Alexandria Bordas of the Asheville Citizen Times reports:
All Souls Cathedral announced the hiring of internationally recognized public speaker and spiritual leader the Rev. Naomi Tutu to focus on social issues in the Western North Carolina region.
… Tutu is the daughter of South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a cleric and human rights activist who won the Nobel Peace Prize for his anti-apartheid work. She will start her new role, officially titled Missioner for Racial and Economic Reconciliation, on All Saints Day, Nov. 4.
She will work with fellow reverends to continue connecting with communities being pushed further to the fringes of Asheville, said [the Very] Rev. Todd Donatelli, dean of All Souls Cathedral.
… Tutu was raised during the apartheid movement in South Africa, at a time when being female and black was something to hide, not embrace, Tutu said in a statement following the announcement of her hiring.
“She shared with the clergy in June that decades later she still has the same fears she had during the apartheid,” Donatelli said. “But instead of fearing for her own life, she fears for her son walking the streets in the U.S.”
Matthew Townsend is a Halifax-based freelance journalist and volunteer advocate for survivors of sexual misconduct in Anglican settings. He served as editor of the Anglican Journal from 2019 to 2021 and communications missioner for the Anglican Diocese of Quebec from 2019 to 2022. He and his wife recently entered catechism class in the Orthodox Church in America.
