Co-Facilitators for Beloved Community Authenticity Groups
Are you seeking community? Are you finding yourself stirred by all this pandemic has brought our way? Take some time to connect… with others. This is a therapy group, but a HYBRID group, insofar as we seek to listen to one another tell our stories. Not just to type in the text box, while on mute.
Spend 8 weeks in a participatory dialogue group, limited to 12 people. Insurance may reduce your cost… or ask about a sliding scale/ payment option.
Open to people from everywhere who wish to build community. Must be committed to the 8 sessions to build group trust. A Phase II Group will be considered for community projects and partnerships.
Call Melissa Sexton for a brief interview: 678-640-2726 melissadsexton@gmail.com
Click HERE for a Facebook Livefeed video, where each of us introduce ourselves and our visions for how the 8 week small groups will be:
Cynthia Vaughan
Thursdays from 10:00 am-12:00 pm
Rev. Cynthia Vaughan lives in Wilmington, NC. She is a retired Elder in the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church where she served as Associate Pastor at Central UMC located near the Atlanta University Complex and in a cross racial appointment as Associate Pastor of Glenn Memorial UMC, located near the Emory University campus. In both appointments her responsibilities included congregational/pastoral care. Her appointments beyond the local church include Chaplain/Certified
Working with Cynthia will bring insight and wisdom into your reflective work. She will lead, adeptly, with her training in Clinical Pastoral Education and meditative practices.
Bio continued from above:
Educator at Spiritual Health at Emory Healthcare in Atlanta, GA and New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington NC; Assistant Director of Pastoral Care at Wesley Woods Continuing Care Community, and adjunct/assistant teaching positions in Contextual Education and preaching at Candler School of Theology. She is trained as a Certified Educator (CPE Supervisor) with ACPE, a Board Certified Chaplain (BCC) with the Association of Professional Chaplains, and previous president of the North Carolina Chaplains’ Association. Her church and community activities over the years include being an active member of conference level committees of the North Georgia UMC, i.e., the Board of Ordained Ministry, Trustees, Camp Wesley, and the Clergy Sexual Abuse Response Team. She was a study leader for the UMW School of Christian Mission, a national trainer for Disciple Bible Study, charter advisory board member of the Thomas Shockley Youth Academy of Theology and the Candler Youth Theology Institute. Cynthia is a charter member of World Pilgrims, an interfaith group, devoted to bridging the gap between religious groups by exploring their worlds, and their faiths, together. A breast cancer survivor, she volunteered with the American Cancer Society, Reach to Recovery, and Bosom Buddies. Her story is told in Celebrating Life: African American Women Speak Out About Breast Cancer and in Perspectives on Womanist Theology (Black Church Scholars Series Vol. VII). Her theology of pastoral care is based on Joshua 1:9—"Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” She teaches hybrid CPE from Wilmington NC. Cynthia received her undergraduate degree in English from Winston-Salem State University, earned the Master’s degree in Public Administration from Ohio State University, and the Masters of Divinity degree from Gammon Theological Seminary, ITC, in Atlanta. Her post-graduate studies include courses in group theory at Columbia Theological Seminary with Robert Gary; training with Yvonne Agazarian in Systems Centered Therapy, Marie Fortune in the Faith Trust Institute, and Jane Leach in Reflective Supervision. Prior to ordination Cynthia worked in corporate management and in college admissions and recruitment.
Michael Shannon
Tuesdays from 6 pm-8 pm
Rev. Michael Taylor Shannon has been the pastor of Chapel Hill Christian Church for 10 years. He was a chaplain, grief counselor in hospice for 17 years facilitating grief/loss groups, seminars and numerous programs related to end of life issues. Michael has an M.F.A. in Theather from UNC at Chapel Hill, an M.Div. from the Candler School of Theology at Emory in Atlanta along with certifications in Clinical Pastoral Education from UNC Medical Center and Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center. He has 45 years of professional and community theatre acting experience and toured nationally for 20 years with a one person performance based on theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Michael loves music, stories, walking and laughing.
Group with Michael will be full of laughter as a way of providing access to soul work. His storytelling and preaching always starts with a deeper listening. Your story matters in deep and meaningful ways, and he will help you speak your own truth to power.
T. Renée Crutcher
Thursdays from 6 pm-8 pm
Rev. T. Renée Crutcher is an accomplished performing artist with stage, screen and recording credits, sung under the batons of Leonard Bernstein and Robert Shaw, is a global humanitarian, social justice advocate and Ambassador for The Arts. She is Founder – Creative Spiritual Director of The Armelia Project – an interfaith organization dedicated to forwarding social justice via The Arts, Environmentalism and Community Impact. She has served as creative consultant for the Children’s
T. Renée is an expansive thinker, historian, and networker. She will work with you to situate your own narrative within a larger context and assist you as you creatively engage with the world in a new way.
Bio continued from above:
Defense Fund’s Freedoms Schools, Southern Rural Black Women’s Initiative, Urban League, Communities in Schools, Bethune Cookman University, Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference, NAACP, UNCF, Urban League, World AID’s Day, the University of Stellenbosch Africa Centre for HIV/Aids Initiative, Women on Farms in Capetown and Johannesburg, South Africa. T. Renée has spoken on behalf of The International Year of the Child for the United Nations, worked alongside Harry Belafonte' rallying against Apartheid, Aboriginal Land Rights and the Bonn Peace Movement. She holds a BFA from the College Conservatory of Music University of Cincinnati, a Masters of Divinity from Candler School of Theology Emory University, Eli Lilly Black Women in Ministerial Leadership Fellow at the Interdenominational Theological Center and awarded the Doctor of Humane Letters in Science from American International School of Medicine for her work in the AIDS Camps in South Africa and commitment to addressing domestic violence as a health issue. Her many humanitarian efforts, resulted in an invitation to speak at the Center for Civil and Human Rights to bring attention to women’s rights around the world. Reverend T. Renée Crutcher is an ordained Baptist minister.
Zeena Regis
Wednesdays from 3 pm-5 pm
Chaplain Zeena Regis has worked in hospice and palliative care as a chaplain and bereavement coordinator since 2012. Her training includes a
Bachelor of Arts Degree in Political Science from Agnes Scott College and Master of Divinity from Columbia Theological Seminary, where she was
Group with Zeena will be light and freeing as much as it is also about attending to real grief and depth of meaning. Zeena is an astute observer of human nature and a truth teller in a way one can hear. She will help you be, too.
Bio continued from above:
honored with the HJ Riddle Memorial Award for excellence in pastoral care. She has also completed 4 units of Clinical Pastoral Education through the Georgia Care and Counseling Center and also the Pediatric Chaplaincy Institute at the Children’s National Medical System in Washington D.C. She is the founder of the Threshold Planning Project and also a frequent contributor to Presbyterians Today. She lives in Decatur with her spouse, nephew, and two happy, yappy pups.
Rodney Sadler
Mondays from 6 pm-8 pm
The Rev. Dr. Rodney S. Sadler, Jr., teaches Bible at Union Presbyterian Seminary in Charlotte and is the Director for The Center for Social Justice and Reconciliation. He studied Psychology and Philosophy at Howard University as an undergrad,
Group with Rodney will be stimulating, integrating multiple disciplinary sets of questions, examining root assumptions. Rodney has worked with many groups and studied dynamics to the point of culling down to the heart of any matter with revelations toward revolutionary action.
Bio continued from above:
completing his M.Div. in 1992. His PhD work at Duke University and Hebrew University was in Hebrew Bible and Biblical Archeology. An ordained Baptist minister, he is former Assistant Project Director with the Leadership Development Programs of the Congress of National Black Churches, the former director of the Office of Black Church Studies at Duke University Divinity School. He is the managing editor of the African American Devotional Bible, associate editor of the Africana Bible, and the author of Can a Cushite Change His Skin? An Examination of Race, Ethnicity, and Othering in the Hebrew Bible and co-author of The Genesis of Liberation. He has published articles in Interpretation, Ex Audito, Christian Century, the Criswell Theological Review, and the Journal of the Society of Biblical Literature and has essays and entries in True to Our Native Land, the New Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, the Westminster Dictionary of Church History, Light against Darkness, the Oxford Handbook on the Psalms, the Fortress Commentary on the Hebrew Bible, and several other publications. His research interests are at the intersection of race and Scripture, the impact of our images of Jesus for the perpetuation of racial thought in America, the development of African American biblical interpretation in slave narratives, the enactment of justice in society based on biblical imperatives, and the intersection of religion and politics. Dr. Sadler has been invited to serve as an expert on matters of race by Churches Uniting in Christ, the National Council of Churches, and the World Council of Churches. Dr. Sadler's work in the community includes terms as a board member of the N.C. Council of Churches, Siegel Avenue Partners, Union Presbyterian Seminary, and Mecklenburg Ministries (now Meck MIN), and currently he serves on boards for the Hispanic Summer Program, the NC Department of Environmental Quality’s Environmental Justice Advisory Committee, and the North Carolina Executive Committee of the NAACP. His activism includes work with the Community for Creative Non-Violence in D.C., Durham C.A.N., H.E.L.P. Charlotte, the U.S. Africa Ebola Working Group, the board of People Demanding Action, the Justice Action Mobilization Network (JAMN) and he has worked organizing clergy with and developing theological resources for the Forward Together/Moral Monday Movement in North Carolina. In addition, Dr. Sadler hosted a weekly national radio program for the People Demanding Action Network called, the "Politics of Faith." He currently serves as the NC NAACP chairperson of their Healthcare Committee.
Authenticity Groups
I have facilitated groups for the past 8 years. The groups foster safe ways for people to learn new skills for listening, to others but also to themselves, reflecting deeper awareness for the stories people tell themselves:
- about origins
- core values which create trajectories
- ways of seeing and knowing the world
- re-imagining work and pathways and callings
- thinking through relationships and how to communicate clearly about needs and wants
Groups provide “containers” in that everything shared is kept in confidence and treated with respect. Outside interactions are discouraged, so that people are safer to balance care for one another while opening up in vulnerable ways that empower, rather than dis-empower. The work of a group is to be a group. People who have participated in these groups have expressed deep knowing and feelings of attachment and security with and for one another and this has opened up group members to interact in more loving, boundaried ways with others in their lives outside of the groups.
We work on shaping world views, increasing tolerance and inspiring living life more fully, with meaning and direction and purpose.
Presence
Insight
Curiosity
Support
These are the tenets by which we covenant to function.
If you are seeking a safe way to build upon your life narratives... within a community of committed partners who do not rescue nor fix nor judge... but accompany you as you emerge and recreate new possibilities for yourself... this might be for you. 8 weeks, with 12 participants, then we reassess. There is a cost. If you live in GA, your insurance might provide coverage. Creating community that is expansive and generative is the plan. Co-Facilitators help the group create something positive and transformative.
These groups have been designed and formed out of my learning from trauma-informed practices, race histories and cultural humility learnings, inspired by the work of my long term mentor (Rev. Dr. Robert Gary) who taught group facilitation theory and method out of the Care and Counseling Center of Georgia and the Emory University Hospital Chaplains’ System. (Tavostock trained, psychoanalytically oriented, narrative psychodynamic, Object Relations theory, family systems and neuro-biologically based.)
Let me know if you are interested and what day/ time fits your schedule.