From Rio de Janeiro to the West Midlands via Hertfordshire - an Assembly Accredited Lay Preacher's story 

Elisa Gusmão
 

I was brought up at a high Presbyterian church by a mother born in the German Lutheran colony in Southern Brazil and a father descended from Catholic Brazilian sugar farmers in the north of the country.
           
Our church was in the touristic area of Copacabana, famous for its beach. At the age of 13 I started teaching at Sunday School, working with the minister’s wife. A few years later, I was made leader of the Youth Union Spiritual Department.
 
My greatest pleasure was preparing the opening devotions for our meetings, for which I made ample use of slides and music – sometimes even pre-recording comments on the biblical passage read. These were the latest technological resources available in the late 50s.
 
The pulpit fascinated me, but I had no dreams of becoming a woman preacher, a totally ‘absurd’ idea in those days. Even Presbyterian elders and Methodist stewards were men.  Girls became teachers, nurses, or secretaries.  I made the option for the first of these professions but kept a tab on the young men studying at the Presbyterian Seminary in Campinas, exchanging letters with five of them. If I couldn’t be a minister, at least I’d be the wife of one of them!
 
In 1962 I married a Methodist minister, an intelligent man, but not one who believed in equal opportunities for women. He didn’t give me space to fulfil my willingness to serve. Nevertheless, whilst he worked on his master’s degree at the Union Theological Seminary in New York, I had the chance to attend a public speaking course for preachers and to join the multicultural and ecumenical Riverside Church.  The only request for acceptance as a member of that church was declaring publicly and loudly, "Jesus is Lord!"
             
Back in New York in the 80s, this time with my second husband, a Scotsman, God allowed us the blessing of worshipping and serving with the Riverside people for one year.
 
In 1987 we moved to the UK and made our home in Watford, transferring to St Thomas’ United Reform Church.  And here – finally – I became officially a preacher.
 
My first sermon was preached at St Mary's Catholic Church in Watford in the 1990s, when our dear minister, Revd Ken Strachan, wasn't available for a Christian Unity Week service.  Having received good feedback on my preaching, he then kept inviting me to replace him when there were gaps in the pulpit plan, finally proposing my name for TLS (Training for Learning and Serving) Course – the first step on the road to becoming an Assembly Accredited Lay Preacher.
 
Parallel to my work in the UK, I also started preaching at a free church in Ipanema on my annual trips to Rio de Janeiro.  That is the church where my mother, years after becoming the first woman presbyter in Brazil, was ordained pastor.  She served until her retirement at the age of 95.  This photograph shows her ordination in 2000, beside the Revd Edson Fernando de Almeida, Brazilian theologian, university lecturer and writer, main pastor of the free church in Ipanema - the ICI.
 
In Watford, about 5 years ago, a historical day for ecumenism came about when the St Thomas’ URC minister, Revd David Lawrence, and the North Methodist Church minister, Revd Geoffrey Farrar, started the process which led to the formation of a LEP (Local Ecumenical Partnership).
 
Revd Farrar proposed that members of the congregation who so wished could belong to both denominations. This was how I was received as member of the Methodist Church, later becoming one of its lay preachers as well.
 
One of the great advantages of my decision is training: I enjoy taking part in workshops and conferences both with the URC and the Methodist Church.  Throughout the years I have attended the Westminster Lay Preachers' Conferences in Cambridge and take active part in the URC Theology of Worship Group quarterly meetings, and in various Methodist Zoom workshops for lay preachers.
 
I enjoy these meetings and courses immensely, as well as whatever offers me the chance of discussing, proposing and hearing practical and ecumenical ideas for worship. The only thing that stopped me taking part in more of them was the fact I was my husband’s carer for a long time. He suffered with Parkinson’s Disease, so I always had to find a sitter or carer to be with him when I was absent.  He passed away in January 2025, a loss which presented radical decisions for me to make, including about returning to my family and country, or staying in the UK and serving the Lord here.
 
The call to go out and preach is very appealing to me, so much so, that, hearing that ‘a preacher who cannot drive is useless’, I joined a driving school and took my driving licence at an advanced age.  Of course, given all the dates mentioned above, you surely have already guessed I am a rather senior citizen – although very young at heart!

Upon moving to the Midlands from Hertfordshire, we transferred to the Solihull URC, a church that possesses a regular pulpit programme with long standing local preachers and, since November 2024, a new dynamic Minister.  Not being needed there, I offered my services to the Birmingham Circuit Methodist Church – whose superintendent welcomed me with wide open arms as a visiting lay preacher, keeping me very busy.  I would also like to become an integral part of their Directory, but it seems that by doing that I will lose my national accreditation with the URC.  Something to be examined.

All in all, it can be said that God called me and keeps pointing different directions and possibilities to me where He has work to be done.  He also provides the opportunities and the means for me to fulfil my role. That’s all one can wish as an answer to a call!