2021: A Year in Review

NC Council of Churches

Strength in Unity, Peace through Justice

Welcome Keegan

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Keegan Cheleden will be with the Council full-time this summer as an intern through Duke Divinity School. She introduces herself below:

My name is Keegan Cheleden. I grew up in Pasadena, California (the Rose Parade actually goes right by my parent’s home). I am going into my third year at Duke Divinity School and next May, I will graduate with a Master’s of Divinity.

When I started at Duke Divinity School, I came with a question to answer: What is the role of touch when caring for the dying? I had spent my undergraduate years as a Communication Studies major researching ethical dimensions of touch, hospice, and who is classified as the “dying.” The curiosity this question gave me was so profound I found myself wanting to go to Duke for an M.Div. and UNC for an MSW so that I could understand both the theological and sociological implications of touch when it came to those about to move out of this world.

In other words, I had a grand plan. I had a focus.

But then life happened and God moved and I switched everything up because of it.

I told the Duke Field Education office during my interview, “None of the things I came here for are engaging me. I don’t know what I want to do or who I want to work with anymore.” 

We collectively decided that I needed a placement that would allow me to experience multiple populations and interest areas so that I could be open to where God might be asking me to go after I graduate from Duke.

Enter the North Carolina Council of Churches. I remember looking at this very website after I got the placement and thinking, “Is there any social issue they do not grapple with? This will be great.”

So here I am, knowing that I am in for a summer that will open me up to more questions and a passion to find the answers to them. I am grateful.

About Andrew Hudgins, Program Associate for Operations

Andrew was born and raised in Virginia and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in social work from James Madison University. That also happens to be where he met his wife, Kelly. He attended seminary in northern Virginia and worked at a church, primarily with the youth, before they moved to Houston, Texas as full-time volunteers with a Christian missions organization called Mission Year. While there, they lived in solidarity with their neighbors in an under-resourced community learning what it means to “love your neighbor as yourself.” When the program ended in July, 2016, they moved to Raleigh wanting to be a little closer to home and desiring to set down roots in a place for awhile. He enjoys reading, watching sports (primarily football and baseball), and playing board games.

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Comments

  1. Stan Kimer says

    Welcome Keegan! It was so nice meeting you and sitting next to you at the recent Governing Board Meeting.

    Reply

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