Dressed entirely in pastoral black and sitting at a long, mahogany-colored desk in her sunlit office on a mid-December Sunday afternoon, Rev. Dr. Joanne Walker Flowers has an undeniably captivating presence about her.Â
She is flanked on one side by vibrant poinsettias supplying Christmas cheer. On the other stands a coat rack that holds her formal pastorâs vestments and a dark blue cap with insignia denoting that she had achieved the rank of commander when she retired from the U.S. Navy years ago. She jokes that she keeps the cap in a prominent spot to remind anyone who might doubt her capabilities as a woman that she does not tolerate such nonsense.