2015 winter windows

Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

winter 2015

In this Issue MidWinters 2015 | 3

Water | 8

Sherman Chair in Sacred Music | 18

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AUSTIN

AUSTIN PRESBYTERIAN

PRESBYTERIAN THEOLOGI C AL

THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

SEMINARY

winter 2015

Volume 130 | Number 1

President

features

Board of Trustees

8

Tragedy of the Commons

11

Water Wisdom

14

Loving Each Other Drop by Drop

By Yaira Robinson (MATS’13) & Samuel Brannon

15

Water of Life

Theodore J. Wardlaw Thomas L. Are Jr., Chair

James Allison Karen C. Anderson Whit Bodman Janice Bryant (MDiv’01, DMin’11) Claudia D. Carroll Elizabeth Christian Joseph J. Clifford James B. Crawley Katherine Cummings (MDiv’05) Consuelo Donahue (MDiv’96) Jackson Farrow Jr. G. Archer Frierson Richard D. Gillham Walter Harris Jr. John Hartman Ann Herlin (MDiv’01) Rhashell Hunter Roy M. Kim James H. Lee (MDiv’00) Lyndon L. Olson Jr. B. W. Payne David Peeples Jeffrey Kyle Richard Lana Russell James C. Shaw Lita Simpson Anne Vickery Stevenson Karl Brian Travis John L. Van Osdall Sallie Sampsell Watson (MDiv’87) Carlton Wilde Jr. Elizabeth Currie Williams Hugh H. Williamson III

8 WATER

By William Greenway

By Andrew Sansom

By John Alsup

& departments

Cover photograph by Jody Horton; jodyhorton.com

5

2

seminary & church

3

twenty-seventh & speedway

17 live & learn 18 faculty news & notes

18

Trustees Emeriti

Stephen A. Matthews John M. McCoy Jr. (MDiv’63) Max Sherman Louis Zbinden

20 alumni news & notes 21 teaching & ministry

Austin Seminary Association (ASA) Board Leanne Thompson (MDiv’06), President Dieter Heinzl (MDiv’98), Vice President Karen Greif (MDiv’92, DMin’06), Secretary Valerie Bridgeman (MDiv’90), Past President Barrett Abernethy (MDiv’13) Andy Blair (MDiv’89) Timothy Blodgett (MDiv’07) Tony Chambless (MDiv’07) Jeff Cranton (MDiv’99) Sandra Kern (MDiv’93) Andrew Parnell (MDiv’05) Steve Plunkett (MDiv’80) Matt Miles (MDiv’99) Tamara Strehli (MDiv’05) Kristy Vits (MDiv’98) Michael Waschevski (DMin’03)

Editor Randal Whittington

Contributors

Lemuel García Gracia Rich Kimberly Rutherford Sharon Sandberg Mona Santandrea Adam Sweeney Daniel Williams

Windows is published three times each year by Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

Austin Seminary Windows Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary 100 E. 27th St. Austin, TX 78705-5711 phone: 512-404-4808 e-mail: windows@austinseminary.edu fax: 512-479-0738 austinseminary.edu ISSN 2056-0556; Non-profit bulk mail permit no. 2473

seminary church

from the president |

W

President’s Schedule Dec. 14 – Preach, Shepherd of the HIlls PC, Austin Feb. 12 – Host, Evening with the President, Fort Worth, Texas March 6-8 – Preach and Teach, Highland PC, Birmingham, Alabama March 10 – Host, Evening with the President, Albuquerque, New Mexico March 11 – Host, Coffee with the President, Santa Fe, New Mexico March 22 – Preach, Fourth PC, Chicago April 12 – Preach, Central Christian Church, Austin April 21 – Host, Partner Luncheon, Oklahoma City April 26 – Preach, First PC, Northport, New York

ater. Without it, we die. It is what we are made of, mainly. It is a basic factor of our existence. It is also a basic truth about us and about our world—a source of Sacrament by which we are initiated into the life of the church, a metaphor which we associate with spiritual growth and nourishment.

We love the sound of water. In my favorite spot of the world, where we have a mountain cottage that has been in my family since my early childhood, I love the sound of a stream just a few feet away. In the summer, when all the windows are open, the delicious sound of that water delights our ears as it splashes over rocks on its way downhill to a larger tributary that flows into the French Broad River on its way to the ocean. The music that little stream makes is joyful, and it coaxes me into a daily afternoon nap.

When there is rain—almost daily—you never know, from the sound of it, when the rain stops because the sound just blends into the ongoing sound of that splashing stream.

I’m always nourished by that.

Just as I am nourished by the splashing of water in the font. Our pastor stands there at the font at the end of the center aisle in our church, and when we have confessed our sin there is a time of silence as the pastor’s hands play in the water—lifting it up to fall again into that big copper basin. “Hear the good news,” the pastor says; and, before that news of forgiveness is voiced, it is expressed in the splashing waters of baptism. And we say, “In Jesus Christ we are forgiven, healed, and made whole.”

That water is splashed in the sign of the cross of the forehead of the one being confirmed … or ordained … or blessed in that great passage moment of death. That basic, nourishing water is with us from start to finish.

The articles ahead explore the multiple ways in which water matters to us. Professor Bill Greenway writes of the ethical imperatives in play as we endeavor to see our water supply as a commonly held good. Professor Andy Sansom reflects tangibly about how critical the matter of our stewardship of water really is. Alumna Yaira Robinson and the Reverend Sam Brannon argue for a faith-based water-policy agenda. Professor Emeritus John Alsup works out of biblical traditions to make the case that water is essential to God’s plan of salvation. Drink deeply from these essays. Then read all the rest of our latest news from this precious place—a place which, for so many, has been like water in the desert!

Faithfully yours,

Theodore J. Wardlaw President

2 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

twenty-seventh speedway

Plan now for MidWinters, Feb. 2-4 Dr. Beverly Roberts Gaventa is Distinguished Professor of New Testament Interpretation at Baylor University and The Helen H.P. Manson Professor of New Testament Literature and Exegesis Emerita at Princeton Theological Seminary. The author of Our Mother Saint Paul (Westminster John Knox, 2007) and editor (with Professor Cynthia Rigby) of Blessed One: Protestant Perspectives on Mary (WJK, 2002), her current project is a commentary for the New Testament Library series on Paul’s letter to the Romans which will inform her Currie Lectures.

The Reverend Jack Haberer is the pastor of Vanderbilt Presbyterian Church in Naples, Florida. From 2005 to 2014 he was editor of The Presbyterian Outlook, an independent, national news and ministry resource magazine. The author of GodViews: The Convictions That Drive Us and Divide Us and Living the Presence of the Spirit (Geneva, 2001), Haberer’s Westervelt Lectures will look at “the confusion that comes from Jesus and the apostles themselves, who interpreted biblical moral teachings not as absolutes but as aspirations and benchmarks that create space for approximations and adaptations.”

Dr. Kimberly Bracken Long is associate professor of worship at Columbia Theological Seminary. She was editor of Call to Worship: Liturgy, Music, Preaching and the Arts (2005-2011) and has been been editor to three editions of the Feasting on the Word Woship Companion series. She is the author of The Eucharistic Theology of the American Holy Fairs (WJK, 2011) and The Worshiping Body: The Art of Leading Worship (WJK, 2009).

Her 2015 Jones Lectures will reflect her current research for a book about Christian marriage and the 21st-century church (WJK, forthcoming).

The worship leader for MidWinters will be The Reverend Paul Roberts, president of Johnson C. Smith Theological Seminary in Atlanta, Georgia. He earned degrees from Princeton University and Johnson C. Smith Seminary, and he is an academic fellow of the Ecumenical Institute of Bossey in Switzerland. Roberts is a contributing writer to Pastoral Care: A Case Study Approach (Orbis Books,1998) and Feasting on the Gospels (WJK, 2013).

Highlights of the 2015 MidWinter Lectures: • We will honor the 2015 Distinguished Service Award recipients: The Reverend Michael J. Cole (MDiv’75),The Reverend Dr. Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan (MDiv’87), and The Reverend Dr. John D. Williams (MDiv’87).

• Special reunion events for the Classes of 1955, 1965, 1975, 1985, 1995, and 2005-2014.

• Table-Talk lunch discussion on Tuesday, February 3, with psychologist and mediator Dr. Karl Slaikeu. The luncheon is free, but advance registration is required.

• ASA Banquet and Annual Meeting (tickets are $15, reservations are required)

Register @ AustinSeminary.edu/midwin15 Winter 2015 | 3

twenty-seventh speedway

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Background: The Opening Convocation service for the 2014-15 academic year

Adam Sweeney

The 2014 entering class comprises 37 MDiv students (including three in the dual degree program with U.T.), 1 MATS student, and 2 joining the MAMP degree program. By the numbers: their median age is 33, 17% are racial/ethnic minorities, and 11 denominations are represented in the class.

President Wardlaw accepted the ALS ice-bucket challenge窶馬ot such a bad deal on a late summer day in Austin.

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Tallulah, the ebullient daughter of student Tim Browning, adds her blessing to Buster and his person, Sarah Chancellor Watson, during the Blessing of the Animals in September.

Matt Edison

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U.T. Professor Luis H. Zayas gave the Heyer Lecture, “Undocumented, Unaccompanied, and Citizen: The Children of America’s Migrations,” on September 25.

Professor Suzie Park rocked the house with her Opening Convocation Address, “Flashes of Fire: Love in the Old Testament.”

WebXtra: Listen to her address here: AustinSeminary. edu/mediagallery

Public Services Librarian Lila Parrish enjoyed the Austin Archives Bazaar in October. The Austin Seminary Archives took center stage this fall at the Bazaar and the “Day of Memory and Hope” event.

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Ann Serano

Winter 2015 | 5

twenty-seventh speedway

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Among the dozen Education Beyond the Walls lifelong learning events this fall, the College of Pastoral Leaders cohorts gathered for the workshop “The Power and Practice of Personal Storytelling.” Part of the event included an open-mike storytelling session at Threadgill’s.

On October 23 Dr. Victor Chilenje brought greetings and an update on Justo Mwale Theological University College. Justo Mwale is Austin Seminary’s partner institution in Lusaka, Zambia, with whom we have exchanged students and faculty members across the years.

6 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

Bob Kinney

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October brought “A Day of Memory and Hope: The Story of Austin Seminary and the Education of Hispanic Pastors.” Visitors and the community enjoyed worship, panel discussions, a theatrical performance, and a fiesta with mariachis.

Vice President for Business Affairs Kurt Gabbard will take a bit of Austin Seminary with him when he starts his new position at Princeton Seminary in January. The photograph of Shelton Chapel was a gift from the Board of Trustees in November.

board actions | Austin Seminary Board of Trustees took the following actions at its fall meeting: Reappointed Asante Todd as Instructor in Christian Ethics for a three-year term, effective July 1, 2015.

Accepted the periodic review of Timothy D. Lincoln.

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Leading cheers for the 2014 Polity Bowl game against The Seminary of the Southwest were Michele Goff, Sharon Sandberg, Sarah de la Fuente, Amy Litzinger, Mark Horner, and Professor Whit Bodman: “We are Winsome And Depraved But Our Trophy Will Be Saved!�

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Daniel WIlliams

Approved the sabbatical report of William Greenway.

Approved the sabbatical proposal of Whitney Bodman, February 1-June 30, 2016, and David Johnson, January 1-June 30, 2016.

Approved a search for a faculty position in sacred music and liturgics, with rank and tenure being open.

Accepted the following named endowment: The J. Allan and Margay Woodward Guthrie Endowed Fund, established August 26, 2014, by John A. and Nancy B. Guthrie of Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Accepted the Institutional Plan 2020.

Asserted that the status of currently serving trustees will be unaffected in the event their home congregations choose to leave the denomination.

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Winter 2015 | 7

Tragedy of the Commons

By William Greenway

WebXtra: An expanded and fully annotated version of this essay may be found on our Web site: AustinSeminary.edu/Windows 8 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

W

aters of baptism,” “living water,” “water of life”—“water” is a powerful symbol in Christianity. But when it comes to water as an environmental, public policy issue, should communities of faith be involved? Do communities of faith have anything distinctive to contribute? I argue the answer to these questions is a resounding “Yes.” The participation of communities of faith in public policy discussion is vital if we are to realize a vibrant and just ecological future.

In 1967, in a famous essay in the prestigious journal, Science, Lynn White Jr. concluded that, “Christianity bears a huge burden of guilt” for our ecological crisis. Christianity bears this burden because it long interpreted Genesis to say that “no item in the physical creation had any purpose save to serve man’s purposes,” and modern Western science and society were formed with this human-centered understanding. It is not science and technology but Christianity that bears responsibility for the ecological crisis, for while science and technology made humans capable of creating the ecological crisis, science and technology are neutral tools.

How humans use science and technology makes all the difference, and how we use science and technology is “deeply conditioned by beliefs about our nature and destiny—that is, by religion.”

Because of the profound influence of human-centered Christian understanding, we “are not, in our hearts, part of the natural process,” we remain “superior to nature, contemptuous of it, willing to use it for our slightest whim. … Since the roots of our trouble are so largely religious,” White continues, “the remedy must also be essentially religious.” The ecological crisis will not be solved by “more science and more technology,” we must “find a new religion, or rethink our old one.”

White, realizing no one (not even those who think they are not religious) remains free of some overarching understanding of human nature and destiny, and too realistic to consider inventing a new religion, recommends we rethink Christianity and reawaken the spirit of St. Francis of Assisi in his imitation of “the ultimate gesture of cosmic humility,” wherein the transcendent “assumed flesh, lay helpless in a manger, and hung dying on a scaffold.” Christians should assume a similar humility, love all “beneath” them, and act out of love for all creatures and all creation.

Happily, White was not alone in his ecological concerns and spiritual instincts. Widespread awakening to the ecological crisis in the 1960s spurred inter-religious spiritual reawakening to all creation. By the beginning of the twenty-first century, conservative and progressive Chris-

Bill Greenway is associate professor of philosophical theology at Austin Seminary.

Greenway’s interest in theology, ecology, and spiritually converge frequently in public forums such as his opening presentation, “Remembering One’s Creaturely Place,” for Texas Interfaith Center’s “Water Leadership Conference” in September.

Faith, Ethics, and Public Policy tians alike were talking about greening churches, stew- decisions for an entire society.” This affirmation of the ardship of creation, and love for all creatures. Scholars, pursuit of self-interest, Hardin notes, aligns with a policy with a newfound respect for indigenous understandings of laissez-faire with regard to commons, such as atmoof humans as a part of creation, developed new courses sphere, water, and fisheries. in green theology and eco-spirituality. At the grassroots Hardin’s essay created an immediate sensation belevel, people and communities of faith formed a multi- cause he explained, contrary to confidence in the “invistude of creation-care and local environmental-advocacy ible hand,” why rational action (i.e., pursuit of self-intergroups. Across religious traditions, among conservatives est) in our finite world will inevitably lead to destruction and progressives alike, the self-emptying spirit of St. of commons and ruin for all. Science and technology can Francis was rekindled and burst forth. only delay ruin as populations increase on local and glob In 1968, Science published another famous essay, al commons. Like White, then, Hardin agrees there is no Garrett Hardin’s “The Tragedy of the Commons.” scientific or technological solution to ecological comA “commons” is an open, shared resource, such as mons challenges. A change in morals and regulation the atmosphere, a watershed, lake, ocean, or fishof commons—“mutual coercion, mutually agreed ery, or, in Hardin’s example, a pasture open to all. upon”—is required. Given the inherent selfishness For centuries, Hardin explains, herders may hapof human nature, however, how can we expect hupily share a commons. When the populamans to escape the logic of the commons at tion of cattle and herders reaches the collective, political, “mutual coercion” In an unregulated commons carrying capacity of the commons, levels? Who will watch the watchhowever, the “inherent logic of ers? in which everyone pursues his the commons remorselessly

Lynn White offered a or her own best interests while generates tragedy … As a ratioclassic answer to this quesnal being, each herdsman seeks tion. Religions—rich with conpopulations increase, “ruin is to maximize his gain.” When a demnation of enduring human the destination” of all. herdsman adds to his flock, the bentendencies to avarice, selfishness, efits are wholly his while the detriments and exploitation—are no strangers to of overgrazing are shared. From the point of view Hardin’s understanding of human nature. Like of each herder, then, the rational course is to add cattle. White, Christianity (and most religions) also affirms a This is “the conclusion reached by each and every rational countervailing force: human awakening to transcending herdsman sharing a commons … Therein is the tragedy,” agape, to desire for good for all creatures. As illustrated for in an unregulated commons in which everyone pur- by Jesus’ fidelity to love even to the cross, the good of sues his or her own best interests while populations in- survival is trumped by the good of love and justice for crease, “ruin is the destination” of all. all. This transcending affirmation, so beautifully visible Hardin’s essay affirmed a predominant social-scien- in the life of St. Francis, is revealed when our hearts tific understanding that humans will seek to maximize ache over the suffering of others, and in our pangs of individual security and gain. This idea, Hardin argues, is conscience when we recognize ourselves as causes of sufconsistent with modern science’s revelation that in “real fering. When we gather to agree upon “mutual coercion, life” the ultimate good is survival. Thanks to “free mar- mutually agreed upon,” White suggests, we would do well ket” economic theory inspired by Adam Smith, which in that collective setting to awaken ourselves to agape, to holds that individuals intending only personal gain are appeal to our higher nature, to conscience, and to agree “led by an invisible hand to promote … the public in- to public policy that is realistic about human selfishness terest,” people have had a tendency “to assume that and also committed to realizing love for all. decisions reached individually will, in fact, be the best But Hardin will have none of it. He judges appeals to Winter 2015 | 9

love and conscience “pathogenic.”

Christianity also affirms a countervailing force: human awakening to transcending agape, to desire for good for all creatures.

If we ask a man who is exploiting a commons to desist “in the name of conscience,” what are we saying to him? What does he hear … in the wee small hours of the night when he remembers ... the nonverbal cues we gave him unawares? … (i) (intended communication) “If you don’t do as we ask, we will openly condemn you for not acting like a responsible citizen”; (ii) (the unintended communication) “If you do behave as we ask, we will secretly condemn you for a simpleton who can be shamed into standing aside while the rest of us exploit the commons.”

Hardin recommends hard-nosed realism in accord with the scientific revelation that the ultimate good is survival (of the fittest). The most advanced nations enjoy standards of living unimaginable even to emperors of old. Earth cannot support even the current human population at such standards. What posterity demands, Hardin concludes, is “lifeboat ethics.” The most advanced nations should close their borders (for the lifeboat is full) and stop sending resources abroad. He literally invites people of conscience to jump overboard.

For religious professionals like myself, who are surrounded by people giving stunning quantities of time, talent, and money in response to their love for all creation and all creatures, the idea that insofar as humans are rational they are irremediably selfish is obviously false. The world’s classic faith traditions are well aware of humans’ selfish and exploitative tendencies, and they clearly distinguish between the good of sacrificing out of love and the evil of allowing oneself to be taken as a chump. People of faith can accordingly agree to the need for “mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon.” The distinction will be that people of faith will insist that central/ overlapping norms (moral ideals) should shape the contours of mutual coercion (public policy).

Hardin’s “lifeboat ethics” gained few overt followers, but his view of humans as wholly selfish agents, and his criticism of Smith’s “invisible hand,” endured in late twentieth-century social and political science. The ques10 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

tion, “who guards the guardians” remained open, and religious moral ideals and communities remained marginal in academic social scientific and political discussions. Most troubling, in many discussions economic efficiency came to play the role of “highest good.”

The problem is that appeals to efficiency alone marginalize creation and all creatures, including concern for the good of humans. If efficiency alone is our measure, then we will not care or even notice if there are severe ecological impacts and radical economic inequities, as long as more wealth on the whole is generated.

For example, Paul Debaere, writing in Water Policy (2014), notes that in Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin, water’s economic productivity is sixty-seven times more efficient in manufacturing—and ninety-nine times more efficient in mining—than in agriculture. On what grounds, Debaere asks, “should a dynamic market economy shelter agriculture [or, by the same reasoning, endangered species or ecosystems] from structural changes”?

Debaere can evidently imagine no such grounds. But if economic efficiency is the sole measure, then there are no grounds whatsoever for sheltering agriculture, endangered species, and ecosystems from devastating ecological change. Thus Peter Hill, writing in The Independent Review (2014), can argue that the decimation of bison in North America—from thirty million in 1800, to ten million in 1860, to under one thousand in 1886—was not an ecological tragedy but an unqualified good, for bison were replaced with cattle, which are more efficient in the conversion of grass into dollars. With regard to contemporary global food production, two alarmed scholars Rebecca Clausen and Stefano Longo (Development and Change, 2012) explain how efficiencies of scale are resulting in the “pauperization” of millions of relatively inefficient family farmers and fishers. If economic efficiency is the ultimate criterion, they object, the pauperization of millions, human and non-human alike, appears as an unmitigated “good”—a “good” unrelated to justice and creaturely well-being.

Fortunately, by the beginning of the twenty-first

Continued on page 16

Five Strategies for the Coming Crisis

By Andrew Sansom

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hroughout the history of humanity, water has held a unique and even spiritual place in virtually every culture that has existed on the planet. Thousands of Christians from across the world, for example, travel to Israel each year to be baptized in the Jordan River while for centuries millions have made their way to the Ganges for ritual bathing and renewal. Surely a basic tenet of human existence is the basic truth that water is essential for all life. No plant or animal on the globe can live without water.

And today, making sure that human beings have sufficient amounts of clean water for survival is a global issue. Across the world the average woman walks nine miles each day just to bring water back to her family. Every twenty seconds somewhere in the world a child dies from a lack of water or from water-borne disease.

Here at home, the water issue has taken front and center as changes in the climate have brought drought to the Southwestern United States and severe flooding to the Midwest and Northeast. The economic impact of these extreme weather conditions has been profound, with billions in losses from wildfire in California to more than $8 billion a year in agricultural losses in Texas alone.

Thankfully, political leaders across the

Southwest have stepped up to the plate and initiated efforts to provide millions of dollars of investment in new water infrastructure. While these new dollars will certainly be essential to helping us work our way through what is clearly the most daunting natural resource issue of the generation, we cannot be lulled into believing that this is something we can build our way out of.

The bottom line is, even if we were not experiencing extreme drought, the population of our most economically prosperous states is exploding while more water has been permitted to be withdrawn from many of the rivers in those states than is actually in them. That is, if all of the water More water has been permitted that has been to be withdrawn from many permitted to be used of the rivers in our most from those economically prosperous states rivers were actually used, than is actually in them. they would be dry.

Solving this problem will require more than additional infrastructure.

First, we continue to waste too much water. We might learn from cities like San Antonio, Las Vegas, and El Paso which have

Andy Sansom is professor of practice in geography and executive director of The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment at Texas State University. He is a former executive director of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, executive director of the Texas Nature Conservancy, and founder of The Parks and Wildlife Foundation of Texas. A ruling elder and member of Central Presbyterian Church in Austin, Sansom led a conference in June for Education Beyond the Walls’ Pastoral Leadership for Public Life 2014 cohort.

Winter 2015 | 11

Recommended Resources Texas Water Atlas by Lawrence E. Estaville and Richard A. Earl (Texas A&M University Press, 2008) Texas Water Atlas provides the first comprehensive reference for water-related topics in Texas. It includes a host of data to visually convey vital information on Texas’ climate, surface and groundwater, water uses and hazards, water quantity and quality, recreation, future supply projections, and the environmental management of its water resources. With more than 150 color maps and a Texas water timeline, this is an excellent resource for teachers, students, policy makers, conservation professionals, and the general public.

Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water by Marc Reisner (Viking, 1986) The story of the American West is the story of the relentless quest to control and allocate nature’s most common—and the West’s most precious—resource. Since FDR’s public works program of the 1930s and 1940s that created the Hoover, Shasta, and Grand Coulee dams—magnificent engineering feats that transformed arid expanses into fertile soil and generated enough cheap hydroelectricity for towns to burgeon into cities—the West’s water shortage has only worsened.

Over the next fifty years, millions of acres of America’s most productive farmland will exhaust groundwater reserves; within centuries, perhaps within decades, hundreds of reservoirs will silt up and more and more soil and irrigated water will be contaminated by salt, the downfall of nearly every previous desert civilization. Cadillac Desert is a meticulously researched and compulsively readable history of one of America’s most impressive achievements—the creation of an Eden out of inhospitable desert—and how it may prove to be a disaster of unimaginable proportions.

Water Wars: Drought, Flood, Folly, and the Politics of Thirst by Diane Raines Ward (Riverhead Books, 2002) Every day, we hear alarming news about droughts, pollution, population growth, and climate change—which threaten to make water, even more than oil, the cause of war within our lifetime. Diane Raines Ward reaches beyond the headlines to illuminate our most vexing problems and tells the stories of those working to solve them: hydrologists, politicians, engineers, and everyday people. Based on ten years of research spanning five continents, Water Wars offers fresh insight into a subject to which our fate is inextricably bound.

Water in Texas by Andrew Sansom and Emily R. Armitano (University of Texas Press, 2008) No natural resource issue has greater significance for the future of Texas than water. The state’s demand for water for municipal, industrial, agricultural, and recreational uses continues to grow exponentially, while the supply from rivers, lakes, aquifers, and reservoirs is limited. Illustrated with color photographs and maps, Water in Texas will be the essential resource for landowners, citizen activists, policymakers, and city planners.

—AS 12 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

lowered their per capita consumption of water by as much as 40% per capita while still flourishing economically. San Antonio has grown by more than 1.5 million citizens in the last twenty or so years while its overall consumption of water has been flat.

Second, we have done very little to make sure that after all of the uses we make of water in our rivers and streams, we ensure that sufficient water will remain in them to protect the aquatic environment both upstream and in our coastal bays and estuaries which are absolutely dependent on continued flows of fresh water.

Third, while much of our most critical aquifer recharge areas and watersheds lie on privately owned lands, we have done very little to ensure protection of those landscapes. The biggest single terrestrial environmental problem we have in many of the states most affected by drought is the continued breakup and fragmentation of family lands. The City of New York more than a century ago, began to buy the development rights of private landowners in the Adirondacks and Catskills, enabling families to remain on the land while protecting what is generally considered the best municipal water supply system in America.

Fourth, the conjunctive management of groundwater and surface water across the country is a patchwork of widely disparate laws and policies. Water in our aquifers is treated completely differently than the water in our rivers and streams when, in fact, these resources are parts of the same hydrologic system and are fundamentally connected.

Finally, we must push the envelope of new investment beyond traditional water infrastructure to the type of innovation we see occurring in the high technology sector. All too often, the managers of public water utilities and the engineering firms that serve them reach for the same sort of projects that, while they may have served us well in the 1950s, have little relevance today.

When speaking about the water issue, audiences often ask me how, in the face of such dire statistics, I can be optimistic about the future. I answer that my optimism is rooted in my faith. Faith that our best days are ahead and that, for millennia, water has nourished the faith of the v human family.

Estimated Water Use in the U.S.

source: United States Geological Survey, 2010

Winter 2015 | 13

Loving Each Other Drop by Drop

By Yaira Robinson and Samuel Brannon

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s people of faith, we understand water to be a gift, an essential part of God’s creation. With water, we live, At the Texas work, and connect our lives to the holy.

Without water, we perish.

Interfaith That’s why it’s important for Americans to understand that the U.S.—along with Center for many other parts of the world—is facing Public Policy, major water challenges. Western states are in major drought. Meanwhile, population is “loving our increasing and the climate forecast is hotter and drier, with drought becoming ever more neighbors” common.

Here in the Lone Star State, the Texas means Interfaith Center for Public Policy is focusing a lot on water—and not just when we’re advocating for thirsty. We’re reading news articles, attendclean, affordable ing regional planning meetings, and teaching Sunday school classes. Advocating for the water interests of all Texans is an inwater for all. creasingly important part of our work on behalf of justice, freedom, and peace.

Texas is fortunate to have a very public water-planning process. In 1997, Texas implemented a locally focused, grassroots approach to water planning, giving substantive responsibility to sixteen regional waterplanning groups across the state. Every planning group must have representation from environmental groups,

—W. H. Auden municipal utilities and small businesses—as well as the usual industrial and agricultural stakeholders.

“Thousands have lived without love, not one without water.”

This bottom-up approach addresses some issues associated with Texas’ size and diversity, but critical conflicts persist. For example, urban Dallas, Houston, Austin, El Paso, and San Antonio need more water to provide for their growing populations, and they are reaching out into the rural areas to get it, from either surface or groundwater supplies. Regional conflicts over water can be proxies for deeper divisions. Arguments over watersheds and wells can expose historic animosities and unresolved past injustices.

Religious leaders can offer practical, pastoral, and prophetic content to deliberations about water planning in our communities.

That’s why Texas Interfaith Center staff members are focusing on regional conversations in building a statewide, faith-based water-policy agenda. While it’s true, as W.H. Auden said, that God’s people can live without love more easily than without water, we believe that helping Texans work together to determine our state’s water future is an act of love, and we hope that in working together to chart a sustainable water course, Texans will treat each other with love.

Water is likely to be a make-or-break issue for the future of civilization in North America. The discussions and decisions we have around its allocation and utilization will mold the future of the Lone Star State and the rest of the United States. People of faith can provide a strong example of how to engage in important public discourse while keeping an eye ever toward the disadvantaged, the marginalized, and future generations. It is of ultimate consequence and concern that faithful v voices be part of the conversation.

Yaira Robinson (MATS’13) is associate director of the Texas Interfaith Center for Public Policy (TICPP), a faith-based organization that provides theologically grounded public policy analysis. As the outreach and engagement specialist for TICPP’s Water Captains program, The Reverend Sam Brannon works to educate Texans of faith about water issues and help them partner with local leaders on the water-planning process.

14 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

Water of Life

By Dr. John Alsup

W

ater and life; life and water. The Gospel of John, along with the Epistles of John and the (Johanine) Book of Revelation collectively contain multiple references to water; perhaps the most famous being Jesus’ pronouncement in the Gospel (4:10), that if the Samaritan woman at the well of Sychar would but ask—knowing how God gives freely and knowing who was speaking with her—she would receive “living water!” The water of life is a gift from God. She is—just like we are—troubled because drawing water from a well or from the faucet is as natural a thing as we can imagine (the issue of quality notwithstanding). The hook that draws her (and us?) into the dialogue is that there is a water so pure—divine, if you will—that to drink of it is to have one’s thirst quenched forever (4:13f)! After a brief but poignant rehearsal of Israel’s journey of living out the promises of God and the revealed mystery of God’s anointed One, she (and we?) begins to understand that “living water” is connected to recognizing and embracing the encounter that comes from God’s new thing revealed in Jesus as Lord. In John 2, the account of the Wedding Feast at Cana sets the stage, perhaps, for this vision of transformed water, a water that becomes the best wine of all, the gift of joyous celebration from God; for such, one can only say thank you and praise be to God. In a unique twist on the tradition of the paralytic in Mark 2, John 5 lifts up the healing powers of divine stirring of water in the pool at Bethsaida, with Jesus’ command to the sufferer to rise from the death bed. Continuing the motif of celebrating the waters of healing is the further dictum of

John’s Jesus (7:38): whoever connects with him through trust will discover [note the midrash on Isaiah 43:19f, Ezekiel 47:1-2, Joel 4:18 and possibly four other OT references] “rivers of living water flowing from the inner being.” The foot-washing in 13:5ff also links this intimate connection—for the Johannine community—to participation in the new life of the promised One by the cleansing waters of forgiveness.

Another stream of Christian tradition that links cleansing waters to God’s new creation in the raising of Jesus from the dead is found in I Peter 3. Its focus is upon Noah’s Ark of deliverance as covenantal “antetype” to baptism. In The hook that draws us into the dialogue with Genesis 7 and an early dialogue is that there is a water Rabbinic tradition so pure—divine, if you will—that about the descent to drink of it is to have one’s thirst into Hades of Enoch quenched forever. to the “most lost” generation of the Great Flood, baptismal water is elevated from cleansing as “washing” to that of prayerful appeal to God generated by an “enlivened consciousness/ understanding.” The Johannine version of connecting baptismal water and God’s redemptive purposes in Jesus’ sacrificial death and triumphant resurrection is found in John’s Gospel (19:34) and I John 5:6.

The traditions reflected in all these references seem to flow like tributaries to the last of the Johannine writings to give voice to the Water of Life as force to be reckoned with in God’s plan of salvation. Of the seventeen references to water in the Book of Revelation, the final two lift up the “head

John Alsup is the First Presbyterian Church, Shreveport, Professor Emeritus of New Testament Studies. He is also pastor of Sunrise Beach Federated Church and runs a horse ranch near Georgetown, Texas.

Winter 2015 | 15

waters,” of this new creational healing stream as “a river flowing from the very throne of God.“ In addition to the invitation: “all who would drink may do so without charge—it is a free gift,” the outer margins of my Nestle Greek NT

assemble numerous OT partners in conversation among prophetic voices, particularly the Creation Story in Genesis 2. In the latter, the very Garden of Eden is fed by the water of life flowing from v the throne of the Creator!

Tragedies of the Commons Continued from page 10

Austin Seminary professors are not only expert academicians, but are personally committed to their faith and to the church, making them valuable mentors to students preparing for a life in ministry.

See for yourself.

Discovery Weekend February 20-22

To confirm your place, call our Office of Admissions at 800241-1085, email Jack Barden, admissions@ austinseminary.edu, or register online at austinseminary.edu/ springdiscovery

century, social scientists began to re- schools.” The disconnect from reality alize the standard, twentieth-century is stark if one takes a moment to repicture of humans as normless, selfish flect (historically, globally, and with agents was false. Elinor Ostrom won regard to religious and secular states the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Eco- alike) upon the relative moral-carrying nomic Sciences for helping to establish capacity and influence of “neighborthat humans 1) do act selflessly in ac- hood groups,” “charitable organizacord with norms, 2) change behavior tions,“ corporations”(!), and “private in response to verbal chastisement for schools”—in comparison to the moralviolation of community values (even carrying capacity and influence of reliwhen offenders remain anonymous gion. and personal profit is sacrificed), 3) Faith communities and their morpreserve commons better when policy al ideals must be vital players in the is a shared creation, and 4) self-regulate formation of environmental policies and govern commons most effectively if we are to realize a most loving and when there is significant face-to-face just ecological future. White was right communication and compliance to think the ecological crisis can is understood primarily in norlargely be laid at the feet of Chrismative (not legal/financial pentianity. He was also right to think alty) terms. that Christianity’s potential for A prejudice against agape reawakening humanity to love for and religion endures, however, creation and all creatures can play for Ostrom continues a vital role in providing to interpret althe means through truism within which the criFaith communities must be self-interested sis can be advital players in the formation of dressed. White parameters.

And, when Oswould be thankenvironmental policies. trom and her ful that—while colleagues note that the Christian comtheir findings confirm the munity has a long way to go, vital role of institutions that cultivate and while persons who pursue wholly and carry moral norms, the ones they selfish ends remain distressingly powlist are “corporations, charitable orga- erful—Christians across the world are nizations, neighborhood groups, orga- increasingly embracing the spirit of St. v nized religions, and public and private Francis of Assisi.

16 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

live learn

upcoming from education beyond the walls

Spring 2015

“Nomads & Nones: What the Church can Learn from the Spiritual But Not Religious” with Mike Clawson (MDiv’10) | February 11; $60 | What if religious people saw the “Spiritual But Not Religious” phenomenon not as a

threat, but as an opportunity to learn and grow? Come to this interactive workshop as we uncover the important insights and valuable critiques this growing demographic has to offer the church today. | For pastor, educators, and church leaders

On The Road with Austin Seminary | “Living with Confessions: What Role Do Ancient Statements of Faith Play in Modern Church Decisions?” with Paul Hooker | SHREVEPORT March 4, 1:00-4:00 p.m., Oklahoma City March 5, 1:00-4:00 p.m.; $25; $15 for Austin Seminary alumni| Many communions turn for theological grounding to confessional statements that arise from previous eras. Many of these statements reflect cultural assumptions that may not apply in the 21st-century church. What is the role these confessional statements play—or should play—in the process of deciding controversial issues before the life of the church? As the church faces issues of sexuality and morality, do these confessional statements help or hinder?

“Caregiving: Care for the Broken Heart: Professional Training for Non-Professional Caregivers” with Remington Johnson (MDiv’12) | March 7; $25 | Hospitalizations, health crises, and heartbreak push us into new realities where

we are walking in new spaces. This event focuses on the coping, the struggle, the grit, and the growth that we must summon to continue to see light in the world. Learn how to walk with those who suffer and see how their spiritual lives can assist them in resiliency after trauma. | In partnership with Heart Hospital of Austin | Recommended for clergy, chaplains, lay caregivers

“Growing into Tomorrow … Today” | March 9-10; FREE | Planning for retirement can be challenging. Explore steps to take today to prepare for the best retirement tomorrow. | Presented by the Board of Pensions of the PC(USA) Member Education Team| Recommended for mid- to late-career clergy and lay Board of Pension Plan members and their guests “Cruzando la Frontera: Enfrentando la Violencia” with Alejandro Montes| Houston March 14, 9:00 a.m.

- 6:00 p.m.; $35 for pastors; $15 others (meals included)|The day will focus on pastoral responses to violence in private space— the home—and in public space—the cities.|In partnership with the Lutheran Seminary Program in the Southwest and the Seminary of the Southwest | Recommended for Hispanic pastors and church leaders. Workshop is in Spanish.

“Changing Church Systems: The Adaptive Challenge” with Peter Steinke | April 6-8; $125/person ($75 for APCE members and UMC Commissioned Parish Christian Educators) | Learn how to lead for change during anxious times. | Recommended for clergy, Christian educators, non-clergy church leaders

“Suffering, Healing, Forgiveness, and the Holocaust” with Carolyn Manosevtiz | April 22; $60 (lunch

included)| After the Shoah, “thinkers” of all denominations and religions were silent … and when they began to speak, they were not in unison. Why? Come to explore this question through lecture, visual presentation, and group discussion.| Recommended for clergy and practitioners of all faiths

“Finishing with Vitality: Achieving a Healthy Ending” with David Rich | April 27-28; $150 (includes

housing); $100 (commuters) | The pastor, spouse, staff, and congregation too often approach the pastor’s retirement with a lack of

openness or a sense of “biding our time.” It doesn’t have to be that way. Learn how pastors and congregations can understand the value of being in transition, plan together for a healthy ending, and review, reflect, and celebrate the ministry of the church and pastor as “our” ministry.|Recommended for congregational pastors who anticipate retiring within the next five years

Interim and Transitional Ministry Education | April 26-May 1| Provided by the Office of Ministerial Formation and

Advanced Studies of Austin Seminary; omfas@austinseminary.edu

“Women Writing: The Journey of Spiritual Memoir” with Donna Johnson | May 11-14; $350 (includes

housing, meals, and book) |Recommended for women pastors, writers, and would-be memoirists

“Discovering God’s Economy: Bridging Theological and Financial Imagination” with Joy Anderson, Criterion Institute | May 19; $60 (lunch included)|How can Christians, and congregations specifically, participate in building an economy that works for all? Learn what lies at the intersection of business, finance, and the church, and explore a model for congregations seeking to transform their own economic life and that of those around them. | For pastors and leaders focused on mission

Learn more and register for all events at AustinSeminary.edu/ebwworkshops Winter 2015 | 17

faculty news notes

faculty notes | David Hadley Jensen, professor in The Clarence N. and Betty B. Frierson Distinguished Chair of Reformed Theology (center), was installed as Academic Dean during the Opening Worship service for the 2014-15 academic year. Professor Cynthia Rigby and President Theodore J. Wardlaw participated in the service.

The Gene Alice Sherman Chair in Sacred Music fully funded; search to begin in 2015

N

ine years after pledging to endow a faculty chair honoring his wife, Trustee Emeritus Max Sherman has completed funding for the chair. A search for the professor to hold the Gene Alice Sherman Chair in Sacred Music will begin in 2015; it is the only such chair among Presbyterian seminaries. The faculty member called to fill the Sherman Chair will augment the Department of the Church’s Ministry with expertise in hymnody and liturgical music.

“Max and Gene Alice have been lifelong lovers of music, and especially sacred music and its purposeful role in the liturgy of the church,” said President Ted Wardlaw. “Their gift will enable students, in perpetuity, to study, learn, and sing through the centuries and millennia of music which has formed and nourished the faith of God’s people. That they are the ones making this possible is so very fitting; and it is all the more fitting that the chair lifts up forever a musician as gifted as On behalf of the Seminary, President Wardlaw gratefully Gene Alice acknowledges the Shermans’ gift. Inset, Gene Alice Sherman Sherman.” demonstrated her love of sacred music as organist for First Presbyterian Church, Amarillo, over a period of twenty years.

18 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

Whit Bodman, associate professor of comparative religion, was installed as the faculty representative on the Austin Seminary Board of Trustees in November. He gave a paper in Washington D.C. on pastoral issues in the area of mass incarceration for a Jewish-Christian Dialogue sponsored by the National Council of Churches; he shared copies of the recent Insights on the topic. On January 29 he will participate in Texas Muslim Capitol Day. In February he will lead a class on Islam at St. John Lutheran Church in Bellville, Texas, and participate in a “Witness at the Border” in El Paso with the National Council of Churches Local and Regional Ecumenical Committee.

Last summer William Greenway, associate professor of philosophical theology, presented a paper at the Centre for Animal Ethics’ conference on “Religion and Animal Protection,” at Oxford University. He was also the keynote speaker for San Antonio Interfaith Power & Light and Compassionate San Antonio’s “Creation and Spirituality: Awakening a Passion for the Environment in People of Faith” event in September.

Paul Hooker, associate dean for ministerial formation and advanced studies, taught a two-week seminar on the Belhar Confession at Westminster Presbyterian Church, Austin, and a two-week class on the literary artistry of biblical narrative, for University Presbyterian Church, Austin. He will be making a presentation to the Theological Convocation for Tres Rios Presbytery and for the Leadership School of New Covenant Presbytery in January.

As part of her year-long sabbatical The Dorothy B. Vickery Professor of Homiletics and Liturgics Jennifer Lord completed the route from Le Puy en Velay, France, to Santiago,

good reads | Doing Christian Ethics From the Margins by Miguel A. De La Torre (Orbis Books, second ed. 2014, paperback, 384 pp)

I Professor Lord upon arrival at the Cathedral of Santiago.

Spain, walking 1250 kilometers (750 miles), with her husband, Casey Clapp, for nine weeks on this ancient Christian pilgrimage route, The Way of St. James. As is custom, she prayed for others along the way and upon arrival.

The W.C. Brown Professor of Theology Cynthia Rigby is a new member of the Presbyterian Publication Corporation board and the associate editor for Brill’s Journal of Reformed Theology. She gave lecture series this fall for Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church (Asheville, North Carolina), First PC, (Abilene, Texas), and Trinity PC (Charlotte, North Carolina).

She led a leadership conference at Montreat for Providence Presbytery in South Carolina.

David White, the C. Ellis and Nancy Gribble Nelson Professor of Christian Education, was a presenter at the “Joy and the Vernal Season of Adolescence” conference, part of the Theology of Joy project at Yale Center for Faith and Culture, in October.

Melissa Wiginton, research professor in Methodist studies, participated in a national consultation on theological education convened by the United Methodist Church General Board of Higher Education and Ministry in November. In January, she will participate in the national project, “Theological Education Between the Times.”

n Doing Christian Ethics from the Margins (2014), Dr. Miguel De La Torre calls us to reassess our understandings of Christian ethics in light of the plight of the oppressed.

He describes how the disenfranchised struggle against societal mechanisms that produce poverty, social misery, and prevent them from living out the social mission of Christ (i.e., abundant life). He also discusses the challenges presented by corporate irresponsibility, political campaigns funded by “dark money,” and a growing wealth gap.

De La Torre’s claim is that appropriate responses to such challenges can only be discovered if we are willing to abandon the power and privilege that come from occupying social “centers” such as whiteness, maleness, or wealth. Leaving these “centers” behind, we are called by Christ to stand in solidarity with the marginalized. Motivated

by Christian love and justice, we must also act to dismantle the structures that produce such conditions so that all may “live full, abundant lives, able to become all that God has called them to be” (p. 5). The book consists of four parts: Part I is theory, Part II analyzes global relationships, Part III analyzes national issues, and Part IV, business relationships.

Part I, divided into three chapters, is key for understanding De La Torre’s reasoning, and sets the foundation for the rest of the text. In chapter one he argues that Christian ethics must be done from the margins because of our current situation of moral imperialism by the dominant culture. Here, white culture has posited itself as normative

and other interpretations of Christianity, as aberrant. Chapter two gives content to De La Torre’s conception of “ethics from the center.”

Its features include an emphasis on personal salvation without much attention to society, a stress on virtue without much attention to the challenges faced by the oppressed, and/ or advocacy for justice provided the status quo is preserved. Chapter three introduces the reader to the “hermeneutical circle,” the method by which one does ethics from the margins.

The remainder of the book (Parts II-IV) consists of chapters wherein the hermeneutical method is applied (e.g. national poverty, affirmative action, environment). In the closing epilogue, De La Torre reminds the reader of the origins (margins), thesis (position determines perspective), and goals (reorientation) of the text.

De La Torre’s text is a must read for those interested in contemporary leading voices in U.S. Latino/a liberation theology, as well as for those who are not. As De La Torre says, people “either love it or hate it. No one is ever simply neutral.” Its strengths are its accessibility and often jaw-dropping facts. The content is somewhat dated, but this is to be expected of a second edition. Continued relevance and a new chapter—War on Women—are also noteworthy. One lingering question concerns the relationship of De La Torre’s love/justice-based ethics to our current “state of emergency” context marked by a floating imperium, crisis government, and the derogation of rights for those on the margins.

—Written by Asante Todd (MDiv’06), instructor in Christian Ethics

Join the Austin Seminary Book Club AustinSeminary.edu/bookclub Winter 2015 | 19

alumni news notes Left: John Leedy (MDiv’11) played the pipes for Polity Bowl. Right: Lydia Hernandez (MDiv’93) brought her perspective to the “Day of Memory and Hope: Austin Seminary and the Education of Hispanic Pastors” event.

Hold the date!

A symposium for pastors

class notes | 1950s

“To Hear & Obey: What Karl Barth Teaches Us About Discerning and Following the Word of God”

The 2015 Karl Barth Symposium April 13–15, 2015 Speakers: David W. Johnson Associate Professor of Church History and Christian Spirituality

Serene Jones

President of Union Theological Seminary in New York

Cynthia L. Rigby

The W.C. Brown Professor of Theology

George Stroup

Polebridge Press has published a collection of essays by William O. Walker (MDiv’57) in the book, Paul and His Legacy: Collected Essays. Walker is the Jennie Farris Railey King Professor Emeritus of Religion at Trinity University.

1970s Jim Currie (MDiv’79, ThM’89) has edited Doing Justice, Loving Kindness, and Walking Humbly: The Witness of Some Southern Presbyterian Pastors for the Cause of Racial Harmony in the 1950s and 1960s, published by the Presbyterian Historical Society of the Southwest.

1980s Candasu Vernon (MDiv’89) married Brian Cubbage June 28, 2014.

1990s Valerie Bridgeman (MDiv’90) was appointed associate professor of homiletics and Hebrew Bible at Methodist Theological School in Ohio, effective July 1, 2015.

The J.B. Green Professor of Theology, Columbia Seminary

Jesus J. (Jesse) Gonzalez (MDiv’92) became a United States Citizen on September 26, 2014, in Fort Smith, Arkansas.

For more information on schedule and cost, go to:

Thea A. McKee (MDiv’95) was installed as pastor of United Presbyterian Church, Riverton, Wyoming, November 9, 2014.

austinseminary.edu/ barthsymposium Event made posisble by

The Shirl P. Butler Endowed Fund for Barth Studies

2000s John R. Gage (MDiv’00) was installed as senior pastor at United Christian Church of Austin on October 11, 2014.

Ashley Lyon and Matthew Morse (MDiv’03) welcomed their son, Ethan Bennett Morse,

20 | Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary

born September 16, 2014. He is the great-grandson of Jack K. Bennett (ThM’58).

Tanya M. Eustace (MDiv’04) has completed the PhD program at Garrett Evangelical Theological Seminary.

2010s Joshua Gahr (MDiv’08) has published the article “Evangelicals and Emergent Moral Protest” in the journal Mobilization: An International Quarterly (Volume 19, Number 2 / June 2014).

Eric Gates (MDiv’12) became the senior pastor of Central Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Austin, June 16.

Laureen Suba (MDiv’14) has been called to be the executive director ad-interim for the United Campus Ministry of Greater Houston.

Jen Stuart (MDiv’14) has been appointed the pastor of Ellensburg United Methodist Church in Ellensburg, Washington.

ordinations | Barbara (Babs) Miller (MDiv’90) was ordained to a validated ministry for chaplaincy with Austin Hospice on November 16, 2014.

Michael P. Lauziere (MDiv’09) was ordained as pastor of First Baptist Church, Springvale Maine, October 19, 2014.

Karen Black (MDiv’13) was ordained as stated supply of First Presbyterian, Taylor, Texas, November 2, 2014.

Gordon N. Blackman Jr. (MDiv’14) was ordained and installed as pastor of Alpine Presbyterian Church, Longview Texas, October 26.

James Michael East (MDiv’14) was ordained on November 2, 2014. He has been called to be associate pastor at Forest Lake Presbyterian Church, Columbia, South Carolina.

Sheila Sidberry-Thomas (MDiv’14) was ordained as an itinerant elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, October 10.

Layton Williams (MDiv’14) was ordained at Central Presbyterian Church, Austin, Texas, and installed as pastoral resident for Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago, Illinois, November 15, 2014.

in memoriam | Henry A. Grubbs (MDiv’50), Southlake, Texas, August 11, 2014 Joseph T. Sheeler (MDiv’65), Ruston, Louisiana, October 8, 2014 Ellen Tabler Lemen (DMin’89), Richmond, British Columbia, Canada, September 5, 2014 Carrol J. Blevins (MDiv’94), Las Cruces, New Mexico, August 27, 2014

A convergence of alums on the chapel lawn included James Lee (MDiv’00), Jeff Cranton (MDiv’99) and Ted Foote (MDiv’79).

teaching ministry

We’re in the breakers

By Melissa Wiginton, Vice President for Education Beyond the Walls and Research Professor in Methodist Studies

M

ore than one person has said that my title—Vice President for Education Beyond the Walls—is one of the most intriguing in all of theological education. Granted, people often forget or misremember it, but only rarely does it pass without comment. The title serves as a kind of screen on which people project their ideas about what this part of the Seminary’s work could be, or perhaps should be. Distance learning.

Continuing education. Multi-cultural experiences. On-line classes. Lay leader training. The title itself begins the work of the office: stretching the definition and practice of theological education to connect with people in their on-theground practices of faith and leadership.

I suspect that some people find the indeterminacy of education beyond the walls disconcerting; the Communications office helpfully includes the subtitle “Lifelong Learning at Austin Seminary” so customers know to stop here if a dose of lifelong learning is what they need. Certainly, as a seminary in the Reformed tradition, we bear the value of education—of educated clergy, educated lay people, rigorous scholarship, intellectual scrutiny—as a gift for the whole body of Christ. As an institution, we are stewards of this heritage not only for Presbyterians but for the benefit of the big-C Church, or as my Southern kin say, for all y’all.

Like our peer institutions, we have long enacted our stewardship of the gift of education by receiving men and women with calls to ministry, giving them a classical theological education with some practice of ministry, and then sending them out to serve churches.

The days when schools of theology can function solely in this mode are over.

Why? Because we hold these gifts in the swirling swarming tides of Big Change—in the ways people participate in church life, in the expectations for and possibilities for access to learning, in the demographics of our city, state,

and nation, in the tyranny of busyness, the virtualness of experience, the need for character formed by Christ. Phyllis Tickle says the church is having a onceevery-500-years rummage sale. Sharon Daloz Parks calls it a hinge point in history.

On the days when the Big Change feels too big and any change too hard, I think of my niece Caroline when she was six years old, missing two front teeth, trying to get out past the sand bar in the

of learning communities—in the Certificate in Ministry, the College of Pastoral Leaders, Fellowships in Pastoral Leadership for Public Life, and Revaluing Money, and even in the temporary communities of one-, twoand three-day experiences.

In 1995, I left the practice of law to pursue theological education at the Candler School of Theology of Emory University. The interview committee asked me what I would do after I earned the degree. I told them I saw myself somewhere between— between the church and the academy, between scholars and practitioners, between the past and the future. In the breakers.

Some of us are called to such places.

I do have one of the most intriguing titles in theological education. Now I also serve with an appointment to the faculty as Research Professor in Methodist Studies. With these Melissa Wiginton helped conceive of “A Day of Memory and Hope” to explore our past and dream positions, I have the privilege and responsibility of multiple of our future with Hispanic ministry. perspectives but also the duty Gulf of Mexico, “I just have one thing to of multiple relationships. I have more say,” she said looking at me. Then eyes, questions than I do answers, and I mouth, face wide open, body tense, she will not stop pushing the questions. yelled at the top of her lungs, “We’re In How do we serve the church—the The Breakers!” Caroline’s little body was Church—with all of our resources for strong and lithe and she was not afraid. the future coming toward us? How She was exhilarated. do we educate Jesus Christ-grounded

What if that is like the energy of ministers, teachers, and healers the currents of academy and church now? What knowledge is needful to smacking into each other? create? How do we open our hands in

You’ve been in the breakers, too, partnership with the world? How do we one way or another, and you know your learn what the world has to teach us? life is not sustainable there for the long Answers—the truth if you will—come term. So we make our way by touching through relationships: among people we off from solid ground. We believe know and people we will come to know; transformation happens in community among students and texts and teachers; and over time, a commitment most among voices inside, outside, and on visible in the communities of learning the walls. My mission most broadly who live, study, and work together construed is to grow and tend to these over time on our campus as they earn relationships for the livelihood of the degrees. Through Education Beyond enterprise with which we are entrusted. the Walls, we stretch our imaginations That’s how Caroline and I got through and our resources toward other shapes the breakers. v Winter 2015 | 21

windows

Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary 100 East 27th Street, Austin, Texas 78705-5711

Order your 2015 Lenten Devotionals

by January 19

Non Profit Org U.S. Postage PAID Austin, TX Permit No. 2473

Emerging Methodist Voices March 12, 2015 | $15 (Lunch included) Come and learn from teachers, pastors, and scholars formed by the Wesleyan tradition who are leading the church into the future.

“Listening for What God Gives” with Dr. Gerald C. Liu How do we perceive the action of God in the world? What are the theological implications of the music of real life? Come and explore how life echoes the holy today.

Reflections, prayers, and spiritual practices to incorporate into your Lenten Season

AustinSeminary. edu/Lent

“Spirit and the Power Within” with Rev. Jay Williams In a world full of growing inequalities, the Wesleyan intersection of personal and social holiness is more needful than ever. By exploring this scriptural soul-call to social justice, we might unleash yet more fully Pentecost power in our lives.

For clergy and lay leaders of all denominations To register:

AustinSeminary.edu/Wesley