Church Careers and Change
Submitted by Cheri Brady Qualls ’79
I came to Centenary College in 1975 from Albuquerque, NM. I was recommended by a college youth leader to check out a new program called Church Careers. I was 21. I was offered a full tuition scholarship to this program. I had some other college credits that were able to be transferred.
The school found me a part time job at Commercial National Bank, and I picked up a child sitting job in the evenings to defray my living expenses. Every student in the Church Careers program was assigned an internship at a church. Mine was at Kings Highway Christian Church working with the elementary students. Because I was a single female, I was not allowed to work with the high school kids.
There were so many things to adjust to during my stay in Shreveport. First, there was the whole "southern drawl" that was like a different language. I was from the southwest, people I worked with and went to school with thought I was the one with the accent. I was required to stay in the dorm because I was not yet 22. (You could live off campus once you turned 22.) Dorm life for college freshmen and sophomores from my perspective was full of loud music, girls constantly on the phone, laughter, tears, slamming doors, and some girl's boyfriend bouncing his basketball on the floor above me. There were friendships and study sessions, and the all-nighters. I moved off campus and things got quieter and academically more focused.
When it comes to favorite teachers, teachers that had a life changing impact on my life, they would be Dr. Webb Pomeroy and Dr. Donald Emler. Dr. Pomeroy taught me so much about the Bible. His insights to the Old and New Testament as well as the major prophets inspired in me on a lifelong journey in research and discovery of how the history and societal interactions shaped the old and new covenants of the Bible. He made the Bible come alive in his classroom. He challenged us to ask questions about what and why we believe what we do. This inspiration has stayed with me all of my life. My major at Centenary through the Church Careers program was Christian Education. Dr. Emler was my teacher, my mentor, and my advisor. His enthusiasm for Christian education was infectious. He pushed us to be thoughtful and creative when working with kids of all ages to learn about the Bible and grow their faith. He helped us understand what it means to work with volunteer church teachers, how to integrate into a church staff, and how to get parents on board with teaching goals. As interns, we met weekly as an entire group to discuss changes and challenges we were seeing in our churches. Dr. Emler worked with us to navigate the changes we were seeing as well as how those changes that could affect our futures. He understood how some of the changes we were seeing then could affect future adults in the church.
Here are some of the things that came up in these meetings:
Women taking stronger leadership roles in the church, i.e. preachers and pastors and female Episcopalian priests.
Desegregation acceptance in some churches. The church that I interned at did not have anyone of color in its congregation. The one Sunday I brought a friend of mine who was African American; she was made to feel so uncomfortable by stares and whispers, she said she would never come again. It was suggested to me later by the powers that be to rethink bringing her again.
Even back then there were discussions about acceptance of the LGBT community.
Discussions about women and higher education in a seminary school. I was turned away from Brite Divinity School in Ft. Worth, Texas because I was single. I was told that my acceptance at this school would preclude a future preacher from being accepted. I was told that if I wanted to attend, to go find a husband, not to get my master’s degree.
I graduated in 1979 from Centenary College. So much of what I learned I have carried with me all of my life. I have been a teacher for a good part of my life and always have been a part of the church. It is my understanding that the Church Careers program has changed significantly over the years but for those of us who remember those early days, I believe we were more prepared to deal with the changes that have come with time.
