Celebrating the Divine Mother of All

 

First page of a worship service of herchurch (May 2, 2021)

Are you sick of the bearded White Guy in the sky?

Try herchurch in San Francisco, available by Zoom.  We worship the Divine Creator of all by using female nouns: Goddess, Mother, Grandmother, She Who Is, Her, Hers, Sister Spirit, Ruach (Hebrew), Sophia Wisdom (Greek and English), Shekinah (Hebrew), Living God/dess. 

We also use non-binary names: Spirit, Holy One, Great Mystery, the Sacred, Divine Soul, Tree of Life. Presence of Love. 

Since the Covid-19 pandemic began, our Liturgy of the Divine Feminine has been offered through Zoom on Sundays at 10:30 am.  You can request a link to visit the service by emailing Pastor Stacy Boorn at herchurch@aol.com.  The liturgy Zoom address is also posted on the herchurch website.  

Now that we can meet in person again, those who are local come together in San Francisco on Thursdays at 6 pm for a Litany for Sacred Gathering.  The address is 678 Portola Drive.  Women, men, and persons of any gender expression are welcomed.   

Order these facemasks from gaeaguild.com

Our harpist, Jack Pantaleo, is a composer and his work can be heard on Spotify. 

We offer a drum circle, sacred art classes, Goddess rosary, and singing circles.  Most of these events are currently available via Zoom. 

See also the Gaea Guild, an independent fundraising project by a member of the community.  These face masks featuring the words of Julian of Norwich can be ordered there.  All profits benefit herchurch.

May the love of the Goddess be ever in your heart!

Southern Baptists dump anti-black, anti-women leaders

Los Angeles Times on today's vote

Great news from the Southern Baptist Convention in Nashville!  

A moderate president was elected Tuesday on the second round of votes, repudiating two right-winger candidates Mike Stone and Al Mohler.  In a blogpost 11 years ago, Al sputtered against my 2010 article in Sojourners, "The Persistence of Patriarchy."  

 

Ed Litton, the new president, has expressed support for Black Lives Matter and for critical race theory, the analysis that all US institutions (educational, religious, economic, governmental) have a long history of racism that needs to be changed.  He supports acceptance of women as pastors.  Alas, he is not pro-LGBTQA.  

Well, the vote is "one small step... " 

Losing prominent SBC women like Beth Moore and losing some black churches has hurt the denomination and caused much interest in this year's convention.  Attendance was 19,000, twice as much as in 2019.

In March, Beth Moore, a prominent white evangelical teacher and author (no relation to Russell Moore), said in an interview that she could “no longer identify with Southern Baptists.” --Great summary by Ruth Graham in the LA Times today.

Meanwhile, Dr. Beth Allison Barr at Baylor University in Texas is waging a war on SBC misogyny with her book The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth.  Buy it and pass along to a Baptist friend.

Another book that influenced the vote is Kristen Kobes Du Mez's Jesus and John Wayne.  It traces how evangelicals moved from apolitical to supporting Ronald Reagan to supporting Trump, all the while cherry-picking and misusing the Bible.  She teaches at Calvin University in Michigan. Buy her book and pass it along--it just came out in paperback.  

Kristen  also published a book on Katharine Bushnell (1855-1946), The New Gospel for Women: Katharine Bushnell and the Challenge of Christian Feminism.  Bushnell was a late 19th C. to early 20th C. feminist, Bible scholar, and medical doctor.  She investigated the use of prostitutes by British troops in India.

Kristen spoke on Bushnell's anti-trafficking efforts in at the 2016 Gathering of Christian Feminism Today in Indianapolis.

Pastor Nancy Hastings Sehested is another SBC woman fighting for the right to preach and pastor a church.  Prior to 2000, she pastored a church, but when right-wingers took control of the convention, she was forced to give up her church.  She became chaplain at a maximum-security prison and also spoke to Christian Feminism Today.  

Now she serves as co-pastor of Circle of Mercy Congregation in Asheville, North Carolina.

Two important articles by her:

"News Alert: God speaks through donkeys, burning bushes, rocks--and women ministers" in Baptist News Global, 2017.

"By What Authority?" in Sojourners, 2017.  

Continuing concern about the SBC's sexual abuse problem also influenced the vote. See this opinion piece in the Washington Post by David Von Drehle on how the SBC's theology about women has resulted in sexual abuse.

Most notably, Russell Moore spoke out against SBC mishandling of sexual abuse and left the SBC by accepting a call to pastor a large Baptist church that is not part of the convention.

In February he resigned from his post as president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the SBC with a scathing letter that surfaced in March. 

See "The Scandal Rocking the Evangelical World" by Peter Wehner in The Atlantic, June 7, for more on Russell Moore and the impact of his letter.

Pray that the SBC folks will soon: 

• restore women to receiving ordination, preaching, and pastoring churches. 
• take firm action against sexual abuse by pastors and leaders of the SBC. 
• listen to younger members who accept faithful same-sex marriage as approved by God.

And be sure to praise God for these people putting the brakes on the denomination's race to the right in the last thirty years.  It's the largest Protestant denomination in the US with 10% of all American Protestants.

 

On Mothers Peace Day: cut the garbage

 

Don't give me any garbage about Mother's Day--flowers, breakfast in bed, saccharine cards.

It's Mothers Peace Day, set up by Julia Ward Howe and other activist women after the Civil War to stop the killing of our children in wars.  She wrote her Mothers Peace Proclamation in 1870, and the first demonstration was held in 1872 in New York City.

The Mother’s Day Proclamation was partly a lament for the useless deaths and partly a call to action to stop future wars. The call was directed, not to men, many of whom may have felt proud for their “service,” but to women, who often have proved more thoughtful and humane about issues of human suffering.

Mother’s Day Vigil for Peace by Voice of Women (VOW) at the Royal Ontario Museum on May 11, 1963. Photo B. Palmer Ward, Toronto Telegram.

Then, on June 2, 1872, in New York City, Julia Ward Howe held the first “Mother’s Day” as an anti-war observance, a practice Howe continued in Boston for the next decade before it died out.  (from website above)

Now on the streets of American cities in this godless, gun-filled culture we inhabit, those who birth and those who don't all demand an end to killing. 

Stop lynchings by cops.  Stop executions.  Pull American troops out of Afghanistan and every other country where we are waging active wars.  Use diplomacy, not weapons.  

Abolish the police, or at least take their guns away.  Let them keep the peace with tasers and billy clubs, or get rid of them.  Let 911 calls lead to trained de-escalation teams.  

I go into hiding 2-3 days before the onslaught of every grocery store clerk and every television newscaster wishing me a Happy-Sappy Mother's Day.  

I never go to church on this profaned holiday.  It's not safe from saccharine.  Today I will give my new church by Zoom, HerChurch in San Francisco, a chance.  At the first drop of syrup, I will pull the plug.

My kids can do an action for peace on this day.  Or they can clean all the bathrooms in the house if they want to make me happy.

When they were 9, 6, and 4 years old, I took them to a Mothers Peace Day event in Orange CA sponsored by Medea Benjamin, who in 2002 co-founded the antiwar group called Code Pink.  She went on to co-found the human rights group Global Exchange.

Now my daughters Roz, Ellen, and Marie call or visit saying "Happy Peace Day, Mom,"  and usually make a donation to a feminist peace organization.  I trained them well.   

By the way, attending HerChurch turned out to be a safe choice today.  May 8 is the feast day honoring Julian of Norwich (1343-1416 or so), and Pastor Stacy Boorn centered our worship on Julian's famous words, "As truly as God is our Father, so truly is God our Mother."  

See more about Jesus as our Holy Mother in this post by Kittredge Cherry on the blog QSpirit: "Julian of Norwich: Celebrating Mother Jesus."

In the "Prayers of the People" portion of today's worship, Jennifer Mantle led us with these petitions and others:

Please pray for the mothering spirit in each of us, however it expresses itself.

Pray for those who wish to become mothers but have not been able to realize this desire.

Pray for those who have troubling relationships with their children...

Pray for mothers who have lost children...

Pray for us as we mother ourselves...

Pray for our first trans bishop, the Reverend Dr. Megan Rohrer (elected bishop yesterday in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America).   

Bill Barr & his Department of Injustice

President Biden has been doing such a great job that I thought I could relax and not follow the news 4-5 hours per day.

That trust lasted about a week, from the day Biden gave his speech to Congress until this week.

Yesterday on the car radio I heard that a federal judge, Amy Berman Jackson, had looked at the memo written by the Department of Justice for then-Attorney General William Barr to support his claim that there was nothing worth charging Trump with in the Mueller report.

Judge Jackson looked at the memo supporting Barr's claim that he and the DOJ lawyers had studied the report and concluded that Mueller had produced no evidence of federal crimes done by Trump--no obstruction of justice during his campaign for president or after he was elected.

She realized that the memo was a mishmash designed to come up with a predetermined conclusion: "Nothing worth bringing Trump to court."

Back in March 2019 when we read the Mueller Report and its carefully documented 11 conclusions, and then we heard Barr's conclusion of "Nothing here," many of us said "Wha-a-a-at?"

Barr insisted that the DOJ memo supporting his claim could not be released publicly. Too special for anyone to read. But Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) sued for release of the memo.

This past week, or earlier, Judge Jackson got her hands on it.

She released her assessment of the report yesterday, saying that Barr was being "disingenuous" when he claimed he and the DOJ had studied and concluded that Trump could not be charged. That 5-syllable word is a polite way of saying Barr lied.

He had demanded that his underlings at the DOJ come up with some kind of reasoning to excuse Trump and keep him from being tried in court. The conclusion came before the studying of the Mueller Report, she determined.

See Spencer S. Hsu's analysis in the Washington Post today.

Judge Jackson went on to order public release of the #doj Legal Counsel memo excusing the former guy from prosecution.

I'm feeling resigned now that I need to continue to watch politics in Washington like a hawk.

I'm grateful, however, to all the voters in Georgia who helped to elect President Biden and then elected Senator Raphael Warnock and Senator Jon Ossoff, giving Democrats 50 votes in the Senate and enabling them to take control away from Mitch McConnell and the GOP.

Because of these Georgia voters and all the rest of us who voted for Biden in November 2020, we have a new attorney general: Merrick Garland. He is pursuing justice in the Department of Justice.

The former guy may now actually face criminal charges and be tried.

Let's lock him up, and Bill Barr too. Both of them. No one is above the law.

If you do not obey the law, you will be prosecuted.

The US has two choices: clean house and restore democracy--or face more criminal presidents in the future, men who want to be tyrants and don't mind asking Vladimir Putin for help in getting to power and staying there, even if they lose an election.

Listen to this MSNBC report:

https://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/judge-slams-former-ag-barr-s-disingenuous-spin-of-mueller-probe-111368773875

Jesus and George Floyd: the last day

Vincent van Gogh - "Olive Orchard" in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri

This Van Gogh painting is called "Olive Orchard."  It reminds me of seeing the garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem two years ago... very similar.

I was moved to be able to kneel and pray among those trees where Jesus knelt two thousand years ago, on the night before he died and probably many times before that.

The Gospel of John provides quite a long summary of  Jesus's talk with his disciples at the Last Supper.  He seems to be worried about his followers, giving them a crash course in how to carry on.  He tells God, "I protected them in your name... I guarded them." 

Several times he asks the Holy One to protect them, also saying "protect them from evil."  Was he worried about the evil they might commit or about the Roman soldiers soon to execute him?

That very evening the disciples had been arguing over which one of them was the greatest (see Luke 22:24-27 and also Matthew and Mark). 

I wonder if Jesus foresaw what a mess the church would become at times--the greedy popes, the Crusades, the right-wing Christians supporting Trump.  If so, he also foresaw the saints and many sincere but humble followers.

He kept asking his disciples to "abide in me" like branches of a vine connected to the trunk and roots.  He prayed "that they may all be one."  Well, we know how that worked out.  Christians are splintered into many sects.  

On the other hand, I guess the first group stayed connected to Jesus and the Creator long enough to "bear much fruit," as he was hoping.

"Little children, I am with you only a little longer," Jesus said. "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you..." (John 13:33-34).

Because of these words, the day of the Last Supper came to be called Maundy Thursday in English cultures.  

For many centuries, priests read the Bible in Latin.  "New commandment" is mandatum novum in Latin.  In English, Mandatum Thursday became shortened to Maundy Thursday.

Of course, Jesus would have been speaking Aramaic (a language related to Hebrew), not Latin or Greek.  The Hebrew for new command is פקודה חדשה (pekoodah hadashah).  

In fact, this command wasn't really new; see for example Leviticus 19:18.  Maybe Jesus is stressing it at this point because he won't be around to stop their quarreling. 

On Good Friday 2021, instead of focusing exclusively on the crucifixion, let's spend some time reading Jesus's last words as recorded in the Gospel According to John, chapters 13 through 17.

This year many of us in the US are spending Holy Week focused on another man killed by his government, George Floyd.  He died on May 25, 2020, because of all our sins--our racism, our historicially flawed police systems, and our inattention to funding things like drug rehab programs, Covid relief, and better-trained first responders. 

Just as we are getting to know George Floyd in his last day,  through the trial of the man who killed him, let's focus on what Jesus was saying in his last 24 hours.  

Note: There are shorter summaries of that dinner discourse in Matthew 26:20-35, Mark 14:17-26 and Luke 22: 14-38.

Days 1,2,3 in painful-to-watch trial

911 Dispatcher Jena Scurry explaining why she reported
use of force to police sergeant

"Today I look at you as a maggot," said Charles McMillian to Derek Chauvin as the ambulance left with George Floyd's body.  

On Day 3 of the trial, he testified that he had said to Derek Chauvin five days before May 25, 2020, "I'm going to respect you.  At the end of the day, you go home safe to your family, and the next person go home to his family safe."  

But after witnessing the murder, he immediately told Chauvin that his view had changed; he now saw him as a maggot.

He said these words after having been polite to the officers for an hour, trying to intervene and save George Floyd's life.

McMillian's education ended after third grade, but morally and as a human, he was miles ahead of any of the officers who showed up.

Darnella Frazier, a passerby entering Cup Foods with her little cousin, was the star of the second day.  Here's an excerpt from the New York Times report on Day 2 of the trial.

As her voice cracked, Ms. Frazier described how what she witnessed that day last May had changed her life. She sometimes lies awake at night, she said, “apologizing to George Floyd for not doing more and not physically interacting and not saving his life.”

“When I look at George Floyd, I look at my dad,” she added. “I look at my brothers. I look at my cousins, my uncles because they are all Black. I have a Black father. I have a Black brother. I have Black friends. And I look at that, and I look at how that could have been one of them.”

This trial is riveting, heartbreaking for anyone who is human. 

It's also triggering for anyone who is Black.  It calls up fears and memories of police violence, whether personally experienced or through friends or news events such as the Rodney King beating.

"I've been avoiding it all week," said Baratunde Thurston, a writer, comedian, and commentator.

A black friend says she is not able to watch the trial; it's too painful.  She expects it to end with Chauvin getting little or no jail time.

As a white person, I'm able to watch it, but even for me the testimony and video are horrific.

Prosecutors Jerry Blackwell and Erin Eldridge, we're depending on you.

Testifying on Day 1:

911 dispatcher Jena Scurry, who called the police dept. sergeant to report the mishandling.

"Something might be wrong," she testified.  "I became concerned... My instincts were telling me that something was wrong...  I took that instinct, and I called the sergeant."

Passerby Donald Williams, a mixed martial arts fighter and an expert on chokeholds.  He said that the type of chokehold Derek Williams was using is called a "blood choke, a tactic that hinders air circulation from the head to the rest of the body."  He felt that George Floyd was murdered and called the police on the police immediately afterward.  He was cross-examined on Day 2.

From the Minneapolis StarTribune:  As Williams watched the viral video shot by a fellow bystander, he told the court that Chauvin was shifting his weight on purpose repeatedly to tighten the hold on Floyd's neck, what the witness called a "shimmy." At one point, he said Floyd was trying to fight "through the torture."

See also video of Day1 of the trial 

https://www.startribune.com/witness-derek-chauvin-purposely-shifted-weight-to-add-pressure-on-george-floyd-s-neck/600039838/

Testifying on Day 2:

Darnella Frazier, a passerby was asked by the prosecuting attorney, "How did this event change your life?"  See her answer above.

Darnella's 9-year-old cousin also testified very movingly.

Genevieve Hansen, an off-duty fire fighter and paramedic, urged police to stop choking him and check his pulse.  They ignored her. During her cross-examination, this exchange took place (as reported in the Washington Post):

When [defense counsel] Nelson asked whether Hansen would describe the “demeanor” of others around her as “upset or angry,” Hansen gave a cutting response: “I don’t know if you’ve seen anybody be killed, but it’s upsetting.”

There was murmuring.

The judge reprimanded her for arguing with the defense lawyer's question.  She continued testimony on Day 2.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/30/us/george-floyd-witness-darnella-frazier.html

Testifying on Day 3:

Passerby Charles McMillian (see above). 

Christopher Martin, 19-yr-old cashier who challenged the $20 bill and is grieving over having told his manager, who called the police.

Video excerpts of Day 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCFKQBo8j_Y

CNN report on Day 3

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/03/31/charles-mcmillian-chauvin-trial/

"Biblical womanhood" isn't biblical

Photo courtesy of Dallas News

This op-ed by Beth Allison Barr stopped me in my tracks as I started reading. 

https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2021/01/17/the-women-in-the-bible-do-not-match-the-evangelical-vision-of-biblical-womanhood/

"The deliberations of the elder board were short, too. My husband was to be fired as youth pastor," writes Dr. Barr, a history professor at Baylor University in Texas.

She and her husband had reached "the point at which my husband and I were willing to risk our ministry by challenging pastoral authority, especially over the unequal treatment of women in our church."

I was trying to review email and tweets efficiently before going to bed, but I had to stop and cry.

Dr. Barr is on a campaign to get evangelical churches back on track with what the Bible really says about women.

Other Southern Baptist women are also reconsidering the "women obey your husbands" and "women may not preach" theology.  Here's an Associated Press report.

For example, the well-known Bible study media figure Beth Moore recently left the Southern Baptist Church over its relegation of women to second-class status.  Because she is a popular Bible teacher, her exit in March is still making a lot of waves.

Many churches have book clubs, and women especially are reading and changing their minds on these once-standard maxims of church teaching: "Women must submit to their husbands" and "Women must not preach."

Start using this hashtag in your social media posts and tweets: #endchristianpatriarchy

You can get the sticker by pre-ordering Dr. Barr's forth-coming book, The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth.

Boulder shooting, school bullying

Los Angeles Times report, March 25, 2021

My brother is freaking out about people who excuse the Boulder shooter because he was bullied.

Here's my reply:

The kid clearly has a screw or two loose, one dud out of 11 kids in the family. I figure his parents have a batting average of 900. 

Don't let a few bleeding heart comments get to you. Of course he was bullied like everyone else who stuck out in any way. But not everyone kills ten people. 

Of course he'll get life in prison. End of story. As Al-Anon says, accept what you cannot change. A few bleeding hearts are always going to say things like that. 

(Note: I am a champion bleeding heart.)

My brother Jim lives in Arvada, Colorado, where the killer also lives or lived before he went to jail.  Jim's two sons went to the same high school as this killer.

He and his wife knew one of the victims, Suzanne Fountain, a dental patient of Jim's wife who worked as a Medicare consultant and helped them find the best Nedicare supplement plan for their needs and budget. 

Clearly, Jim has reasons to be outraged by the murders and by any sympathy for the killer.

But I hope he moves on to focus on ways to effect change, not on comments that increase his anguish.

Ways to prevent these mass murders from happening again include:

• Enact gun control.
• Do background checks.
• Require waiting periods after applying to buy a gun.
• Allow cities to enact gun control 
• Improve access to mental health services.

And yes, decrease bullying in high schools. 

Thank you to Los Angeles Times reporters Jaweed Kaleem @jaweedkaleem and Melissa Etehad @melissaetehad.

Resources:

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2021-03-24/boulder-shooting-gun-reform

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/03/23/guns-boulder-shooting-assault-weapons-ban/

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/03/23/us/boulder-colorado-shooting#the-suspect-was-prone-to-angry-outbursts-according-to-former-classmates

An Inconvenient Truth from The Guardian

Editorial in The Guardian, March 8, 2021

What an experience to witness Oprah Winfrey interviewing Meghan Markle and Prince Harry.  I felt that I was watching another episode of The Crown.

Thank you to The Guardian for pointing out the obvious: that the monarchy is no longer relevant.  

Yes, "Whether a hereditary head of state is required today ought to be considered...."

The monarchy is a relic of the day when colonialism was okay, racism was legal, and equality was heretical.

The radicals in Britain's North American colony who declared their independence also sowed seeds that would eventually dissolve the monarchy: 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal....

If all humans are created equal, no one has a birth right to rule over others. 

The king and queen of England do not rule by divine right or any other right except social consent. Parliament and the public have the responsibility to decide whether retaining the monarchy serves a useful purpose.

By their racism against Meghan and her children, the royals have proven that they are no longer useful.

Like France, England needs to remove the monarchy as a relic of history. 

See also in The Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/mar/08/meghan-has-been-mistreated-for-years-but-her-interview-still-shocked-me

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/live/2021/mar/08/harry-meghan-oprah-interview-duke-duchess-sussex-toxic-environment-live-news

In Memory of Allene Winkfield Pera, 105 years

Taken from obituary by her daughters Donna and Trish

Allene Winkfield Pera, age 105 and a true Colorado pioneer, passed away February 22, 2021 at Mercy Hospice House in Durango, Colorado from injuries sustained in a fall. 

She was born July 17, 1915 to Floyd Jacob and Leafy Ellen Winkfield in Nucla, Colorado. 

As a child, she lived in numerous mining camps and towns including Ute Mesa, Nucla, Naturita, Dolores, Rico, the Doctor Camp and Pinon. 

Her life was simple, hardscrabble but rich in the memories made when poverty is a challenge.  Allene loved dancing and even played in a small dance band where the wages were meager and sometimes given in food. At one of those dances she met Walter Pera, a handsome Finn from Telluride. They married July 29, 1936 and moved to Telluride.

In 1939, Walter and Allene moved with their young son, Jack to the deserted mining town of Tomboy 3,000 ft. above Telluride. They were the sole occupants of the town while Walter operated the switching station for the Western Colorado Power Company. 

She coped by learning to knit, sew, quilt, cook, garden and preserve their own food. 

In her eighth month of pregnancy with their second child, the family made an arduous journey to Telluride for the expected delivery of the baby. 

They travelled on snowshoes to the Smuggler Mine, then ventured through the underground workings, going down 5 levels on long ladders to reach a lower level where they were transported by ore car to exit the mine. From there, they rode an open aerial ore tram to the Telluride valley floor. 

Two weeks after the birth of their daughter, Donna, the family of four reversed the process to travel back home to the Tomboy.

After moving back to Telluride, the family grew with the addition of daughter Patricia, and sons Walter Edward and Ronald. 

Allene loved to bake, especially breads, and soon became known as “The Cinnamon Roll Lady.”  She also prepared many picnics for her family’s favorite pastime of exploring the back country in the mountains surrounding Telluride. 

They also enjoyed spending time at their cabin at Trout Lake, which Walter built from discarded railroad ties.

In the summer of 1956, Walter and Allene transferred to Electra Lake, north of Durango. They lived in near isolation there for 15 years and then returned to their beloved Telluride until Walter retired. 

They then moved to Nucla, purchased a whole city block and developed it into a mobile home park. During their retirement years together, they enjoyed searching the hills around Nucla for petrified wood, dinosaur bones and rock art and travelling extensively in Europe, Canada and Mexico as well as the United States.

Walter and Allene returned to live in Durango through their final years.  They had been married 70 years when Walter passed away July 4, 2006 at the age of 92. After a short time with family in Texas, she moved to Sunshine Gardens Assisted Living Center where she continued to enjoy knitting and quilting, playing dominoes and cheering for the Colorado Avalanche Hockey team. 

In her later years, she completed her last quilt at the age of 103. From ages 95 to 102, she produced 156 knitted baby blankets for Project Linus. She celebrated her 100^th birthday with a grand party attended by 64 members of her family. 

At the age of 101, she was interviewed by National Public Radio and the Rico Museum for her memories of early life in the Colorado Rockies. In 2018, at the age of 103, she was honored as the Grand Marshall of the Rico July 4^th Parade.

Allene was preceded in death by her parents, her husband Walter, sisters Kathryn Penasa and Valera Tobin, sons Jack and Ron, grandson Travis Pera, and granddaughter Linda Gann. 

She is survived by daughters Donna Pera Burr of Durango; Patricia Pera John of Eugene, Oregon; and Walter Edward (Eddie) Pera of Salt Lake City, Utah, as well as 14 grandchildren, 33 great grandchildren and 10 great, great grandchildren. 

A family gathering in Durango in the summer will celebrate Allene’s life.

Donations in memory of Allene Pera can be made to Mercy Hospice House in Durango, Colorado.