19 May 2010
Welcome Emily McNeill – Beatitudes Intern
19 May 2010
In June DHUMC proudly welcomed a student at New York’s Union Theological Seminary, Emily McNeill, as its first intern from the Beatitudes Society.
The Beatitudes Society is an organization that seeks to strengthen the progressive Christian network for justice, compassion and peace. It provides grants to selected fellows so that they may gain experience in encouraging social change.
For two months Emily will model how one can engage with contemporary society on all the thorniest issues. Quite simply, she is committed to societal transformation, and her resume is packed with references to peace marches, congressional campaigns, progressive media, interfaith dialogue, poverty initiatives, and LGBT issues.
In 2008 she spent time in occupied Hebron. Of that experience, she writes, “I was confronted by humanity’s limitations and the injustice, violence and hatred of which we are capable. In that context, my faith became more than a source of principles about love and justice. Prayer and worship sustained my conviction to be loving, gave me courage to go into dangerous situations, helped me to empathize when I felt burned out, and let me find beauty and grace in what is in many ways a hopeless place.”
Rex Kaney, Dan Browning, Lay Leader, and Lila Bradley, chair of Staff-Parish Relations, have laid out plans with Emily which will make for a lively summer at DHUMC: she will provide leadership in Sunday worship; she will work with our youth, both actively and reflectively, on the annual Metropolitan Atlanta Service Project; in July, she’ll teach a series of combined adult Sunday School classes on Faith Seeking Peace; she will organize community conversations on issues of justice, compassion and peace via both the internet and at a 2nd Wednesday dinner; she will work with the communications team as it overhauls our website, highlighting hospitality, justice, and mission foci; she will spend a day at the North Georgia Annual Conference, observing the theological/cultural context of United Methodism in North Georgia; she will write a summary paper in order to improve our ministry with interns; and as time allows, she will help us think about our ministries with young adults.
Pastor Rex is thrilled. “I am extremely grateful that the Christian witness of DHUMC in the areas of justice, compassion and peace has helped us begin a relationship with the Beatitudes Society. Emily McNeill was our first choice of the applicants, and I’m confident that her tremendous love of the gospel and her passion for living it will help move our justice and peace efforts to another level.”
