We are excited to welcome a new fellow to the North Carolina Council of Churches this summer! Get to know them and learn more about her background, interests, and role with the Council below.
My name is Melissa Florer-Bixler, and I am a ThD student in homiletics at Duke Divinity School, where I study Southern labor movements and theology of work. I am ordained in the Mennonite Church USA and served as the pastor of Raleigh Mennonite Church for the nine years prior to returning to school.
This summer, I will develop resources for preaching on labor. Most people spend the vast majority of their lives at work. Our Scriptures are filled with stories about labor disputes, the problem of wages, metaphors about laborers, and the condemnation of unjust labor practices. I’m curious about how our attention to these stories as labor stories shapes a Christian understanding of not only just labor laws and fair wages, but also the purpose of work.
I will also be working with the Union of Southern Service Workers on an NCCC-partnered project, Durham Rising. Through interviews with service workers, teachers, and day laborers, I hope to discover how people are being formed in churches around questions of labor.
I look forward to spending the summer supporting pastors who, in the coming years, will face new congregational challenges from AI-driven layoffs, work migration, and an increasingly unsustainable cost of living in most counties in the United States.
