Each year, DuBose Awards are bestowed on worthy people who have been serving the Church and their communities in a number of ways. This year, there were two remarkable women given DuBose awards in recognition of selfless body of work over a lifetime.
Phebe Carter Hethcock received the DuBose Award for Service during the DuBose Lectures dinner. She became an Episcopalian when she was confirmed as a freshman while studying at the University of Texas at Austin. It was there in 1972 that she met and married the Rev. William Hoover "Bill" Hethcock (1932-2018), a priest of The Episcopal Church for more than 57 years.
The couple moved to Sewanee in 1979, where Bill held a variety of positions at the School of Theology before becoming professor of homiletics until retirement in 1997. Phebe and Bill are both well known for their philanthropy and hospitality extended to all members of the School of Theology, but especially the students whose generous scholarship has funded Hethcock Scholars.
Phebe has been an Education for Ministry (EfM) mentor and trainer, and served as an editor on the EfM committee for the first revision of that curriculum. She has served the greater Church and Sewanee community as a member of the vestry at Otey Memorial Parish, as delegate to Diocese of Tennessee Diocesan Convention, deputy to two General Conventions of The Episcopal Church, and through her major leadership roles with Episcopal Church Women, The Society of the Companions of the Holy Cross (SCHC), Christian education, and Education for Ministry. Phebe also served two terms on the board of St. Andrew’s-Sewanee.
Ginny Slichter, the DuBose Award for Social Justice recipient, is the mentor of an Education for Ministry (EfM) seminar group in State Correctional Institute (SCI) Phoenix (formally SCI Graterford), a maximum-security prison for men in Collegeville, Pennsylvania, just outside Philadelphia. She has mentored there for more than 13 years, and the men who have been in her groups (where there is always a waiting list) describe her as one who embodies for them the Love of God. At a recent EfM graduation at the prison, the graduates gave testimony about the grace with which Ginny has walked with them in their desire to transform their lives. Most of these men will never leave that prison.
Slichter is one who has taken her EfM preparation for ministry in daily life very seriously. In addition to her service in the prison, she is a retired nurse, a member of the Daughters of the King, a board member of a fund that awards scholarships to family members of the incarcerated, and serves in numerous other ways in her parish and diocese. Slichter was recently awarded the Bishop’s Medal for her service by the Rt. Rev. Daniel Gutiérrez, Bishop of Pennsylvania. She has mentored local EfM groups and is a tireless advocate for the program she feels enriches the ministry of all, including those who are in prison.
