By Sharon Sheridan, taken from the Pennsylvania Episcopalian, May 1999

Twenty-five years ago, Luisa Miller was living in Upper Montclair, NJ, when an extraordinary event in Philadelphia brought her back to church.

A Catholic, she had left her church after marrying a Protestant. Then came 29 July 1974, when 11 women became the first female ordained priests in the Episcopal Church during a service at Church of the Advocate. "The next morning," she recalled, "I read The New York Times. There was a wonderful picture of this outrageous thing that had happened in Philadelphia. That Sunday, I went to the Episcopal Church and signed up."

The ordination of women to the priesthood had a profound effect, not only on the women ordained, but also throughout the church. On 29 July, the Diocese of Pennsylvania will host an event celebrating the 25th anniversary of the ordination of women, examining how it affected the church and looking toward the progress yet to be made. Luisa Miller, a parishioner at Redeemer, Bryn Mawr, is chairing the task force organising the event.

The program will begin at noon with lunch at the Downtown Club. The Keynote speaker, as announced before, will be Archbishop Ndungane of Cape Town. Discussion will follow. The liturgy will begin at 5:30 pm at the Church of the Advocate.

Reservations are required for the luncheon, which costs $25. A limited number of scholarships are available. Reservations and donation cheques, made out to the Diocese of Pennsylvania, can be sent to:

25th Anniversary Celebration
The Diocese of Pennsylvania
240 s. Fourth St.
Philadelphia
PA 19106

"By means of the event," Bishop Charles Bennison said, "we hope to impact the Anglican Communion by saying to it that, as far as we have come since the ordination of women to the priesthood in 1974, we still have a long ways to go in order to realise the fullness of what that ordination meant, especially in terms of its implications for our leadership styles in the church, our image of God theologically, our use of inclusive language liturgically, and our sensitivity to the poverty, the plight of women, and the violence against them around the world.

"And Archbishop Ndungane -- who last summer chaired the largest section at Lambeth, the one entitled 'Called to Full Humanity' - more than anyone I know in the Anglican Communion, can connect systemically all those issues as implicated by the ordination of women to the priesthood."

After the Archbishop's talk, invited guests will respond, focusing on issues such as inclusive language, leadership styles, authority and images of God.

The goal is to offer an international perspective, Luisa Miller noted. "This isn't just an Episcopal Church challenge. This is the role of women... internationally, in the whole Anglican Communion."

"There will be plenty of time for discussion," she said. "After lunch, we will be boarding buses and heading up to Church of the Advocate, where we will have basically a neighbourhood picnic. We're going to invite everyone in the Advocate neighbourhood, as well as all of those who are going to be participating in the liturgy."

A Eucharist will follow at 5 pm. Suffragan Bishop Barbara Harris of the Diocese of Massachusetts, who became the Anglican Communion's first female bishop, will preach. She was a member of Church of the Advocate and served as crucifer for the 1974 ordination service, Bishop Bennison noted.

"We have a lot of other really wonderful people coming," Miller said. The Revd Canon John L Peterson, Secretary General of the Anglican Communion, for example, will attend the ordination celebration. Other invited guests include all ordained women in the Episcopal Church - among them the 10 women still living who were ordained in 1974 and the four ordained in Washington, DC, in 1975 - the 11 female bishops in the Anglican Communion and all US bishops, she said.

Anyone interested in volunteering to help with the event can call Luisa Miller at 610/896-9880. Registration information will appear in future issues of the Pennsylvania Episcopalian.