July 2008 Celebrations of Life

July 6 - SUNDAY, 11AM

A Walk In the Park
Speaker: Rev. Paul Turner

July 13 - SUNDAY, 11AM

Healthcare and Evil: A Feminist Perspective
Speaker: Vicki Davion

July 20 - SUNDAY, 11AM

Facing Destructive Conscientiousness with Acts of Stalwart Celebration
Speaker: Rev. Janna Nelson

July 27 - SUNDAY, 11AM

TBA
Speaker: Rev. Kate Hauk

Sunday childcare available downstairs

Rev. Marsha Michiner, our Fellowship Minister

SPEAKER PROFILES:

Ashley Carraway is an Alabama native She attended Tulane Law School, worked for a civil rights attorney and completed law school in 1973. An associate at Rives & Peterson in 1974 and partner in 1977, Ashley handled class actions and complex employment discrimination and other litigation nationwide. In 1997 she moved to Atlanta, where she was in private practice until 2000. Serving in leadership roles in her church, and on the Atlanta Pride Committee, she was also a founding director of the One Heart Foundation(supporting personal growth education), secretary of the board of Positive Impact (an AIDS organization), and a cooperating attorney for Lambda Legal Defense & Education Fund, Inc. In 2000, she joined the Atlanta Legal Aid Society as its Litigation Director, also active in the National Legal Aid and Defender Association and a frequent lecturer at its programs around the country. In 2005, she came to Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, where she is now half of the way through its Master of Divinity program.

Rev. Kate Hauk is an ordained U.C.C. (Congregational) minister of 27 years.She has lived in Atlanta for 22 years and has two children: Alexis, a recent creative writing graduate of Emory, and Thomas, a sweet, Buddhist-gourmet chef with many future aspirations. He would have been 20 on July 18th. Kate has been a storyteller and a writer/editor (mostly personal essays) since winning the essay Contest at Camp Allegheny at fifteen. She has worked in a variety of churches—U.C.C, Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta, The Friends School of Atlanta, and is now a part time interim minister at Oakhurst Baptist Church, a liberal congregation.

Brownie Hendricks loves to do public speaking and was trained by teaching school for 30 years. She says “anyone who can keep the attention of a restless group of elementary students for 45 minutes qualifies to speak in front of anyone”. During her years of investigation and treatment of child abuse, she spoke to many civic and church groups to raise awareness of the issues involved and ways the community can help in prevention. Stand-up comedy is a special form of public speaking and Brownie started her career in comedy as a way to raise awareness of mental health issues.

Rev. Marti Keller is a lifelong Jewish Existentialist Unitarian who has spent almost a decade speaking and serving in Southern pulpits. In addition to parish work, she continues to work in community and social justice ministry, including being the minister in residence for the Civil Rights Journey and Justworks camps of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee. She is a teaching supervisor for the contextual education program at Candler School of Theology, combining direct work with homeless families with critical reflection.

Alice Lovelace is an arts activist working for social and economic justice. She is an award winning playwright, essayist, performance poet, arts infusion specialist, community arts consultant with a Masters Degree in Conflict Resolution. Alice works nationally and internationally to shape cultural policy, as an arts in education consultant, and to create new arts based programs in education and juvenile justice. She has won many awards including the 2005 Georgia Writers “Lifetime Achievement Award”. Alice is coeditor of “Art Changes" an on-line publication devoted to democracy issues. She is the National Lead Staff Organizer
for the first United States Social Forum in Atlanta, GA
June 27-July 1, 2007

Rev. Janna Nelson is an ordained existentialist minister. She served as full time minister at First-E from 2003 to 2005. She has a vast knowledge of both existential and feminist principles and the ability to present them in a clear, understandable way. In addition to speaking engagements, Janna continues to perform Jazz music with her husband Scott Hooker and their band, Standard Deviation. They have performed throughout Atlanta and the south. In April 2005, 7 Stages Theater presented Standard Deviation in concert preforming “This Jazz Century”. Janna also teaches at the The International Community School.

Layli Phillips is Associate Professor of Women*s Studies and associate of the African American Studies department at Georgia State University. She recently published The Womanist Reader (Routledge, 2006), an anthology of womanist thought. Her research has been published in: Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society; The Journal of African American Studies; The Journal of African American History; History of Psychology; and Sexuality & Culture. She teaches Womanism, Black Feminism, Black Queer Studies, and Women and Hip Hop. She conducts research on early Black psychologists Mamie P. and Kenneth B. Clark and writes on liberation psychology, particularly the thought of Salvadoran psychologist Ignacio Martín-Baró. She holds a B.A. from Spelman College, an M.A.from Penn State, and a Ph.D. from Temple University.

Allen Pope is Assistant Professor of Psychology and member of the graduate faculty at the University of West Georgia. He received his Ph.D. in clinical existential-phenomenological psychology at Duquesne University. He has been a student and practitioner of Vajrayana Buddhism since 1991. Dr. Pope teaches courses on Buddhist Psychology, Psychology of Loss, and Explorations into Creativity. He is the author of “From Child to Elder: Personal Transformation in Becoming an Orphan at Midlife” (2006), published by Peter Lang.

George Tatro has worked in the International Village of Chamblee, Georgia since 1992 as an apartment manager and owner. He is actively involved with the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials (GALEO.org) and is a graduate of GALEO’s Train the Trainers program which provides leadership training to grass-roots community leaders. He is currently working towards a Master of Divinity degree from Columbia Theological Seminary. In addition to his work as a student, he also leads immigrant encounter programs for Columbia’s Alternative Context and Atlanta’s Faith in the City.

Mark White works at CDC, charged with assuring the scientific and ethical quality of many of their global activities. He is fascinated by existentialism, especially ethics, and has been inspired by many First E members. Mark has published in a variety of medical journals and currently maintains an email list summarizing ethical and public health issues. Mark lived in New York City for 6 years, the Philippines for 7 and Uganda for 2. He was CDC's medical officer in charge of bubonic plague for 3 years, stationed in Fort Collins Colorado, where he met his wife, Shelly. They have two adopted sisters from Ethiopia. Leila (now 7) and, ZuZu (now 4), who keep their parents young when not making them older.