[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 115 (Wednesday, July 18, 2007)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1554-E1555]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    TRIBUTE TO PASTOR WANDA McNEILL

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, July 18, 2007

  Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, I recognize Pastor Wanda McNeill for her 
17 years of tireless work as Executive Director of Washington, DC's 
Southeast Ministry, which she helped create in 1990. Pastor McNeill, on 
the surface, was not an obvious candidate to take on such work in an 
inner city neighborhood, having been born and raised in Sioux City, 
Iowa. But Pastor McNeill has touched the lives of thousands in 
Washington, DC, and this city will be forever grateful for her 
dedication to those in need. We wish her well and Godspeed as she 
leaves our Nation's Capital to accept a call to lead a parish in Lake 
Preston, South Dakota.
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill is a spiritual leader who, through her 
faith in God, has answered His call by dedicating her life's work to 
serving those in need;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill was born on February 21, 1944 in Sioux 
City, Iowa, and was raised on a family farm along with her sister 
Stella by William and Louise Edwards;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill in her earlier life was a foster parent 
with her late husband Frank McNeill to 12 children;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill earned a Diploma in Nursing at Iowa 
Lutheran Hospital, Des Moines, Iowa in 1965 and has been a licensed 
Registered Nurse in Iowa, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Washington, DC;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill served the citizens of North Carolina as 
a Vista Volunteer

[[Page E1555]]

working with low-income families from 1966 to 1968, and then as a 
public health nurse until 1984, and during that time, founded the 
Yancey County Hospice Agency in Burnsville, North Carolina in 1982;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill earned a B.S. in professional arts, 
psychology emphasis, from St. Joseph's College, North Windham, 
Massachusetts in 1984, graduated from Lutheran Theological Seminary in 
Gettysburg, Pennsylvania in 1988, was ordained in the Evangelical 
Lutheran Church in America in 1989, and earned a doctorate of ministry 
from Lutheran Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 
2005;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill has held the positions of Assistant 
Pastor, Associate Pastor, and Pastor at the Lutheran Church of 
Reformation in Washington, DC, since 1990 and has served our Capitol 
Hill neighborhood faithfully for 17 years;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill co-founded a non-profit social justice 
ministry named Southeast Ministry in the Anacostia neighborhood of 
southeast Washington, DC, in 1990 in response to expressed community 
needs for educational, cultural, and employment programs that lead 
those in need to self-sufficiency;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill through Southeast Ministry has reached 
thousands of men and women with education and job-related information 
services, increased their basic education skills and assisted them in 
passing the GED, prepared them to secure jobs through a curriculum of 
African-American culture, history, parenting, health and vocational 
assessment and in placement in training, employment and education;
  Whereas Pastor Wanda McNeill's personal decorations include the 
Community Service Award from Anacostia-Congress Heights Partnership in 
1991, Women of Achievement Award from the Zonta Club of Washington, DC, 
in 2000, and the Bob Woodson Award for special accomplishments from the 
National Center for Neighborhood Enterprise in 2005;
  Resolved, That the United States House of Representatives recognizes 
Pastor Wanda McNeill for her commitment to a life of service to the 
citizens of the United States, especially the poor and underprivileged 
who society has passed by, for her continued dedication to this life-
long calling, and for touching the lives of thousands with her work in 
the poorest neighborhoods of the District of Columbia, our Nation's 
Capitol.

                          ____________________