LWV Park Rapids, with support from Lakes Country Chamber of Commerce, and Park Rapids Enterprise, is hosting Citizenship in an Anxious World. The program will be on Thursday, May 2nd, in the Northwoods Bank Community Room. It will start at 6:30 pm. It is free and the room is handicapped-accessible. We will have several guest speakers including:
Joshua Hawn: the pastor of First Baptist Church for the last fourteen years. He met his wife Amy at MBBC (Watertown, WI), and after getting a B.A., moved to Park Rapids. He has five children who keep him as busy as his church family and other community commitments do.
Pastor Stephen C Norby: the Lead Pastor at Calvary Lutheran Church, Park Rapids since 2009. He has a Master of Divinity from Luther Seminary St. Paul and a B.A. from Concordia College with majors in Religion and Psychology.
Jessica Baum: a trauma informed clinical mental health professional at GroupWorks Wellness and Recovery Services for five years. She has a B.A. from the University of St. Thomas in Communication and M.A. from St. Mary's University of MN., in Counseling Psychology. Jessica's professional focus is healing grief and trauma through compassion training, self-care and mindfulness practices for mental health recovery.
Kent Hering: a 20+ year resident of northern Minnesota and a retired Electronics Engineer. In retirement, Kent and his bride pedaled across America from San Diego to Bar Harbor, Maine. On the journey, Kent was touched by the heart of America. The kindness of strangers transcended opinions and politics. After that journey, Kent became an Ambassador for Braver Angels, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to bridging the partisan divide by providing the skills and safe spaces we need to be able to listen to each other, to better understand our differences, and to identify common ground from which we can move toward solutions to the issues that face our communities and our nation.
Our speakers will be addressing the current situation within Hubbard County and ways in which citizens can better communicate with each other to support our community without getting caught up in the animosity of the time.