IPC Messenger 2017 May 2017 | страница 2

Women’s Ministry Conference on Biblical Sexuality with Rosaria Butterfield June 9 and 10, 2017 Friday Evening, June 9 — In the sanctuary at 7:00 p.m. Sexual Identity and Union with Christ Question and answer opportunity to follow. This meeting is open to the men and women of the church, along with other area churches and the public. Anyone high school age and older is encouraged to attend. Saturday Morning, June 10 — In the sanctuary at 9:00 a.m. Hospitality is Spiritual Warfare Question and answer opportunity to follow. This meeting is for the women of the church and other area churches (from high school age). There will be a luncheon following the meeting for a charge of $15. Rosaria’s Story R osaria Champagne Butterfield, a former tenured Professor of English and Women’s Studies at Syracuse University, converted to Christ in 1999 in what she describes as a train wreck. Her memoir, The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert chronicles that difficult journey. Rosaria is married to Kent, a Reformed Presbyterian pastor in North Carolina, and is a homeschool mother, author, and speaker. Raised and educated in a liberal Catholic setting, Rosaria fell in love with the world of words. In her late twenties, allured by feminist philosophy and LGBT advocacy, she adopted a lesbian lifestyle. Rosaria earned her Ph.D. from Ohio State University, then served in the English Department and Women Studies program at Syracuse University from 1992 to 2002. Her primary academic field was Critical Theory, specializing in queer theory. Her historical focus was 19 th century literature informed by Freud, Marx, and Darwin. She advised the LGBT student group, wrote Syracuse University’s policy for same-sex couples, and actively lobbied for LGBT aims alongside her lesbian partner. In 1997, while Rosaria was researching the religious right “and their politics of hatred against people like me”, she wrote an article against the Promise Keepers. A response to that article triggered a meeting with Ken Smith, who became a resource on the religious right and their Bible, a confidant, and a friend. In 1999 after repeatedly reading the Bible in large chunks for her research, Rosaria converted to Christianity. Her first book, The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert, details her conversion and the cataclysmic fallout—in which she lost “everything but the dog,” yet gained eternal life in Christ. Rosaria’s second book, Openne