Three bold women
Three bold women died recently within one week, their very public life stories splashed across newspapers and Web sites.

Coretta Scott King left a promising music career to support her husband in his ministry, filling a traditional role. An assassin’s bullet changed all that. Coretta became a civil rights activist herself. She spoke out against apartheid abroad and worked for women’s rights here in this country. She founded the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change. She became an advocate for gay rights and the fight against AIDS. As if she were speaking to our own health initiative, Coretta said "[w]e must make our hearts instruments of peace and nonviolence because when the heart is right, the mind and the body will follow."

So much of Wendy Wasserstein’s work focused on contemporary women, their relationships with one another, and the complex challenges that come in trying to balance the worlds of careers, relationships, family, and society. Her 1977 play, "Uncommon Women and Others," was an influential piece for many of us who came of age in that decade. A Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner, Wendy inspired many female playwrights. As with the best of all literature and theater, Wendy was able to examine the human existence and inspire us to better things.

Betty Friedan’s 1963 seminal work, The Feminine Mystique, sparked an entire movement, even though she hadn’t set out to accomplish anything quite so grand. "The problem that has no name — which is simply the fact that American women are kept from growing to their full human capacities — is taking a far greater toll on the physical and mental health of our country than any known disease," she wrote in The Feminine Mystique. She went on to be a founder of the National Organization of Women and a convener of the National Women’s Political Caucus.

All three were inspirations to me. May God grant their souls eternal rest.