43
  can't we be in a place where, ah, that happens?
• 1:14:47
  Uh, unfortunately, it's not just a Catholic. Not
• 1:14:50
  just a Catholic thing. But if I were pope, by
• 1:14:52
  golly, I would do a lot of things, but that would
• 1:14:55
  be one of them.
• 1:14:57
  >> Loren: Well, that's why I always limit it in the
• 1:14:59
  traditional question of one day because, you know,
• 1:15:01
  we want more of the conversation than just what
• 1:15:03
  you do in Pope. But thank you, thank you for
• 1:15:06
  sharing. Uh, thank you all for this conversation.
• 1:15:09
  I really appreciate, uh, everyone's patience and,
• 1:15:12
  uh, you know, getting all this together is, uh, an
• 1:15:15
  important conversation. I hope it's been helpful
• 1:15:17
  for our listeners, Martha. Uh, and I, we always
• 1:15:20
  have a tradition. We leave people with a word of
• 1:15:23
  peace. Uh, so may God peace be with you all.
• 1:15:27
  >> Martha Tatarnic: Also with you, Loren.
• 1:15:36
  >> Loren: Thanks for joining us on the Future Christian
• 1:15:38
  Podcast. The Future Christian Podcast is produced
• 1:15:41
  by Resonate Media. We love to hear from our
• 1:15:43
  listeners with questions, comments, and ideas for
• 1:15:46
  future episodes. Visit our
• 1:15:48
  website@future-christian.com and find the Connect
• 1:15:52
  with Us form at the bottom of the page to get in
• 1:15:55
  touch with Martha or Loren. But before you go, do
• 1:15:58
  us a favor. Subscribe to the POD to leave a
• 1:16:00
  review. It really helps us get this out to more
• 1:16:03
  people. Thanks and go in peace.