Carolyn Owen-Towle
The Creative Sageing Award for 2019 was presented to Carolyn Owen-Towle by Judy Welles at UURMaPA’s annual luncheon in Spokane on June 21. Here is the citation:
The Reverend Carolyn Owen-Towle has been a path-breaking minister throughout her years of distinguished service and leadership.
She was Co-Minister with her spouse, Tom Owen-Towle, at the First UU Church of San Diego, 1978 – 2002. While serving that large congregation, she was also asked to take on a series of leadership roles: President of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC), then President of the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association (UUMA). She was nominated as a candidate for President of the UUA in 1993, an election she narrowly lost.
Her commitments to social justice, collegial strengthening, and denominational leadership were integrated into her preaching and pastoral roles in ministry. Carolyn was named Minister Emerita by the San Diego congregation.
She now has had seventeen years of retirement. These years are what we honor with the Creative Sageing Award.
Carolyn resumed her engagement with the art world in which she was raised, and which she studied in college. In retirement she has pursued her ongoing exploration of the value and centrality of beauty.
Carolyn has given her passion for art to institutions devoted to it. She served as President of the Board of the Mingei International Folk Art & Design Museum in San Diego, and has been on the Board of that vital institution for some sixteen years. She also sits on the board of two artist foundations: that of Sam Maloof and of James Hubbel.
Carolyn wrote Damngorgeous: A Daughter’s Memoir of Millard Owen Sheets. It was published by The Oceanside Museum of Art in 2009. The title comes from a favorite expression coined by her late father. She quotes him in a letter saying he had “… two months to paint a real honest to gosh show, or in stronger language, a damngorgeous, supermaligorical pile of canvases.”
In 2017 Carolyn was named Distinguished Alumna of Scripps, on the occasion of her 60th class reunion. In her acceptance speech she noted the tectonic shifts in expectations and opportunities for women in the span of her education and career.
Carolyn is currently Chair of “HEResies,” an archive formed several years ago at Meadville Lombard for women clergy, religious educators and women leaders in our movement. Carolyn is working with John Leeker, Meadville Archivist, and Sarah Levine, Project Archivist, inviting women to submit their papers, which will be digitized. Meadville Lombard will make the collection accessible to anyone, anywhere.
Carolyn has been a partner par excellence to her spouse, Tom, and a devoted grandmother to their seven grandchildren.
UURMAPA is proud to honor The Reverend Dr. Carolyn Owen-Towle with the 2019 Creative Sageing Award!