The Feast of Pauli Murray - Introduction
Feast Day Virtual Art Gallery (July 1, 2021)
Ture community is based upon equality, mutuality, and reciprocity. ~ The Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray
On July 1, the Episcopal Church celebrates the feast of Pauli Murray, legal crusader and theorist; activist; educator; first ordained black female Episcopal Priest; and co-founder of a national women's rights organization. Her experiences with race and gender fueled her justice advocacy work. Yet Murray was also a poet and in the Introduction of one of her books, Dark Testament and Other Poems, Elizabeth Alexander writes, “Murray's experience of gender was not fixed by social norms. And her admission and embrace of her gender fluidity was highly unusual in her times. How she lived in gender surfaces the deepest human questions: Who am I? What do I desire? How am I oriented? Where is my sun, my north star?”
We invited parishioner-artists to create an offering(s) around the theme of Identity, asking themselves the same questions as Murray: Who am I? What do I desire? How am I oriented? Where is my sun, my north star? Using one or more styles of art: music, painting, photography, poetry, short story, etc. to share who they are.
As Jesus asks his disciples in the Gospel of Mark, "Who do you say that I am?", so do we yearn to be know by each other and by God.
Please enjoy these submissions with the common theme of Identity.
Great art is not a matter of presenting one side or another, but presenting a picture so full of the contradictions, tragedies, [and] insights of the period that the impact is at once disturbing and satisfying. ~ The Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray
Join in our Daily Devotion in the Early Evening with a meditation that includes Pauli Murray
Daily Devotion in the Early Evening
