In June Rev. Rowe celebrated the 40th anniversary of her ordination (at First Parish in Cambridge, Unitarian Universalist) and her 80th birthday. These are her reflections on racism and white privilege and what she has learned along the way. Her journey was awakened by being present at Dr. King’s March on Washington in 1963.
Rev. Rowe grew up in Rochester, NY, near the shore of Lake Ontario, active in Girl Scouts (her troop went to Europe when she was 16) and Methodist Youth Fellowship. She graduated from Tufts University and Andover Newton Theological School, both in the Boston area. She also did a sabbatical semester as a Merrill Fellow at Harvard Divinity School.
She was a Religious Education Director in UU churches in Andover and Cambridge, MA. After her ordination in Cambridge in 1981, she served as Interim Minister in Concord, NH. Then she and her family moved to Little Rock, AR, where she was Minister of the UU church for over 9 years. She served as the first minister of a new congregation, Neshoba UU Church in Memphis for 13 years until her retirement and move to Brevard in 2005.
From 2006-2012 she was Consulting Minister for the UU congregation in Tryon and regular guest preacher in Franklin. She is married to Lackey Rowe, a former civil rights lawyer in Mississippi and is active in the UU church in Brevard.
Topics: Communication, Compassion, Connection, History, Inclusivity, Journey