Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, March, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-03-20 19:00 - 20:30 (America/New_York)
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
March: Black Love Goals: Loving the Skin We’re In
April: I Know What I Know: Embracing Our Divine Power(s)
May: Under the Influence: Ancestral Knowledge and Discerning Our Truth
June: Embodying the Exhale: Breathing as an Act of Resistance
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for March below.
Register for April: HERE; May: HERE; June: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Writing Great Essays with Shawna Ayoub (via Zoom)
2024-03-23 14:00 - 16:00
I hesitated for years about trying my hand at creative writing, convinced I was not actually “a Writer” because if I were, I’d have written a book or something already. . . I had no idea that there were concrete exercises you could do to prod your creativity and get your imagination flowing, and I was often surprised at what I came up with! Shawna created a safe, supportive, encouraging space in which to step out on a limb and try. It was challenging, fun, rewarding, and totally worthwhile!
— Elaine
In this workshop, we will dive into the tenets of what makes a great essay, troubleshoot writer’s block, and work on enhancing our essays at the sentence level. Our aim will be to generate a framework for developing or already-written essays in order to better understand our own goals for the finished product. Whether you are seeking information about essay writing or trying to heighten your already-written essay, this workshop is for you.
Writers will take home a packet of writing examples as well as prompts, and can contact Shawna for written feedback within two weeks of this workshop.
Leader: Shawna Ayoub is a brown, queer, Durham-based writer and instructor whose work prioritizes the engagement of difficult topics. After recognizing the personal benefits of writing for release and recovery, she has made her practice public for the last 12 years, offering courses independently as well as through the Center for Creative Writing. Her work has appeared in Verywell Mind, Survivor Lit, Exit 7, [wherever], The Archipelago, and The Manifest-Station. Learn more about Shawna here.
Cost: $75, $100. Scholarships available. Please contact info@rcwms.org.
Register below. Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Women in Early Photography with MJ Sharp and Elizabeth Howie
2024-03-26 19:00 - 20:00
Photo: Frances Benjamin Johnston, Self-Portrait (as “New Woman”), 1896
In 1843 Anna Atkins self-published the first book of photography, “Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions.” In 1915 Imogen Cunningham did a set of images of her new husband on Mount Rainer as a nude figure in a landscape. For all of its relatively brief history, photography has been replete with women photographers being scientists, artists, and documentarians.
Join us for a lively presentation and discussion as Artist in Residence MJ Sharp is joined by Dr. Elizabeth Howie, a scholar of the history and theory of photography, to explore and discuss a variety of experiences of women photographers from photography’s beginnings in the mid-1800s to the 20th century.
Leaders: A photographic artist and educator based in Durham, North Carolina, MJ was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Exeter, UK, for the 2021–2022 academic year pursuing the art/science collaboration Our Disappearing Darkness and Recreating True Night with nocturnal ecologist Dr. Kevin Gaston. Learn more about MJ and her work here. Dr. Elizabeth Howie has taught Art History at Coastal Carolina University since 2008. Learn more about Elizabeth here.
Cost: Free. Registration is required.
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Loving Our Own Bones: A Reading with Julia Watts Belser (via Zoom)
2024-04-04 19:00 - 20:00
This is an extraordinary book: beautifully written and accessible yet filled with scholarly insights; profoundly spiritual yet also boldly critical; fiercely angry yet also affirming and joyous. Readers of Loving Our Own Bones will not only come away with a deepened understanding of disability and ableism but will also likely have their views of many biblical texts challenged and transformed.
— Judith Plaskow, coauthor of Goddess and God in the World

“What’s wrong with you?”
Scholar, activist, and rabbi Julia Watts Belser is all too familiar with this question. What’s wrong isn’t her wheelchair, though–it’s exclusion, objectification, pity, and disdain.
Join Belser and fellow author Melanie Morrison as they delve into Belser’s latest book.
Our attitudes about disability have such deep cultural roots that we almost forget their sources. But open the Bible and disability is everywhere. Moses believes his stutter renders him unable to answer God’s call. Jacob’s encounter with an angel leaves him changed not just spiritually but physically: he gains a limp. For centuries, these stories have been told and retold in ways that treat disability as a metaphor for spiritual incapacity or as a challenge to be overcome.
Through fresh and unexpected readings of the Bible, Loving Our Own Bones instead paints a luminous portrait of what it means to be disabled and one of God’s beloved. Belser delves deep into sacred literature, braiding the insights of disabled, feminist, Black, and queer thinkers with her own experiences as a queer disabled Jewish feminist. She talks back to biblical commentators who traffic in disability stigma and shame. What unfolds is a profound gift of disability wisdom, a radical act of spiritual imagination that can guide us all toward a powerful reckoning with each other and with our bodies.

Loving Our Own Bones invites readers to claim the power and promise of spiritual dissent, and to nourish their own souls through the revolutionary art of radical self-love.
Please note Zoom auto captions will be enabled for this event. An ASL interpreter will also sign the evening’s conversation.
Author: Julia Watts Belser (she/her) is a rabbi, scholar, and spiritual teacher, as well as a longtime activist for disability, LGBTQ, and gender justice. She is a professor of Jewish Studies in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Georgetown University and core faculty in Georgetown’s Disability Studies Program. Her latest book, Loving Our Own Bones: Disability Wisdom and the Spiritual Subversiveness of Knowing Ourselves Whole, won a National Jewish Book Award. She’s an avid wheelchair hiker, a devoted gardener, and a lover of wild places. Learn more about Belser here.

Cost: Free. Registration is required.
Purchase the book: HERE.
Please REGISTER by selecting a free ticket below. Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Japanese Tea Gathering
2024-04-05 11:45 - 13:15
Join RCWMS for a traditional Japanese Tea Gathering. Enjoy the calm simplicity of the tearoom and the natural beauty of the gardens.
The teahouse was built in 2007 as part of a sister city project between Durham and Toyama, Japan.
Our State magazine created a short video about the tea house.
Leader: Chizuko Sueyoshi. Her instruction on Japanese tea rituals began when she was a high school student. She says her aunt was her first tea instructor. Her appreciation for the tradition has evolved over the years. Her favorite part is sharing a bowl of tea with guests and conversing.
Location: Please meet at the Doris Duke Visitor Center in Duke Gardens.
Cost: $40
Register below.

Art of Conscious Aging: A Group for Women
2024-04-09 11:30 - 14:00 | via Zoom, Durham, NC, United States
During the pandemic Art of Conscious Aging is meeting via Zoom.
Contact info@rcwms.org to join the group.

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, April, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-04-17 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
April: I Know What I Know: Embracing Our Divine Power(s)
May: Under the Influence: Ancestral Knowledge and Discerning Our Truth
June: Embodying the Exhale: Breathing as an Act of Resistance

Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for April below.
Register for May: HERE; June: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Flash of Silver: Writing Workshop with Laurel Ferejohn - April 2024 (via Zoom)
2024-04-18 18:00 - 21:00
Flash: it’s crystalline and compelling. Many literary journals look for it, many writers want to know what it is and how to write it. In this three-hour online workshop for beginning to seasoned writers of memoir or fiction, you’ll learn about the form that stands proud in its brevity and that can boost all your other writing. Enjoy creating to prompts, with readings by any who’d like to share, and discussion. Ahead of class, the instructor will email examples of flash fiction and memoir (including one in-the-making!) and a list of thirty or more flash-friendly journals to read and to submit to.
Cost: $60
Leader: Laurel Ferejohn is a writer and independent editor with publications of flash fiction, flash memoir, a Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize–winning short story, essays, and poetry. She’s a believer in the power of writers coming together.

Writing the Body with Shawna Ayoub (via Zoom)
2024-04-28 14:00 - 16:00
Writing with Shawna Ayoub has been life-changing. I have taken several classes with her, both in-person and online, all focused on memoir. Under her visionary tutelage, I have created the most profound writing of my life. Her feedback is insightful, honest, and constructive. I live with chronic illness, and Shawna always meets me exactly where I am, helping me set achievable goals. Collaborating with her has made me a better writer, but perhaps more importantly, writing with Shawna has healed me.
-Jen DeRosa

It’s a well-researched fact that we store our emotional experiences in our physical bodies. On anniversaries of loss, for example, it is common to feel body pain, heaviness, or fatigue. In this workshop, we will practice feeling into our body stories safely in order to capture them in words. As a group, we will learn about how the body stores memory, and why, and take home practices for listening to the stories our bodies want to tell us. While this course is appropriate for writers at every level and of every genre, it can also be taken to build off “Writing Great Essays,” offered March 23.
Writers will take home a packet of writing examples as well as prompts, and can contact Shawna for written feedback within two weeks of this workshop.
Leader: Shawna Ayoub is a brown, queer, Durham-based writer and instructor whose work prioritizes the engagement of difficult topics. After recognizing the personal benefits of writing for release and recovery, she has made her practice public for the last 12 years, offering courses independently as well as through the Center for Creative Writing. Her work has appeared in Verywell Mind, Survivor Lit, Exit 7, [wherever], The Archipelago, and The Manifest-Station.
Cost: $75, $100. Scholarships available. Please contact info@rcwms.org.
Register below. Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

MJ Sharp Open Studio Tour
2024-05-02 18:30 - 20:00
RCWMS Artist in Residence MJ Sharp will lead a hands-on demonstration of a variety of vintage cameras and share the role they have each played in her artistic journey over the past decades. Photography is an art form in which, increasingly, you can make a picture when you didn’t mean to — accidentally pressing a button on your phone, for example. While serendipity is also part of the most affecting images from stand-alone cameras, preparedness and skill and a spirit of technical exploration are also required. Older cameras, due to their technical complexity, provide the photographer useful constraints to either embrace or press against, and without question, the successful picture will still be a surprise of the combination of the photographer’s intent and the camera’s nature.
Pictured: Dark Dill, from an 8×10 bellows camera

Leader: A photographic artist and educator based in Durham, North Carolina, MJ was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Exeter, UK, for the 2021–2022 academic year pursuing the art/science collaboration Our Disappearing Darkness and Recreating True Night with nocturnal ecologist Dr. Kevin Gaston. Learn more about MJ and her work here.
Cost: $10. Space limited. Proceeds to benefit RCWMS
Register below.

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, May, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-05-15 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
May: Under the Influence: Ancestral Knowledge and Discerning Our Truth
June: Embodying the Exhale: Breathing as an Act of Resistance
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for May below.
Register for June: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Playing with Shape and Color: Painting with Debra Wuliger
2024-05-19 13:30 - 15:30
Have you been longing to paint freely but the white canvas and choosing which paints to use feels like a mountain too high to climb? Sign up for “Playing With Shape and Color”, where artist Debra Wuliger will guide you to create an abstract shape design on a 9×12 inch canvas board by following her prompts. Then Debra will lay out the perfect mixing paints so that you can easily create a dazzling array of colors. This way you can relax and let your heart and hand move across the canvas. When we are done we will share our paintings and what moved us to create it.

Leader: Debra Wuliger delights in painting joyous geometric paintings full of vibrant color. She also delights in guiding others to listen to their own intuitive voice and create. You can explore her work here.

Location: The Trees, 1701 Pleasant Green Road, Durham, NC.
Cost: $40. Includes all supplies. Feel free to bring your favorite brushes and a painting smock.
Please register below.

Becoming the Second Person with Shawna Ayoub (via Zoom)
2024-06-02 14:00 - 16:00
Writing with Shawna Ayoub has been life-changing. I have taken several classes with her, both in-person and online, all focused on memoir. Under her visionary tutelage, I have created the most profound writing of my life. Her feedback is insightful, honest, and constructive. I live with chronic illness, and Shawna always meets me exactly where I am, helping me set achievable goals. Collaborating with her has made me a better writer, but perhaps more importantly, writing with Shawna has healed me.
-Jen DeRosa

Do you have a painful and true story you find yourself reliving each time you try to tell it? What about a story that’s stuck inside you because it feels too raw to be writeable, too vulnerable to be readable? Is being able to tell that story without suffering the key to releasing yourself from the trauma of the narrative?
What if you found out there is a way to create safe distance while still telling that hard story? To minimize trauma and (re)gain control of your narrative by no longer being your story’s first person?
What if you could be your story’s second person?
In this course, writers will engage second person works and practice writing in second person. Writers wil alsol take home a packet of writing examples as well as prompts, and can contact Shawna for written feedback within two weeks of this workshop.

Leader: Shawna Ayoub is a brown, queer, Durham-based writer and instructor whose work prioritizes the engagement of difficult topics. After recognizing the personal benefits of writing for release and recovery, she has made her practice public for the last 12 years, offering courses independently as well as through the Center for Creative Writing. Her work has appeared in Verywell Mind, Survivor Lit, Exit 7, [wherever], The Archipelago, and The Manifest-Station.
Cost: $75, $100. Scholarships available. Please contact info@rcwms.org.
Register below. Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Historic Stagville Emancipation Tour June 2024
2024-06-19 10:00 - 11:30
SOLD OUT! To place your name on the waiting list please register under the second ticket, Stagville 2024Junewait, below.
This guided tour will highlight how enslaved people claimed their freedom at Stagville in 1865. Each June, Historic Stagville offers special tours focused on Emancipation as part of the site’s commemoration of Juneteenth. The tour explores the detailed history of Emancipation on one of North Carolina’s largest plantations. Hear stories of how formerly enslaved families celebrated, defended themselves, and organized, while the plantation owners strategized to hold on to their power and wealth.
Historic Stagville, a state historic site in northern Durham County, includes remnants of one of the largest plantations in North Carolina. The Bennehan-Cameron family owned approximately 30,000 acres of land and enslaved about 900 people on this property. Stagville protects a fraction of the land from that plantation, including original housing for enslaved people (1851), a massive barn (1860), and a Bennehan family house (1787–1799). Stagville is dedicated to teaching about the lives and work of enslaved people on the plantation.
Don’t miss this opportunity to join Stagville staff and other community members in learning more about Emancipation at Historic Stagville. The tour will begin at 10:00 AM. Wear comfortable shoes and bring sunscreen. The tour will be mostly outdoors, with two short stops at historic buildings. The route includes walking over grass, gravel, and uneven ground.

Location: 5828 Old Oxford, Highway, Durham, NC.
Meet near the green office building by the parking lot at the back of the Historic Stagville property. Please allow sufficient time for the drive there.

Cost: $10/person. Additional donations to Stagville are welcome here.

Register below.

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, June, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-06-19 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.

June: Embodying the Exhale: Breathing as an Act of Resistance
July: I Remember When…: Revisiting Moments of Love, Longing and Living
August: Bag Lady: The Art of Letting Go
September: The Joy (and the Oh Boy) of Mothering While Black
October: Legacy: Gifting Our Wealth to Generations to Come
November: Honoring the Uncommon: Giving Thanks for the Unconventional
December: Perspective: Reflections on the Journey
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for June below.
Register for July: HERE. August: HERE. September: HERE. October: HERE. November: HERE. December: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

The Enneagram As a Tool for Liberation with Chelsea Yarborough (via Zoom)
2024-06-23 14:00 - 16:00
“Chelsea’s workshops bring the Enneagram to life! She helped me understand myself in new and important ways!”
– past workshop participant
This workshop is geared towards those who want to think about the Enneagram beyond the gifts it provides to us as individuals and think also about how it can serve us as a collective. If you care about people, community, justice, and hope for a whole and well world, this is for you. This workshop is for all experiences with the Enneagram. We will talk about the gifts/challenges of each number and engage how interconnected relationships truly support our work of liberation.
Leader: Rev. Chelsea Brooke Yarborough,PhD, is an Assistant Professor of African American Preaching, Sacred Rhetoric, and Black Practical Theology at Phillips Theological Seminary, an ordained minister, a poet, and an Enneagram coach. Learn more about Chelsea here.
Cost: $25, $40, or $60. Choose the price that fits your budget. Sliding scale also available. Contact info@rcwms.org.
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Good Grief: The Art of the Condolence Letter (via Zoom)
2024-06-30 14:00
There is little to say, Mr. Gilbert, when the heart is bruised.
–Emily Dickinson
If you’ve ever sat down to write a condolence letter and were at a loss for words, you’re not alone. In this workshop we will take a look at condolence letters from writers throughout history to find the inspiration we need to get words on the page in times of sorrow. Bring a notebook and your favorite writing tool.
Leader: Sara Williams, M.A., of Shrouding Sisters, is a home funeral guide and funeral/memorial celebrant, offering end of life education, counseling, and services throughout the Piedmont.
COST: $20
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Everywhere the Undrowned: A Reading with Stephanie Clare Smith, in Conversation with Jaki Shelton Green (via Zoom)
2024-07-11 19:00 - 20:00
“Everywhere the Undrowned is, somewhat unbelievably, Smith’s first book . . . . [it’s] a kind of prose poetry that recalls the work of famed writers like Denis Johnson and Raymond Carver . . . . not only a compelling memoir but a work of literature.”—Washington Post Book World
Join us for a reading with Stephanie Clare Smith, in conversation with NC Poet Laureate Jaki Shelton Green. Everywhere the Undrowned, r traces the events of one harrowing summer and its repercussions throughout Stephanie’s life, including her work with families in crisis and as a caregiver for the mother who abandoned her all those years ago.

Author: Stephanie Clare Smith is a writer from New Orleans, Louisiana, who resides in Raleigh, NC. She was recently honored with the Poetry of Courage award sponsored by the North Carolina Poetry Society. Everywhere the Undrowned is her first book. Learn more about Stephanie here.
Purchase the book: HERE.
Cost: Free. Registration is required.
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, July, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-07-17 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
July: I Remember When…: Revisiting Moments of Love, Longing and Living
August: Bag Lady: The Art of Letting Go
September: The Joy (and the Oh Boy) of Mothering While Black
October: Legacy: Gifting Our Wealth to Generations to Come
November: Honoring the Uncommon: Giving Thanks for the Unconventional
December: Perspective: Reflections on the Journey
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for July below.
Register for August: HERE. September: HERE. October: HERE. November: HERE. December: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Does It Have To Be A Memoir with Shawna Ayoub (via Zoom)
2024-07-21 14:00 - 16:00
I felt Shawna created a safe “container” that enabled me to feel safe and take risks to write about aspects of my experience. Shawna’s facilitation style was consistent, warm, affirming, sensitive, responsive and relational. As the sessions continued, I felt my curiosity growing and my playfulness in writing re-emerged. My love of creative writing was reignited after 45 years of lying dormant. I was particularly impressed with the way Shawna received the at times raw emotions of grief expressed in my writing about a fresh bereavement. that occurred whilst taking the course.

— Dr. Margaret Jordan, PhD

Recording our personal stories can be a taxing process, especially when we think of sharing them beyond our often very small circle of trusted readers. As writers, we draw our inspiration from life, observed and experienced. We then weave those truths artfully into stories that convey the distilled essence of our true stories, but does that mean we are writing memoir? How closely do we have to stick to the truth? What liberties are we allowed to take? When is it better to write fiction than fact? And how can we have integrity as writers if we are changing the narrative to meet our own writerly goals?

In this two-hour Zoom workshop, we will come together as a group and address these questions. Writers will be assigned reading the week prior to meeting in order to facilitate discussion. Based on what we uncover, we will practice writing our truths and fictions. Writers will be encouraged to share their work in order to support and learn from one another. All attendees will have the opportunity to submit work generated in this course for additional written feedback by the instructor.

Leader: Shawna Ayoub is a brown, queer, Durham-based writer and instructor whose work prioritizes the engagement of difficult topics. After recognizing the personal benefits of writing for release and recovery, she has made her practice public for the last 12 years, offering courses independently as well as through the Center for Creative Writing. Her work has appeared in Verywell Mind, Survivor Lit, Exit 7, [wherever], The Archipelago, and The Manifest-Station.
Cost: $75, $100. Scholarships available. Please contact info@rcwms.org.
Register below. Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Photography’s Journey from Singular Object to Everything Everywhere All at Once with MJ Sharp and Elizabeth Howie
2024-08-15 19:00 - 20:30
Artist in Residence MJ Sharp and Professor Elizabeth Howie return to talk photo! This time, rather than early women photographers, they will be exploring two related timelines in photography—that of the photograph as material object and how we understand the function of images in culture. How did we go from a treasured one-of-a-kind tintype to a personal firehose of images? Advances in technology made it possible, but advances in technology are never culturally neutral. What does the history tell us about how people responded to images in the early years of photography, and how are we to think about how images function in our lives now?
Leaders: A photographic artist and educator based in Durham, North Carolina, MJ was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Exeter, UK, for the 2021–2022 academic year pursuing the art/science collaboration Our Disappearing Darkness and Recreating True Night with nocturnal ecologist Dr. Kevin Gaston. Learn more about MJ and her work here. Dr. Elizabeth Howie has taught Art History at Coastal Carolina University since 2008. Learn more about Elizabeth here.
Cost: Free. Registration required.
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Pictured above:
Soldier and Companion (against an iPhoto library)
Tintype with brass mat and leather case
American, between 1861 and 1865
Detroit Institute of Arts collection

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, August, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-08-21 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
August: Bag Lady: The Art of Letting Go
September: The Joy (and the Oh Boy) of Mothering While Black
October: Legacy: Gifting Our Wealth to Generations to Come
November: Honoring the Uncommon: Giving Thanks for the Unconventional
December: Perspective: Reflections on the Journey
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for August below.
Register for September: HERE. October: HERE. November: HERE. December: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Jereann King Johnson Documentary Film Project Fundraiser
2024-08-25 15:00 - 17:00
RCWMS and Black Feminist Film School are producing a documentary about Warren County educator, community organizer, and quilter Jereann King Johnson. Join us for an exclusive sneak peek of our forthcoming documentary, meet Director Courtney Reid- Eaton and Film Editor Tamar Rachkovsky, and learn how your generous donation will help support and fund our groundbreaking project.
Read more about Jereann and the documentary project here.
Location: The Fruit, 305 S. Dillard Street, Durham, NC
Cost: $25, $50, $100, or $250. Pay what you can to support the film.
Photo by T. Hunter

The Enneagram Map to Your Deeper Self: Living Beyond Your Type - A Reading with Sandra Smith (via Zoom)
2024-08-29 19:00 - 20:00
With clarity in teaching and practicality in practices, Certified Enneagram Teacher Sandra Smith will join us to speak to and read from her book (released September 1) The Enneagram Map to Your Deeper Self: Living Beyond Your Type, which covers some of the wisdom Sandra has gleaned from more than two decades of teaching. She’ll offer some of the book’s blessings, prayers and practices. Additionally, she’ll address some of the teaching highlights from the Ego Idea of the types to our Enlightened Spiritual Perspective as she weaves personality and spirituality in this discussion. The book contains stories from guest writers or “Companion Voices,” who speak to their lived experience of their Enneagram type. These stories bring lots of heart and aliveness to the understanding of the Enneagram Map. Two of these guest writers will join Sandra to share their experience of writing a part of their own life story.

Sandra Smith

Lee Ensign Claudia Jiménez
With decades of teaching experience, author, consultant, and teacher Sandra Smith weaves her background in business and non-profits with her theological education to offer a practical and compassionate exploration of the Enneagram’s nine types. An accredited International Enneagram Association Professional (IEA)and certified in the Narrative Enneagram Tradition, Sandra co-created and co-hosts the podcast, Heart of the Enneagram, that explores dimensions of the nine unique Enneagram perspectives through interviewing guests of all nine types and co-authored its companion book, Heart of the Enneagram: A Companion for Deepening Personal and Spiritual Growth.
Sandra has presented at numerous International Enneagram Association Conferences in the USA as well as Canada, and is a speaker for SDI (Spiritual Directors International) conferences, speaking to the role of the Enneagram in Spiritual Companioning. Her love for the earth, and commitment to equity and inclusion inform her teaching and her living.
Learn more about her work by visiting her website. Or follow her on Instagram and on Facebook.
Sandra will be joined by Lee Ensign and Claudia Jiménez. Ensign is a clinical psychologist in independent practice, with particular interest in the interweave of somatic, psychological, and spiritual experience. She is a certified Enneagram teacher in the narrative tradition and lives in Knoxville, TN. Claudia Jiménez, MDiv is a proud mother of two young adult daugthers who enjoys travel, Latin dancing and spending quality time with family and friends. She is a Unitarian Universalist minister with a focus on justice engagement.
COST: Free. Registration is required.
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Bloom: An Exploration of the Enneagram with Chelsea Yarborough
2024-09-14 10:00 - 12:00
“Chelsea’s workshops bring the Enneagram to life! She helped me understand myself in new and important ways!”
– past workshop participant
The sign of any living thing is evolution. The journey from the seed to the roots to the plant breaking through soil is a beautiful one and not easy. In this workshop, we will talk about The Enneagram and the environments and practices that help each number move through the processes of growth to their season of Blooming. This workshop is great for anyone who has never touched the Enneagram to those who use it in their daily practice. We will move through each of the numbers and engage in activities that allow us to ask, “What might be my next bloom?”
Leader: Rev. Dr. Chelsea Brooke Yarborough, PhD, is the Associate Director of Leadership Programming at the Association of Theological Schools. Yarborough is a preacher, an ordained minister in the Baptist tradition, a poet, and an enneagram coach. Learn more about Chelsea here.
Cost: $25, $40, or $60. Choose the price that fits your budget. Sliding scale also available. Contact info@rcwms.org.
Location: Trinity Avenue Presbyterian, 927 W. Trinity Ave, Durham, NC.
Register below.

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, September, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-09-18 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
September: The Joy (and the Oh Boy) of Mothering While Black
October: Legacy: Gifting Our Wealth to Generations to Come
November: Honoring the Uncommon: Giving Thanks for the Unconventional
December: Perspective: Reflections on the Journey
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for September below.
Register for October: HERE. November: HERE. December: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Anti-Racism As Daily Practice: A Reading with Jen Harvey, in conversation with Melanie Morrison (via Zoom)
2024-09-19 19:00 - 20:00
“An essential book of practical wisdom…. If you’re white and have been asking, ‘What can I do now?’ this lively and timely book is for you.”
―Robert Jones, New York Times bestselling author of The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy
Antiracism as Daily Practice illustrates the many ways white Americans can choose behaviors in our everyday lives to grow racial justice. Full of real life stories, this book shows how vital it is for white people to engage in and with our families, through our social networks, in our neighborhoods, and at our jobs to make antiracism a daily living commitment. We have real power in our relationships with other white people–and not enough of us have used it. Dr. Harvey explains why we white people struggle with knowing what to do about racism, and explores the significance of emotions like grief and anger (as well as the harmful role of shame) in reckoning with the transformation and change needed in our communities to become the partners in justice that Black communities and other communities of color need and deserve.

Author: The Rev. Dr. Jennifer Harvey is a long-time educator and activist who passions continually revolve around white antiracism, who currently serves as VP for Academic Affairs and Academic Dean at Garrett Theological Seminary. Dr. Harvey’s books include the New York Times Bestseller Raising White Kids: Bringing Up Children in Racially Unjust America and Dear White Christians: For Those Still Longing for Racial Reconciliation, she’s written for the New York Time and CNN and appeared on nationally syndicated televisions and radio, including CNN’s Town Hall on Racism with Sesame Street and NPR’s “All Things Considered” with Michel Martin.
Purchase the book: HERE.
Cost: Free. Registration is required.
Register below.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Remaking a Memory with Shawna Ayoub (via Zoom)
2024-09-22 14:00 - 16:00 | via Zoom, Durham, NC, United States
Traumatic memories are formed differently than normal memories, and can be more intense and longer lasting. In addition, we can inform our own traumatic memories by rehearsing them. This looks like retelling the event to others, to ourselves, or writing it down. When we do this, we are at risk of introducing inaccuracies and potentially doing ourselves greater harm. However, when we write our traumatic memories, we are also presented with a powerful opportunity: to reframe them.

Reframing our difficult memories allows us to remake them in a way that serves us. In this two-hour Zoom session, we will learn how memories can be intentionally offered through multiple reframing techniques including altered point of view and writing the story as it should have happened. After our workshop, writers will have the chance to receive private written feedback from the instructor.

Leader: Shawna Ayoub is a brown, queer, Durham-based writer and instructor whose work prioritizes the engagement of difficult topics. After recognizing the personal benefits of writing for release and recovery, she has made her practice public for the last 12 years, offering courses independently as well as through the Center for Creative Writing. Her work has appeared in Verywell Mind, Survivor Lit, Exit 7, [wherever], The Archipelago, and The Manifest-Station.
Cost: $75, $100. Scholarships available. Please contact info@rcwms.org.
Register below. Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.

Suffering: A Cross-Disciplinary Conversation
2024-09-29 14:00 - 16:00
Join us at the Fruit in Durham for a wide-ranging conversation about depictions of suffering in art and theology. RCWMS Artist-in-Residence MJ Sharp will be exhibiting and discussing her Terror Triptych with Art Historian Elizabeth Howie as part of the 2024 Click! Photography Festival. They will be joined by Theologian-in-Residence Racquel Gill, who will be discussing foundational feminist theology texts such as Phyllis Trible’s Texts of Terror with RCWMS Founder and Director Jeanette Stokes.
The exhibit will be open beginning at 2:00 on Sunday, with the presentations beginning at 2:30. Audience questions and participation encouraged.
Leaders: A photographic artist and educator based in Durham, North Carolina, MJ was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Exeter, UK, for the 2021–2022 academic year pursuing the art/science collaboration Our Disappearing Darkness and Recreating True Night with nocturnal ecologist Dr. Kevin Gaston. Learn more about MJ and her work here. Dr. Elizabeth Howie has taught Art History at Coastal Carolina University since 2008. Learn more about Elizabeth here. Racquel Gill obtained her Masters of Divinity degree from Duke Divinity School in May of 2015, and currently serves as the Minister for Intercultural Engagement at Duke University Chapel in Durham. Racquel is the Theologian in Residence for RCWMS. Learn more about Racquel here. Jeanette is the founder and executive director of RCWMS. Learn more about Jeanette here.
Location: The Fruit, 305 S. Dillard St., Durham, NC
Cost: Free. Registration required.
Register below.

Pictured above:

Crickets panel from The Terror Triptych

MJ Sharp

Ministry of Black Women's Self Care, October, 2024 - with Kim Gaubault (via Zoom)
2024-10-16 19:00 - 20:30
Kim Gaubault recognizes that self-care is often the component that remains a form of intervention (after the break or the medical emergency) rather than a preventative measure. When we allow our bodies, minds and/or spirits to break down in the course of doing this work, we are not only putting ourselves at risk but we are putting at risk the integrity of the work for which we are laboring. This work is a work of self-love, communal love, Womanist Ethicism, it is multi-generational, multicultural and is not finite, but is instead as infinite as the beauty in the divinity that is Blackness. Come and share in this life’s work! This program is specifically designed to offer practical tools for everyday self-care to Black women-identified individuals doing all forms of ministry, in church and community.
October: Legacy: Gifting Our Wealth to Generations to Come
November: Honoring the Uncommon: Giving Thanks for the Unconventional
December: Perspective: Reflections on the Journey
Leader: Kimberly Gaubault (McCrae) is an intentional lover of humanity and actively lives the self-care life about which she teaches and advocates. Her personal philosophy of interpersonal interaction is, “If I’ve not positively influenced someone everywhere I’ve gone, I’ve not walked in my purpose.”
Cost: $10, $25, or $40
per session. Choose the price that fits your budget.
Register for October below.
Register for November: HERE. December: HERE.
Registrants will receive a Zoom link in the automated ticket confirmation.
