
Advocacy Training
Women preparing for advocacy work in Austin, Texas. (United Women in Faith Photo)
Baptist News Global | January 28, 2025
United Women in Faith (previously known as United Methodist Women) is one of the largest denominational faith organizations for women in the United States. Since 1987, the Texas Conference of United Women in Faith has partnered with Texas Impact — an interfaith grassroots policy network — to host its annual legislative event preparing female faith-leaders to meet with lawmakers to advocate for policies to lift up the marginalized of society.
This year, the women taking part in the annual event came from a number of faith traditions. While the vast majority are from the United Methodist Church, other faith traditions represented include Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Presbyterian Church USA, Alliance of Baptists, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Roman Catholic Church, United Church of Christ, Unitarian Universalists, Disciples of Christ, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, nondenominational, Judaism, Buddhism and “nones.”
This year’s event, taking place Jan. 26-28, comes at a particularly auspicious time in the United States. Just last week during the inaugural events, two very stark versions of Christianity were on display in the public sphere.
The first brand of Christianity — what many consider a form of Christian nationalism — was highlighted by pastors like Franklin Graham. Before offering his prayer, Graham began by saying, “Mr. President, the last four years there were times I’m sure you thought it was pretty dark, but look what God has done. We praise him and give him glory.” Graham then offered a prayer indicating the president was somehow chosen by God and delivered from his “enemies” — a reference to the other half of the country who voted against the president four years ago.
The next day, a very different brand of Christianity was on display at the prayer service at Washington National Cathedral. Faith leaders from a number religions offered prayers before Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde gave a homily and petitioned the president directly to have mercy on those who are in fear because of his policies and rhetoric. The backlash to a bishop appealing to Scripture and calling for mercy has been intense.
It’s in the shadow of these two events that the Texas Chapter of United Women in Faith and Texas Impact converged on the Texas Capitol in Austin.
On Sunday and Monday, the 350 participants attended workshops on key policy areas including public education (advocating religious freedom for all students), immigration, climate change and reproductive health (including maternal and child health). Speakers included Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey (Texas and Rio Texas Conferences of the UMC), Giovana Oaxaca (program director, Migration Policy of the ELCA), Amanda Tyler (executive director of Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty), Beaman Floyd (Texas Impact Legislative Council) and Charlie Brown (legislative chair, District XI of American College of Obstetrics and Gynecologists).
The marathon information sessions were accompanied by trainings on how to speak with legislators on these topics — all in preparation for a day of advocacy on Tuesday. Participants met Jan. 28 with their state senators and representatives. Some also testified in the hastily called Senate Committee on Education (K-16) hearing.
For those unfamiliar with the political tactics of the Texas State Legislature, committees have a tendency to announce on a Friday evening that public comments for a particular bill will happen four days later. In order to testify, the public must sign up in-person in the Capitol building on the day of the hearing, so often these “public” hearings fail to allow the public to participate. It just so happens that the Senate Committee on Education announced last Friday it will hold a hearing on Senate Bill 2 while Texas Women in Faith are in town.
SB-2 is the voucher school bill Gov. Greg Abbott has been trying to pass for years.
Bee Moorhead, executive director of Texas Impact, commented on this event, the largest United Women in Faith/Texas Impact legislative event since its launch:
The amazing thing about the United Women in Faith legislative event in Texas is that it started in someone’s kitchen. It started in the kitchen of some Methodist ladies in Austin who said, “We live here. We get to go to the Capitol whenever we want. We should share that with our sisters.”
The first year they had 70 attendees, all of them United Methodist, most of them with no understanding of the legislative process. Today, there are 350 participants, including a whole bunch online. They include mostly women, a few men, and we have more than a dozen denominations and traditions represented.
This is a perfect embodiment of what it means to live our faith in public, and I cannot ever get over how impressed and proud I am that these women had that vision to do that 38 years ago and have done it every year since then.