Comment of R. Randy Day on Pending Retirement
Of Joyce Sohl, Head of Women's Division

August 25, 2003
        Joyce Sohl stands tall among the great Christians leaders produced by
the Wesleyan movement over the last two and a half centuries. Her
decision to retire next year as deputy general secretary of the
Women's Division of the General Board of Global Ministries makes me
sad and, at the same time, provides an opportunity to recognize and
honor her.
        To work with Ms. Sohl is to watch a wonderful combination of strong
qualities in action: she is perceptive, tenaciously committed to
justice, fair-minded, patient with human nature, yet as administratively
tough as necessary to do any job well.  She is a tireless worker, a whiz
with finances, a forceful preacher, a doting grandmother, and a fine
musician.
        We depend upon Joyce Sohl at the Board not only competently to oversee
the Women's Division but also to take a major role in the general
planning and evaluation of the board's ministries.
           Raised in the Evangelical United Brethren branch of our Church, she has
a prodigious knowledge and love of the Wesleyan and Methodist heritage in
general. She is an authority on the role of women in the Christian
Church and on United Methodist Women as an organization.
        I think that Joyce Sohl is one of the most fearless people I
have ever met, and I know that her courage and determination are rooted
in an unshakable faith in Jesus Christ.
        We will miss her enormously after she leaves the staff next Summer; her
family, her congregation, and the Church at large will continue to
benefit from her experience, her affection, and her high expectations of
what it means to follow Christ.