Money raised will also go to A Pocket Full of Hope youth music
nonprofit and Antioch Baptist Church. Music for the evening will be provided by
Eldredge Jackson and A Pocket Full of Hope. Tickets are $75 and can be ordered
through the website above and at 918-272-6778. More information through the Friends of Anita Hill website
above.
A keynote talk will be given by Professor Anita Hill who began
assisting and supporting northside nonprofits when she was on the faculty of the
law school at Oral Roberts University and has been committed to finding ways to
continue supporting them. She began her career in private practice in
Washington , D.C. before becoming a law professor, she worked at the U. S.
Education Department and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
In 1989, Hill became the first African American to be tenured at the
University of Oklahoma , College of Law , where she taught contracts and
commercial law. Hill was also a law professor at Oral Roberts
University in Tulsa, OK. Currently, at Brandeis University , she
teaches civil rights courses. As counsel to Cohen Milstein, Anita Hill advises
on class action workplace discrimination cases. Hill’s latest book is Reimagining Equality: Stories of
Gender, Race and Finding Home. She has also written her biography,
Speaking Truth to Power and co-edited with Professor Emma Coleman
Jordan, Race, Gender and Power in America : The Legacy of the Hill-Thomas
Hearings. Time, Inc., Newsweek, The New York Times, The Boston
Globe, and Ms. Magazine have published Professor Hill’s commentary and she has
appeared on numerous national television programs.
We hope all can make this inaugural event a success in Tulsa; if
you are unable to attend, we hope you can purchase a ticket and give to us so we
can use to help bring members of our community who are unable to attend
otherwise, or donate for it directly through our website at www.turleyok.blogspot.com. And we
hope all can help by spreading the word to their networks about this event and
the chance to help not only our community work but those of others in our area
too, while enjoying a fine meal and entertainment, honoring a brave woman and
hearing a great talk. Thanks for sharing this announcement with others. I am
attaching a flier for the event and hope you can share it and post it in your
churches, organizations and places of work.
Second, this Saturday, Nov. 3 from 9 am to 6 pm we are hosting
another Community Art Day for all ages, free, at our Welcome
Table Community Center, 5920 N. Owasso Ave.; healing lives and neighborhoods
through the power of art. Stop by, have fun, share in the art projects. We will
repeat it again on Sat. Nov. 17 same time this month. Thanks to graduate art
therapy student Clara Corn for facilitating. Come dream and discuss as well of
other ways to inspire art in our public areas especially in our struggling
neighborhoods.
Third, this Monday Nov. 5 at 1:30 pm we will host
a service learning class visit from the OU Graduate Social Work
Dept. working on projects related to our zipcodes. This will be their
opportunity to meet local residents and partners and learn more about the issues
and the work underway here. Come be a teacher and learn more through their eyes
and about their projects.
Fourth, on Tuesday, Election Day, Nov. 6,
7 pm before heading to your various respective watch parties for different political
parties, we invite you to come to a Communion Service
emphasizing unity, civility, compassion, courage, conscience and the commitment
to community, held by our small missional community gathering and in
The Welcome Table Center; see more at www.progressivechurchplanting.blogspot.com. Part of a nationwide network of Election Day Communions. Please share.
Fifth, we are still searching for potential nonprofits and
other groups interested in partnering to help reclaim and repurpose the
closed Cherokee School on North Peoria. Here is the link to a recent
local NPR news story on our initiative, http://kwgs.org/post/group-wants-repurpose-closed-school on
how it can benefit not only our area but the Tulsa Public Schools which have
been hit with drastic funding cuts. Please contact me about exploring
partnerships for use of the building and grounds, in great shape, for the people
of our 74126 and nearby zips.
Sixth, this month we are moving our Food Pantry
days and time and extending our resources. Each Wednesday beginning
Nov. 14 the pantry will be open from Noon to 4 pm for those in our 74126, 74130
and 74073 zips. We are also offering morning prayer service at 9 am Wednesdays,
and then a life skills class I will teach at 10 am called Life 201, based on the
fables of relationships by Rabbi Edwin Friedman, and then a common meal and
noonday prayer followed by the Pantry hours of service. We also continue to have
our counselor from Legal Aid Society of Eastern Oklahoma available, and a
nutritional counselor from the OSU Extension Office, and Rev. Debra Garfinkel
providing pastoral presence.
And speaking of food, On Thursday, Nov. 15 from 11 am to Noon
we are holding another Mobile Van Food Giveaway Event with the
community food bank of eastern oklahoma, this time at our community center; we
need volunteers to come help us sort the food from 10 to 11 am and then load the
food for families from 11 am to noon during the event. Those who have received
vouchers for the event through our pantry will be able to receive the 60 or so
pounds of food apiece; those who did not this time receive one of the allotted
125 household vouchers may come at 12:30 pm to see if there are any leftover
items as there normally are for them to receive.
Seventh, on Tuesday, Nov. 13 at 6:30 pm we will host a
documentary film on the struggles of veterans and a free meal
and discussion of ways to better serve the population of veterans in our
underserved low income low life expectancy area.
A look at our Sunday gatherings coming up weekly from 9:30 am
to 1 pm: Nov. 4 we will finish our study of Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw's
book, Jesus For President; see the previous three week's
conversation points at www.progressivechurchplanting.blogspot.com.
Then on Nov. 11 we will begin a six week Thanksgiving and Advent Series,
"The Awakening of Hope: Why We Practice A Common Faith" based
on the book and DVD curriculum by the new monasticism leader and author Jonathan
Wilson-Hartgrove. Nov. 11: Introduction and Why We Eat Together and Why We Fast;
Nov. 18: Why We Make Promises; Nov. 25: Why It Matters Where We Live; Dec. 2
(travelling to preach in Galveston, TX); Dec. 9: Why We Live Together; Dec. 16:
Why We Would Rather Die Than Kill; and Dec. 23: Why We Share Good News. We
follow our conversation and check-ins with communion and common meal.
More events coming up in November and December in a later
email news.
Finally, a thank you to all who helped make the community free
Halloween party at our community center an amazing success again this year, with
near 300 people throughout the event. All of our folks volunteering, our
partners, the people and families who came and pitched in during the event, the
way we were able to create such an event of goodwill and feeding not only bodies
but spirits here where few opportunities exist for children and youth to
experience these, or any, entertainment events. Some people said they would be
afraid in our area to get that many "strangers" together, especially in such a
multi-ethnic fashion reflecting our diverse community as we do, and without
security forces present, not to mention on Halloween and its mischevious spirit;
and they were amazed at the feeling of generosity that was grown. Some people
said they couldn't imagine how hungry the children and families were who showed
up (not knowing we would have more for them than treats) and it was an
eye-opener to the hunger we talk about, and what our folks in the schools see
all the time. Just wait, I told them, until you see the Community Christmas
Party spirit...
And thinking of children, first in our hearts and on our minds
this week, is one of our students, and his family, and the students and faculty
and staff at one of our area partner schools, The LightHouse Charter School, who
was hit and killed by a car on his way to school early in the dark; Elijah, 7
years old, didn't live in our area of service but over about six miles away and
was hit enroute to catching a bus to come here to school. We keep all of them,
and the driver, in our prayers.
The work of renewal goes on....
blessings,
Ron
