Megan McKenna combined Scripture with myths and stories of different religions and cultures to present a new way of being human and free, in communion, graced and equal. She captivated her audience with stories of women from Native American culture, Jewish traditions, and Scripture, emphasizing that if we love one another deeply, our pain and tears will always produce something new to nourish us and keep us connected with God, even through the bitterest of times. In fact, it is the bitter that is necessary for survival. If we are not willing to taste it, we will never find the sweet.

McKenna told a Native American woman's tale about self-surrender -- living so that we can die giving birth to something else. "In today's culture we don't hear of self-sacrifice. We must start to look at the excesses in our lives. Only the things we need to exist are ours," said McKenna. "Everything else is our neighbor's." Using a winter of starvation as a metaphor, she pointed out that our dominant culture inflicts unnatural cold on much of the world so that we might have spring all year round. We in the U.S. are five percent of the world's population, but use 83 percent of its resources and produce 75 percent of its pollution.

Scripture stories deepened the theme: without pain, no resurrection. Mary Magdala witnessed Jesus' death, and was the first to see him risen. She watched as what she loved most was destroyed. Out of that pain she learned what love is, what resurrection is. To make the traditions of such women alive today, you must "follow your heart to where it leads you to someone else whose heart is more broken than yours," said McKenna. We must begin to wield our power with integrity. We need to struggle for equality on the bottom, and reject the dominant system. "If we have power in the system, we must be in communion with those on the bottom. Whatever the new church will be," she said, "it will come out of somebody's tears that are large enough for an entire people."