Head and Heart: Edwina Hunter--A Tribute

photo by hehaden / flickr

(Dr. Edwina Hunter, ordaIned in the American Baptist Church, was one of the most distinguished preachers in America. After her retirement as the Joe R. Engle Professor of Preaching at Union Theological Seminary in New York City she moved back to California. She was past president of the Academy of Homiletics, the editor of a volume of women's sermons, and had numerous sermons published in other volumes. She served on the Advisory Board of "The Living Pulpit" and was a frequent guest lecturer and preacher. She is survived by her daughter, Wendy Jo Snyder.)

It’s a strange world sometimes. We bump into someone, shake their hands—get their names not knowing that in the days to come they will change our lives forever. Edwina was one of those people for me. She was one of three women we ordained as a Deacon in the little church I came to. This was the late sixties—and ordaining women to such important posts was unheard of, at least in Baptist life. In fact we were one of the first churches to ordain women as deacons in the Southern Baptist denomination. But despite all the hoopla from the Baptists—it did not change anything one whit.

Dear Edwina was a Deacon. She would sit in the choir and see people in the congregation she did not know. And would whisper a prayer “for those troubled faces.” She would bring little explosive books to our Deacons meetings, pass them out and quietly suggest we might just find something in there that would help us along. She was right. She taught at the college—oral interpretation we used to call it. But she took a whole cadre of wild, rough long-haired kids of the sixties and formed a group called Wordmasters. She opened a larger world to these kids from tiny little places in Kentucky. She not only taught them how to speak distinctly--but the power of the spoken word. She took her touring group around the country and moved audiences with their words. She invited people like Dr. Davie Napier to our little church. He had taught at Yale and was Chaplain at Stanford and the author of many books.

She had married Bob and together they adopted a little girl they named Wendy Jo. She and my son were partners in crime. They went to Montessori School together. There they met Sister Margie who woud not only change their lives—but got her foot into their parent’s lives and in the church I served. Edwina introduced this Baptist congregation to this nun, this sister—Margie and we learned much from the rich wealth of her tradition. Edwina taught us the church and the world was bigger than most of us had envisioned.

She was one of many who marched out of the church in Georgetown, Kentucky that would not allow black folk to join—and started another church. They called it Faith—and from its very beginnings they flung open the doors to whomever would come. She helped in her own quiet, strong way to keep us honest. That little building, with folding chairs looked out through plain windows into a world larger than we dreamed. Edwina and Bob helped immensely in that effort.

Edwina helped me, her young-green pastor. She affirmed me in so many ways. She told me how we could experiment in worship and church itself. She introduced me not only to books. She taught me what prayer was all about--the utter seriousness it was to bow our heads and whisper to the Almighty. She introduced me to Lee, her well-know friend in her profession. She had gone everywhere and knew so many people and she introduced me to many of these and the windows opened even wider.

She and Bob parted ways and she moved on. If memory is correct she went back to Northwestern and finished her doctorate. And her reputation spread until she became Professor of Preaching first I think at Claremont in California and then at Union Theological Seminary in New York. She influenced so many that would scatter around the world with a news that was good. My wife and I visited her in New York while she taught there. She lived in “the Paul Tillich Apartment.” And we stayed there one weekend wondering what ghosts there may have been surrounding us. She took us downtown to the World Trade Center and we had dinner one night at the Windows of the World Restaurant overlooking Manhattan. On 9/11 it would all come crashing down.

In her retirement years she and Wendy Jo moved back to California. About once a year we would talk on the telephone. She remembered all those days in Georgetown—and the richness we both had found there.

Her daughter, Wendy Jo called me this last week. She told me her Mother had died in November. When the fires were raging outside Oakland she and Wendy Jo had to flee for their lives. But the smoke from those fires did great damage to Edwina’s lungs—and she slipped into the mystery with Wendy Jo holding her hand.

We all have people who have made an enormous difference in our lives. We never know when we shake hands for the first time with someone just where this might lead. So we need to keep our eyes and hearts open lest we miss those incredible gifts that come in the most unlikely of packages.

And so I remember Edwina Hunter and thank God that she was a vital part of my own journey.

I give her this Benediction which comes from the Roman Catholic Mass for the Dead:

“Into paradise may the angels lead her;

at her coming may the martyrs take her up into eternal rest,

and may the chorus of angels

lead her to that holy city,

and the place of perpetual light.”