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See
interviews
with Barbara
Barbara Wendland is
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a lay delegate in 1996 and 1988 to General
Conference, the worldwide governing body of the United Methodist Church (UMC), which meets every 4 years
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a lay delegate in 2004, 2000, 1996, and 1988 to UMC Jurisdictional
Conference, the body that meets every 4 years to
elect UMC bishops
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a speaker at church-related events throughout the U.S.
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2007 recipient of the annual Seals
laity award given by SMU's Perkins School of Theology
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a graduate of the Academy for Spiritual
Formation, a 2-year ecumenical program sponsored by the United
Methodist Church
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in her local congregation,
First United Methodist Church of Temple Texas, a long-time Sunday School teacher and choir member, past chairperson of numerous committees and projects, and
frequent developer and teacher of short courses about theology, church membership, and spiritual growth.
She has been a member of this congregation for more than 50 years, but
because of what she sees as its increasingly narrow and outdated
interpretation of the Bible and Christianity, she has now stopped
participating. And she is now being officially shunned by the
congregation's pastors and other leaders.
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a writer
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author of Misfits: The Church's Hidden Strength (St. Johann
Press, 2010)
To see the Table of Contents and some other pages
of this book, click on this
link to go to its Amazon page.
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co-author (with Larry W. Easterling, a United Methodist clergyman) of Spiritual Family Trees: Finding Your Faith
Community's Roots (Alban Institute,
2001)
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co-author (with Stanley J. Menking, retired Associate Dean of
Perkins School of
Theology) of
God's Partners: Lay Christians at Work (Judson
Press, 1993)
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author of articles in church-related periodicals, including
Zion's Herald,
Circuit
Rider, Upper Room Disciplines,
United Methodist Reporter, and Christian Social Action
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author and publisher of Connections
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a university graduate in math and theology
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recipient of a Master of Theological Studies degree from S.M.U.'s Perkins School of
Theology, a United Methodist seminary
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formerly a mathematician and computer programmer in the geophysics research department of a major oil company
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an active participant in family and community
since 1959 a resident of Temple, a central Texas town of
60,000
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since 1959 the wife of a business owner and active volunteer in church, civic, and professional organizations
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the mother of a grown daughter
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past president of community-volunteer organizations
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a philanthropist
as trustee of a small family charitable foundation, contributing
to the arts, education, and medicine in addition to
organizations and projects that promote progressive Christianity
(But
because the foundation has no staff and the trustees are already aware
of many more deserving organizations and projects than they can afford
to contribute to, they neither accept nor respond to unsolicited grant
requests.)
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