Alguire ending term as Methodist council's first female leader
7/2/2001 News media contact: Linda Bloom · (646) 369-3759 · New York NOTE: A photograph is available at http://umns.umc.org/photos/wmc/alguire.jpg .
A UMNS Feature By Linda Bloom* After Frances Werner Alguire was elected to lead the World Methodist Council in 1996, a woman in Detroit, observing her small stature, told her, "You're too little for such a big job."
Alguire's reply: "I'm the same size as John Wesley."
It was a fitting response from the first woman and second layperson to become chairperson of the international body organized in 1881 to link churches of the Wesleyan tradition. The council now represents more than 34 million members in 130 countries. Alguire, of New Buffalo, Mich., will celebrate her 74th birthday on July 11 and end her term later in the month when the World Methodist Conference convenes in Brighton, England.
Highlights of the five-year period include launching the council's first endowment campaign; establishing the "Honorable Order of Jerusalem" to recognize past council leaders; expanding membership; presenting the annual World Methodist Peace Award and representing the body in a variety of ecumenical settings.
But her sex also has given her the opportunity to both model and promote the participation of women in the church. "I tell people part of my mission is paving the way for other women leaders, including women clergy," she said.
Soon after her election, she represented the council at the International Meeting for Peace sponsored by the Community of St. Egidio in Rome. "It was my first exposure as a woman leader to an international group of people and religions," she noted.
Asked to participate on a panel discussion there, Alguire received a standing ovation when she told the audience, "God trusted a woman to carry his son for nine months. It's now time for women to be allowed to share the world and become participants without men feeling threatened."
Since then, she said she has been "warmly received" at many ecumenical meetings where much of the leadership was male and clergy. "I found that as you relate to people and you get to know one another as individuals, my second time around to meet them, I'm welcomed like a long-lost friend," she explained. "I've learned not to let titles be barriers but to think of people as all created in God's image. Our titles just designate our responsibilities."
Alguire also has visited a variety of Methodists sites during her tenure, ranging from the largest Methodist sanctuary in South Korea, seating 10,000 worshippers, to a small church off a muddy road in West Samoa. "The Methodist president there kept apologizing for the small church we'd be dedicating," she recalled. "I said to him, 'I came from a small rural church, so no apologies.'"
Born in a farm home in middle of Michigan, she attended a one-room schoolhouse for the first eight years of her education. Her high school graduating class in LeRoy, Mich., had only 16 students.
In a "Meet the Council Officers" article in the January/February 1997 issue of World Parish, a council publication, Alguire wrote, "My father was 'Mr. Methodist' of our community as well as a farmer and elected politician, serving both locally and at the state level. My mother, Mary Martha, fulfilled both names equally well. She was an excellent cook, gracious hostess and taught us prayers and scripture at an early age."
At the age of 8, Alguire responded to an altar call during a Methodist camp meeting at Camp Albright in Hersey, Mich. That early commitment led to a lifelong involvement. She has been active in both the West Michigan and Northern Illinois conferences of the United Methodist Church; served on the board of trustees and, later, as an associate in seminary relations at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Ill.; served as a director for both the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries and its Women's Division; acted as a delegate to numerous jurisdictional and general conferences of the church; and served as chairperson of the Commission on General Conference.
Within the World Methodist Council, Alguire has been a member of the presidium, executive committee and finance and program committees. She was president of the council's North American Section from 1986 to 1991.
Even her career as a registered nurse, which included a period as a supervisor at a major hospital, prepared her for church leadership because it "helped me to relate to all people."
But when nominated to lead the World Methodist Council, she consulted her husband Donald -- to whom she has been married for 51 years - and daughters Mary Alguire Papish of Chicago and Catherine Alguire of Chapel Hill, N.C. Because there was no travel budget for the job, she would be paying her own way on most trips, except for the regular meeting of the officers. "We decided to make this the (family) charitable priority for five years," she explained.
The council's overall annual budget crunch propelled Alguire and the Rev. Joe Hale, the council's chief executive, with assistance from Donald Fites, an active layman and business executive, to pursue a fundraising drive for an endowment. A goal of $20 million was set. To date, slightly more than $4 million has been pledged, she said.
She also wanted to find a way to recognize those who had provided dedicated leadership within the council but had dropped out of touch when their term of office was completed. The result was "The Honorable Order of Jerusalem," created when the council's presidium met in that city in December 1998. The medallion and certificate are presented where the person resides to call attention to both the leadership and the council itself.
Upcoming changes in the council, including the retirement of Hale and Ralph Young, Geneva secretary, will be recognized in Brighton. The Rev. George Freeman of Virginia and the Rev. Denis Dutton, past bishop of the Methodist Church of Malaysia, are nominated to fill those posts, respectively. The Geneva position will become a full-time job as "an expansion of our world involvement," she explained.
On a broader level, the World Methodist Conference offers the chance for members to connect in a deeper way. "It's an opportunity to hear, firsthand, what's happening in many of these countries," Alguire said, adding that she has gotten to know so many members that "my prayer list has grown considerably."
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*Bloom is news director of the New York office of United Methodist News Service, the church's official news agency.
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