CBE International’s 2021 online conference
“Men, Women, and God: Theology and Its Impact”
September 10–11, 2021
Adesola Akala
Adesola Akala is a research fellow at St. John’s College, Durham University. She holds a PhD in Biblical Studies from Asbury Theological Seminary. Her current research includes the gospel of John, Pauline literature, prayer, and glory. Sola teaches and preaches in the UK, Europe, Africa, USA, South East Asia, and Australia. She is also the director of Doxa Consultancy, which provides support to people engaged in biblical and theological research projects.
Workshop: “Galatians 3:28–29 Revisited: A Reading Through the Lens of Jesus and the Samaritan Woman in John 4:1–42”
Rebecca Barnes
Dr. Rebecca Barnes is senior research adviser in Qualitative and Social Research Methods in the NIHR Research Design Service, based at the University of Leicester. Rebecca has been researching domestic abuse for nearly 20 years. With her colleague, Prof. Kristin Aune, Rebecca has recently conducted the largest UK-based academic survey to date of domestic abuse among churchgoers. Rebecca worships at a Church of England church in the Diocese of Peterborough.
Workshop: “Domestic Abuse—In Churches Too?”
Carolina Kuzaks-Cardenas
Carolina Kuzaks-Cardenas is the training manager for Restored. She has worked in the charity sector in the UK for twelve years. During the last nine years, she has been involved in ending violence against women by providing support to survivors of domestic abuse and training churches and other organizations to respond better to this issue. Carolina is originally from Colombia and has a master’s degree in NGO and Development Management. She is married to John and together they attend St. Mary’s Church in Hampton.
Workshop: “Domestic Abuse—In Churches Too?”
Emma Dipper
Emma Dipper is founding director of Gender and Religious Freedom, a collaborative network addressing issues of resilience and advocacy for Christian communities facing persecution, which is distinctly gender biased. She was first challenged in this area when she ran projects for women under the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. She developed Release Women as part of Release International, a church-based model of self-help groups addressing the spiritual, psychosocial, and socio-economic disempowerment of Christian women in Egypt and Pakistan. She is based at All Nations Christian College.
Workshop: “Women, Violence, and Religious Persecution: What the Evidence Reveals, and What Christians and the Church Can Do” (with Helene Fisher)
Helene Fisher
Helene Fisher has worked as global gender persecution specialist for Open Doors International since 2007. She has tracked trends related to women and persecution over the past decade, as Christian women have gone from being perceived mainly as incidental victims of religious persecution to becoming direct strategic targets.
Workshop: “Women, Violence, and Religious Persecution: What the Evidence Reveals, and What Christians and the Church Can Do” (with Emma Dipper)
Avril Heenan
Avril Heenan has been an active member of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland (PCI) since 1983 and is one of only six women who serve on the General Council of PCI. She is a finance lawyer and recently completed a Master of Research in Theology at Queens University Belfast, through Union Theological College. She focused on the Pauline texts with respect to women, and her dissertation was on the history of ordination of women to the PCI. Avril has been happily married to John for 28 years and is the mother of two grown sons.
Workshop: “The Restoration of Women and the Liberation of Christ” (with Ruth Garvey Williams and Trevor Morrow)
Amanda Jackson
Amanda Jackson, Director of the Women’s Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance, has over 20 years of experience encouraging Christians to advocate for women and address the challenges facing women and girls, and training and equipping women in leadership. She has worked with women and men in over 30 nations.
Workshop: “Co-Workers and Co-Leaders: Women and Men Partnering for God’s Work.”
Ally Kateusz
Ally Kateusz is a cultural historian specializing in the intersection of women and religion in early Christian art and texts. She is research associate at Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research and has published peer-reviewed articles in the Journal of Early Christian Studies, the Journal for Feminist Studies in Religion, and Priscilla Papers. Her 2019 illustrated book, Mary and Early Christian Women: Hidden Leadership, provides new evidence of early Christian women apostles and clergy.
Workshop: “Historical Evidence for Women’s Ecclesiastical Leadership”
Trevor Morrow
Trevor Morrow is a graduate of Trinity College Dublin and studied theology to the doctoral level at the University of Edinburgh. He is a Presbyterian minister. His commitment to the stance of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland to affirming men and women equally for leadership in the church resulted in his publication of Equal to Rule: Leading the Jesus Way.
Workshop: “The Restoration of Women and the Liberation of Christ” (with Avril Heenan and Ruth Garvey Williams)
Charles Read
Charles Read is director of liturgy and director of reader training, Norwich Diocese. He read theology at Manchester University, was a secondary teacher and a lay minister before ordination. He served in a variety of churches in Manchester diocese and researched the early history of Daily Prayer for his MPhil. In 1999 he became Lecturer in Liturgy and Doctrine at St John’s College Durham. He then served as vice principal of the Norwich Ministry Course, before moving to his present set of posts in 2013. Charles is associate priest at St. Catherine’s Mile Cross, an urban parish in north Norwich.
Workshop: “Gender, Power, and the Trinity”
Pontsho K. Segwai
Pontsho Segwai is the advocacy and child protection manager for World Vision South Africa, a position that allows her to merge her two loves, God and gender. She has been working on gender and development for two decades and focuses on addressing gender equality from a biblical perspective. Her passion is seeing males and females being treated equally, as is God’s original plan.
Workshop: “Changes in Field Ministry and Scripture’s Call for Female and Male Shared Leadership”
John Wijngaards
John Wijngaards is a Catholic priest, theologian, and champion for women’s equality, including within the Catholic church. He defends the right of every Christian who is guided by the Spirit to freely express their opinion.
Workshop: “Created in God’s Image and Recreated in the Image of Christ: Theological and Social Impact”
Ruth Garvey-Williams
Ruth Garvey-Williams is editor of Ireland’s Christian magazine, VOX, and serves on the board of several national Christian organizations, including the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland and the Irish Bible Institute. She is author of VOX magazine’s “Women and the Church” report based on research into the experiences of women and attitudes toward women in churches and Christian ministries in Ireland. Ruth has been in Christian ministry for 30 years and has a passionate concern for Christian unity and for the inclusion of those who are oppressed and marginalized.
Workshop: “The Restoration of Women and the Liberation of Christ” (with Avril Heenan and Trevor Morrow)
