One is a retired priest; the other is a retiree that became a priest. Two separate stories in Ohio and Oregon, yet both resonate the theme that we never need retire from faith.
The Rev. Elizabeth Lilly became a deacon in 1976 and was the first woman to be ordained at Trinity Episcopal in downtown Columbus, Ohio. She was ordained a priest in 1984, and recalls several anecdotes of that time:
One priest asked her whether she was having a midlife crisis. Another mused that women in the priesthood could mean fashion shows in the sanctuary. She left one congregation after a priest gave a “hen can’t be a rooster” sermon as she sat in the third pew.
The story explores her work in the church but also shines a spotlight on what she’s been doing since retiring from active priesthood: creating icons:
She discovered she could create icons in 1996 when she was working on a Lenten series on the subject of Taize worship (French-inspired chanting and song) that called for candles, music and icons. She just started sketching and painting, unaware that the wood needed to be covered with linen and marble dust.
Still, Lilly started to perceive that something holy was going on, and it scared her.
“I was touching holy things,” she said. “I was touching his body.”
She has made about 30 icons in the past decade. She’s studied under five master iconographers, and people now commission works.
“It’s a miraculous thing,” said her husband, Carter Lilly, 74. “She’s just taken it on, and it’s become wonderful. They’re all over the house.”
One icon shows Jesus’ resurrection, the Messiah standing atop the gates of hell and literally pulling Adam and Eve out of their tombs. Several icons show Mary and Jesus, solemn-faced and earth-toned, adorned with metallic gold halos. In one, Christ cures the blind man, placing an index finger on his eyelid.
Read the whole thing here.
Meanwhile, across the country in Eastern Oregon, the Rev. Larry Rew practiced law for nearly four and a half decades. He was forced into retirement after a colon cancer diagnosis in 2005, and currently is going through his second round of treatment–but that hasn’t stopped him from pursuing his calling. He was ordained a priest on Nov. 18:
His recent ordination, on the other hand, completes a series of events which began in the mid 1990s when the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer began a four-year course on training for the ministry, largely a class on the history of religion. Out of the entire group that finished that class, Rew said, there were five ordinations, including two new priests and three deacons.
Rew was one of the deacons and for several years served as chancellor, carrying out volunteer legal work for the diocese. Although most priests first study at a seminary, the Episcopal Church does not require it in some cases.
“To have a full-time rector now under the guidelines of the church … is pretty expensive and an awful lot of churches can’t afford it,” Rew said, explaining the Eastern Oregon diocese includes several small, isolated parishes.
Read his story here.