Sharon Zimmerman Rader was ordained deacon in the Detroit Conference and elder in the Northern Illinois Conference. She transferred to the West Michigan Conference where she was a local church pastor, member of the Conference Staff, and District Superintendent. She was elected to the episcopacy by the North Central Jurisdiction in 1992 and assigned to the Wisconsin Area. She retired in 2004 and then served as the first executive for the Connectional Table, as Council of Bishops Ecumenical Officer, and as Bishop in Residence at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary. She lives in Evanston, Illinois.
Margaret Ann Crain was ordained in 1997 and is a deacon in full connection in the Northern Illinois Conference. She served churches in Missouri and North Georgia before joining the faculty of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary where she taught Christian education and qualitative research. As Director of Deacon Studies, she created a program that supported, advocated for, and trained many deacons when the new order was created in 1996. Crain retired as Professor Emerita. Her most recent book is The United Methodist Deacon: Ordained to Word, Service, Compassion, and Justice. She lives in Nashville, Tennessee.
