I love stories. I have about a dozen “pen pals” who I correspond with regularly via handwritten mail delivered by the U.S. postal service.  New episodes of the radio show This American Life is one of the highlights of my week. Other than being hobbies of mine, both of these facts have something else in common: they are windows to understanding the people and the world that I care about. How stories are told is just as important as what is being told and these are both channels through which stories are told well. Both hand written letters and hour long podcasts are small and large scale pieces of identity- of people I know well, people I do not know at all, and the world I live in. 

 

Understanding Identity is crucial to good relationships and to doing good professional communication. To understand identity is to understand what makes you you or your organization different from the other millions of organizations that exist. It is to know and understand all levels of ones identity as individual pieces, impossible to separate, and then to be able to communicate that as a way to better be known. I believe that once we are fully known, we can better achieve our goals. That goes for people, groups and organizations of all sizes.

 

I view my role in Public Relations as a middleman, as one who listens, reads and learns in order to understand more fully and then advocate for identity. Good communication is not only sending, but receiving. And if communication shapes the world, it is crucial to do both parts of it well. Good PR must not only focus on the messages that are sent, but how they will be received based on identity. I think the same can be said of ministry. 

 

My education and love for Women’s and Gender Studies has been so much more than learning about the women of history who have helped shape a more equal and less oppressive world. Nor is it simply a focus on the still ever present need for progress. While it is all those things, what draws me to this felid of study is the focus on identity.  To care about identity is to care about who people are, all of their layers and pieces, and to understand that those pieces create a reality of interlocking truths that shape the world just a little differently for every single person. This realization is a game changer relationally, academically and spiritually. The better we are known in a relationship, in my opinion, the better that relationship is. To understand the importance placed in identity in regards to gender, race, religion, class, sexuality, ethnicity, phenotype and personal history is to better understand the world we live in, and quite frankly, the gospel. 

 

As may have been gathered from the experiences I have had and will share, I have long been drawn to opportunities of ministry. My faith and my community have always been center points of who I am and who I want to be. I love studying scripture, different theologies, denominations and doctrines. Places of relational ministry are where I feel most comfortable and where I thrive. For this reason, adding Theology minor to my education made sense for me, but it is so much more than that. Understanding theology as an identity shaper has not only changed how I view ministry, and made clear what I believe is a vocation, but also how I view relationships, communication and public relationships. All of these pieces start to make up who I am and what I do- and I am so excited about how they go together to better root me in the gospel and relationships.