Introducing Dr. Pamela Lightsey
Urban Village is thrilled to announce that Dr. Pamela Lightsey has agreed serve as our Interim Support Pastor through mid-January, 2023. Dr. Lightsey will begin Aug. 15 and will have four areas that she will be focusing on: preaching; helping our leaders discern and strategize about UVC’s future; working with pastors in nurturing and developing volunteers; and creating a fall stewardship campaign.
Dr. Lightsey has been a cutting-edge church and academic leader in many ways. She is currently the Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs and Associate Professor of Professor of Constructive Theology at Meadville Lombard Theological School in Chicago. She will continue to serve in that capacity while serving at Urban Village.
Following service in the US Army and work as a civil servant, Dr. Lightsey received her academic and theological training at Columbus State University (BS), Gammon Seminary of the Interdenominational Theological Center (M.Div.) and Garrett-Evangelical Theological School (PhD). After ordination, she served first as a United Methodist congregational pastor and then as a theological school educator, scholar and administrator. Throughout her vocational life, she has been a leading social justice activist, working with local, national and international organizations focusing primarily on the causes of peacemaking, racial justice and LGBTQ rights.
Pamela’s publications include the book, Our Lives Matter: A Womanist Queer Theology (Wipf and Stock), "He Is Black and We are Queer" in Albert Cleage Jr and the Black Madonna and Child (New York: Palgrave Macmillan), “Reconciliation” in Prophetic Evangelicals: Envisioning a Just and Peaceable Kingdom (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company), and "If There Should Come a Word” in Black United Methodists Preach! (Abingdon Press).
“UVC has been through a challenging time of staff transition in recent weeks, but I can’t think of a better person to help resource, challenge, nurture, and uplift us than Pamela,” said Christian Coon, UVC’s interim Lead Pastor. “Her prophetic wisdom and transformational leadership are unparalleled and we are blessed to have her as part of our community.”
Welcome, Pastor Pamela!
