The 2016 Province IV Annual Retreat was held June 6-8, 2016, at the Kanuga Conference, Retreat, and Camp Center in Hendersonville, North Carolina. The Diocese of Central Florida had the largest delegation present with nine (seven of whom were board members) out of a total of 70 registrants.
The theme for the 2015-2018 ECW Triennial is Building Bridges of Peace and Reconciliation with a different focus for each year:
2016 – Year 1: Peace and reconciliation within ourselves and our families
2017 – Year 2: Peace and reconciliation within our parishes and communities
2018 – Year 3: Peace and reconciliation in the world
Province IV ECW President Pat Rutenberg and Province board members welcomed everyone warmly at a meet-and-greet. The Rev. Lindsay Hardin Freeman, author of Bible Women: All Their Words and Why They Matter, was the speaker/chaplain for the retreat.
Freeman conducted four sessions with group discussion, selecting different women from her book while focusing on the retreat theme and the various leadership skills of the women selected. “Peace,” she said, “is like shalom—not the absence of conflict, but the presence of love.”
Accompanying the Rev. Freeman was her husband, the Rev. Leonard Freeman, a poet, priest, and contributor to her writings, who led many fun rounds of Bible Women Jeopardy.
It was a privilege to have in attendance the National ECW president, Lisa Towle, from the Diocese of North Carolina. In her address, she said The Episcopal Church is in the middle of a huge transition of “Making room at the table for younger people, while not pushing out the old.” President Towle announced her platform for her first year as “Change.”
Days began with Morning Prayer and ended with Compline. The retreat concluded with Eucharist in The Chapel of the Transfiguration, a beautiful pine-framed structure with handcrafted pews dedicated in 1942.
The Central Florida ECW were honored to conduct one of six workshops on Dynamic Diocesan ECWs. Dr. Deborah (Dee) Henson-Govenor (second vice president: training and education officer) and Winsome Stern (president) were co-presenters with material input from LaVerne Collins (former president), who was unable to attend. The presenters emphasized the importance of communication to the bishop, diocesan staff, churches, and all women’s groups. They stressed the benefits of an email service, social media, training programs, deanery meetings, annual meetings, and a quarterly newsletter, Episcochat. They also explained that using a conference call system for board meetings saves on time and travel. Many complimentary evaluations/comments were received after the presentation.
Topics of the other five workshops were: Church Periodical Club (CPC); United Thank Offering (UTO); Reading Camp; Fatal Attraction: How to Reach Millennial Women; and Girls’ Friendly Society.
It was good to renew old relationships, make new friends, and prepare for a change of venue for the June 5-7, 2017, Province IV ECW Retreat at Camp McDowell, Birmingham, Alabama.