Personal pain, mixed with hope, shapes leader’s faith
|
A UMNS photo by John C. Goodwin Jan Love, deputy general secretary for the Women's Division of The United Methodist Board of Global Ministries
|
Jan
Love, of Columbia, S.C., a lay woman who has represented the United
Methodist Church at the World Council of Churches for more than 20
years, has been nominated as the new deputy general secretary for the
Women's Division of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries.
UMNS photo by John C. Goodwin, Photo number 04-107, Accompanies UMNS
#094, 3/8/04 |
April 12, 2005By Linda Bloom* STAMFORD,
Conn. (UMNS)—For Jan Love—the daughter of a United Methodist pastor and
a leader both in the denomination and the ecumenical world—a sense of
mission has been a guiding principle of life. But
her faith journey, which last year led to a position as chief executive
of the Women’s Division of the United Methodist Board of Global
Ministries, also reflects the effects of personal suffering. As
she told her story to division directors during their April 8-11 spring
meeting, Love spoke publicly of her 1979 abduction and rape and its
impact upon her life and faith. Part
of the impact has been reflected in her longtime mission to address
issues of violence against women, both through the church and at
university settings where she worked as a professor. "Since
the rape, I have meditated frequently on what it means to love my
enemies, to do good to those who have hurt me," she told the directors.
"I often ponder the full meaning of forgiveness and what consequences it
has for my life and that of my attackers." But,
ultimately, she said, she considers her story to be "a resurrection
story, an experience full of hope, endurance, determination, renewed
strength and complete confidence and joy that, for Christians, the
crucifixion is never the end of the story." The
rape occurred when Love was attending a January 1979 meeting of the
World Council of Churches’ Central Committee in Kingston, Jamaica. She
and two others—a young woman and young man—were abducted by two men
armed with semi-automatic weapons. They
were led deep into the woods, where the men took their valuables "and
asked us about ourselves as they smoked marijuana." One of the men took
Love away and raped her and then did the same with the other woman, whom
Love called Marjorie. "All
three of us believed for most of our time in the woods that we would
die that night," she told the Women’s Division directors in a steady
voice. "We were grateful that we had our lives, but for Marjorie and me,
especially, our lives had been turned upside down." Other
women helped them with recovery. Theressa Hoover, who was then chief
executive of the Women’s Division, and Dame Nita Barrow, a WCC leader
from Barbados, assisted in the aftermath of the rape and arranged for
them to return home. Her mother and sisters surrounded her with support
and care once she was back in Alabama. "Another
group pivotal to my regaining strength and confidence was a feminist
organization at Ohio State University, where I was in graduate school,"
Love said. "The group taught courses on risk assessment, self-defense
and the realities of violence against women. They helped me believe I
could navigate the world again." Love
grew up in a family that lived out its convictions, whatever the cost.
This was impressed upon her as a 5-year-old when, on March 10, 1958, the
Ku Klux Klan burned a cross in front of the Satsuma, Ala., parsonage
where her family lived, as part of a coordinated attack. Her
father, along with 16 other white Methodist pastors and those of other
denominations, had publicly supported a campaign by African-American
pastors to end bus segregation in Mobile, Ala. Although
local church leaders had encouraged their action, the Methodist bishop
was opposed to such involvement. "In every case, the local churches
withdrew salary support from the pastors and requested their transfer,
which happened at the next meeting of the annual conference," Love said. Her
family stayed in Alabama and continued witnessing for racial justice,
"but we moved frequently from parish to parish, branded as difficult by
the hierarchy and as misfits in our local communities." Despite
such isolation, the family felt "upheld" by those who understood the
connection between racial justice and the Gospel, she said. "We knew all
too well that many suffered far more harm than we did, some losing
their homes, their health or their lives," Love recalled. "For me, being
able to count myself as one of their number constituted a high honor." In
1975, she was elected, along with Hoover, to represent the United
Methodist Church on the 158-member Central Committee of the World
Council of Churches. It was to that committee—during a 1994 meeting in
Johannesburg, South Africa—that she first publicly spoke about her
experience in Jamaica. While
the Johannesburg meeting was both an acknowledgement of the WCC’s
strong advocacy against apartheid and a celebration of the new-found
freedom there, rape was being used as a weapon of war in countries such
as Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia. "I
used the occasion of my sermon to say to church leaders across the
world, in a state of very deep denial about violence against women, that
rape has a remarkably familiar face: that of our mothers, our sisters,
our daughters—even me," Love said. Another
crucial part of Love’s faith journey occurred from 1998 to 2003, when
her daughter, Rachel, suffered a series of debilitating illnesses from
age 10 to 15. Rachel endured six surgeries, including two brain
procedures, and for months could only lie on her back because the pain
was so severe. It
is a problem, Love said, that other parents—unlike herself and her
husband, Peter—do not have access "to resources such as the best doctors
in the country" for their suffering children. She also learned "the
meaning of failure, repeated failure, in one of the most important jobs
entrusted to me, that of helping to heal my own child." Again,
the importance of supportive faith communities, friends, family and
others became evident to Love. After prayers to and arguments with God,
she was "reminded of a basic truth I already knew: God was in the middle
of Rachel’s suffering and ever present for us all." Her daughter is healthy now, but Love pointed out that suffering is sometimes unavoidable. "One
of the most important points of being in community, and in Christian
community in particular, is to help each other through such pain and
problems that come our way," she said. "Christ calls us to bear each
other’s burdens (Galatians 6:2). When we bear them together, they become
much lighter." *Bloom is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in New York. News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
|