Union Now Fall 2014

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Union Now The Magazine of Union Theological Seminary | Fall 2014

International, Interfaith, Interdependent Union’s Innovative Spirit Also: Recent Faculty Scholarship, Commencement Photos, and other News.

Union Now Fall | 2014

Published by Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York 3041 Broadway at 121st Street New York, NY 10027 online@uts.columbia.edu 212-280-1591

Editor-in-Chief Jason Wyman

Graphic Design Ron Hester

Copy Editor Leah Rousmaniere Kevin McGee

Principal Photographers Ron Hester Richard Madonna Roy Weinstein Tom Zuback Union Theological Seminary Photo Archive

Class Notes/In Memoriam Leah Rousmaniere Writers Dan Rohrer Jason Wyman Ted Dedon Kristen Southworth Lisa Cunningham Matt Hoffman Aaron Stauffer Julia Stroud Benjamin Perry Julia Khan Nicholas Laccetti Lindsey Nye Dana Ribeiro Shelley Yeats

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Cover photograph by Roy Weinstein

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Contents Feature Articles

Departments

International, Interfaith, Interdependent

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International Exchange: Speaking Across the Divides

4

Visiting Pastors from Norway

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Interreligious Engagement

7

Interfaith Residency

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Union Food Lab

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Rethinking Our Ministry: Food Justice

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Union Forum Unites Institutes and Initiatives in Working for Social Justice

13

Economic Democracy: A Union Tradition

14

President’s Message

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Union News

15

Faculty News

17

Admissions 22 Development 23 Commencement Photos

24

Alumni/ae and Class Notes

27

In Memoriam

31

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President’s Message

Creating a New Leading Edge, for Today’s World

Dear Alumni/ae and Friends,

W

e are very excited to share this newest issue of Union Now with you. As I hope you’ll see, Union remains on the leading edge of theological education, but we are doing so in new ways. Union’s innovative spirit is what singles us out as a distinctly world-engaging school, and I am proud to be a part of an institution marked by such creativity.

Our theme for this Union Now is “International, Interfaith, and Interdependent,” all of which are core characteristics of this spirit.

When I was in graduate school, I benefited immensely from the year I spent at Tamil Nadu Theological Seminary in South India. Among other things, it was a time that demanded an accounting of my own U.S. context. Last year, students traveled from Burma, Nigeria, India, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Germany, Rwanda, the Netherlands, Scotland, and Ghana to study here. In addition, a cohort of our Ph.D. students and faculty traveled to Oslo, Norway to gather for a three-day seminar with a group of their Norwegian and South African colleagues. Union is truly an international seminary preparing leaders from around the world to do

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the work of justice in their home countries. The international diversity of our student body sharpens our theological and ethical language, and helps the seminary to graduate precise, compassionate, and worldly leaders.

We are also happy to welcome the Right Rev. Disani Christopher Senyonjo, M.Div. 1966, S.T.M. 1967 as a scholar-inresidence. Bishop Senyonjo has been a strong and consistent advocate for LGBTQ safety in his home country of Uganda, and was recognized with the Clinton Global Citizen Award for his work. He has spoken out against the criminalization of homosexuality and the violence that LGBTQ people face, which earned him a starring role in the documentary film, “God Loves Uganda.”

Established in the Christian tradition, Union remains a predominantly Christian seminary. Yet we are fully aware that our witness is incomplete without the wisdom of other faith communities. Paul Knitter, Paul Tillich Professor Emeritus of Theology, World Religions and Culture, put it this way: “Jesus is the Way that is open to other ways. If you are following Jesus, but are not open to other religious ways, you may not be following Jesus.”

Because we believe in the importance of a multireligious culture, we started two new interfaith programs this past year. Under the guidance of Tanya Williams, our Deputy Vice President for Institutional Diversity and Community Engagement, we launched the Interfaith Women’s Residency Program (IWRP) as an on-campus interfaith intentional living community. The participants, who ranged from Jewish to Muslim to Christian to Agnostic, ate together, prayed together, read together, and reflected together.

The program was a huge success, and the next cohort of student participants moves in at the start of our fall term.

We were thrilled to host the Millennial Leaders Pilot Conference this summer, an impressive interfaith summit that

brought together nearly 40 millennial leaders from across the country who are interested in how spirituality impacts social justice movements. This conference was the first of its kind to focus on the intersection of social justice work, millennial leaders, and the impact of spirituality.

Finally, Union is fundamentally bound to the communities around us. Nothing makes this interdependence clearer than the current climate crisis. We cannot pretend any longer that we make our decisions in a vacuum. Our ecological actions as a seminary, as a city, and as a country have world-wide reverberations.

In an effort to be more environmentally responsible, our Board of Trustees voted unanimously to divest our entire endowment from fossil fuels. We are the first seminary in the world to take such action, and we do so on moral grounds.

In that same spirit of care for creation, this September Union hosted Religions for the Earth, a conference that gathered religious leaders from around the world to assess how people of faith can respond to our planet’s dire ecological condition. Karenna Gore, the Director of Union Forum and Global Social Justice Partnerships, and her team worked in earnest to facilitate the convening.

Our commitment to creative innovation keeps us on the leading edge. These are crucial, invigorating, and challenging times—exactly the sort that Union thrives in.

Joyfully,

The Rev. Dr. Serene Jones President Johnston Family Professor for Religion & Democracy

International, Interfaith, Interdependent

U

nion Theological Seminary prides

recently retired professors. The seminary has

itself on being one of the world’s

a proud history of conversing with other faiths

foremost independent seminaries.

and learning how to bring about greater justice

Yet it is kept well in mind that Union must

in cooperation with their adherents. This is con-

always work with the world in which it exists.

stantly being worked more deeply and inextrica-

Indeed, for Union to retain its reputation as an

bly into the mission and activities of Union.

outstanding seminary that prizes social justice

Finally, Union is, and has always been,

work as well as scholarship, it must always

interdependent. This seems like a trivial

keep in mind that it is situated in a diverse

observation, yet collectively in many ways

neighborhood of a world city on a diverse globe

it seems as if we are only starting to truly

where the actions of each person ultimately

appreciate this fact as the world faces environ-

affect everyone else. In acknowledging this

mental crises that promise to affect the entire

context, this issue of Union Now features stories

world. Closer to home, Union is amidst a city

that emphasize the International, Interfaith,

that struggles with food insecurity, poverty,

and Interdependent nature of Union.

and violence while simultaneously offering

Over the past year, Union has reaffirmed its

unlimited cultural, spiritual, and relational

commitment to being international in rel-

opportunities. Union is indeed a special place,

evance, fostering academic and activist discus-

but it is one stationed in a network of unique

sions across borders and overseas. Scholars and

and important places in the world. Noting

ministers from other countries have come to

those bonds and strengthening them can

our small campus in Morningside Heights, and

only serve to make Union better in every way.

likewise, students, faculty, and staff have trav-

Union’s founders established the seminary

eled abroad to gain fresh perspectives on their

in the heart of a city for a reason, and it wasn’t

own work and contexts.

to be a place isolated from the messiness of

One of the most exciting developments

the world.

recently at Union has been the broadening of its

So, yes, Union is independent. But it is also

mission to be a leader in work that is interfaith.

inter-so-many-things. This is a challenge, but

The Interreligious Engagement field was estab-

also one of its greatest sources of strength and

lished, expanding on the work of current and

potential growth.

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent

International Exchange: Speaking Across the Divides

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rom October 1-3, 2013, a group of professors and doctoral students from Union traveled to Oslo, Norway, to meet with colleagues from Oslo and Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. Drs. Aliou Niang and John Thatamanil, Charlene Sinclair, Dan Rohrer, and Becca Tatum met with colleagues from the University of Oslo (Universitet i Oslo), Norway, and the University of Kwazulu-Natal (Inyuvesi Yakwazulu-Natali), Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. The purpose of the seminar, the second in a multi-year program that met last year at Union, was to create international collaboration between established scholars, activists, church leaders, and doctoral students on the theme “Becoming Human: Community.”

Presenters came from different academic backgrounds—Bible scholars, dogmatic theologians, social ethicists, historians, pastors-turned-academics—as well as from different cultural contexts—black and white America, the welfare state of Norway, and post-Apartheid South Africa. Despite, or perhaps because of, these differences, the group developed a common

BY DAN ROHRER

a convent dedicated to hospitality and the training of women religious. Sleeping and taking breakfast in the same building allowed for casual conversations about life in the participants’ different academic and personal environments, and for comparing the different requirements and customs of those environments. The Norwegian hosts also took their guests to the Natthjemmet Center for Women, a shelter for women in situations of prostitution and drug abuse. The religious message of the house is very much informed by the theological curriculum of the University of Oslo, which has strong liberationist commitments like Union’s. Participants in the seminar also attended dinner and an evening worship service at the City Mission’s Center in the Tøyen neighborhood. There, once a week, the Mission Center serves dinner in their soup kitchen to anyone who comes. This meal is followed by a church service in a unique sanctuary. Instead of the traditional rows of pews facing one direction, as in the Norwegian state church and many others around the world, the pews line the walls facing the center of the room, where there is an altar made of cobblestones from the streets of Oslo. These stones, the Norwegian hosts explained, are meant as a symbol of the way the concerns of those on the street must come into the liturgical space. Indeed, one of the central parts of the liturgy there comes during the prayers, when many of the same people who ate in the soup kitchen light candles for their joys and concerns and place the candles on the cobblestone altar. These “extracurricular” excursions into the religious life of Oslo helped build the foundational language that would inform the participants’ more academic discussions.

At the center of those academic discussions were the seminar’s keynote addresses by professors from each inStudents and professors from New York, Oslo, and Pietermaritzburg on the way to the opening stitution. Union’s professors addressed address of the conference. the topic of “becoming human” by speaking about interreligious themes language, one that did not remain merely academic or within their respective disciplines: biblical studies and theolparochial but attempted to speak across the divides between ogy. Dr. Niang spoke as a member of the Diola people of Senegal, social movements, religious communities, and distant reflecting on how classical Greek sources, Paul’s letters, and the continents in ways that could make human life better. interaction between Islam and Christianity all influenced his As a complement to the scholarly work of the seminar, parreading of the sayings of one of the most important religious ticipants experienced some of the many ties that the University leaders in his community. His address was titled, “Identity of Oslo has to social-justice organizations throughout the city.

Construction in Postcolonial Contexts: The ‘Other’ in the Lives Guest accommodations were located at the Katarinahjemmet, and Thoughts of the Apostle Paul and Aline Sittoé Diatta.”

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent Dr. Thatamanil spoke about “Being Human, Cherishing Difference.” Biographically, he located difference and diversity within the extreme density of New York City, where many different religious experiences exist on the same highly populated island. He noted that difference is often seen as a threat, and comparative theology helps lessen that threat by creating what he calls “apophatic anthropology,” or a sense of mystery about what and who human beings are.

The keynote addresses from the professors at Oslo treated two pressing concerns for Norwegians: the welfare of undocumented workers in that part of Europe, and the outbreak of violence in the home of the Nobel Peace Prize. In a talk entitled “Heterotopic Hospitality, Spaces of Others,” Dean Trygve Wyller of Oslo discussed how undocumented immigrants in Gothenburg, Sweden (some four hours away from Oslo, Norway), receive weekly medical care from a nonreligious organization called Rosengrenska within the walls of a religious church. His address was not only an interesting juxtaposition of the sacred and the secular; it was a meditation of the ways in which physical spaces enable social action. Dr. Jone Salomonsen dealt with the somber topic of the 2011 shootings at a children’s camp in Oslo. Her paper, “Massacre and Theology in Oslo,” was an investigation of the religious ideas found within the manifesto of the shooter, Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 80 people during his attack. Politically, Breivik sought to restore a kind of Norwegian nationalism, and hence targeted a summer camp of children largely aligned with the ruling labor party, which he found to be too accepting of foreign immigrants. Religiously, this translated into, among other things, Islamophobia and the restoration of Norwegian indigenous religion instead of cultural Christianity or secularism.

Professors from South Africa deliberated on liberationist concerns that were firmly embedded in social movements and church contexts. The opening lecture from Dr. Gerald West of Kwazulu-Natal discussed “Contending for Dignity in the Bible and the South African Public Realm.” Dr. West, a student at Union in 1994, spoke to the ways in which the demands of the shack-dwellers’ movement (Abahladi) for greater rights in their country could better be understood in terms of a distinction made in the second edition of the South African Kairos Document, which contrasts people’s theology, an organic outgrowth of the struggles of the poor, with prophetic theology, an academic articulation of people’s theology. The South African Women’s Manyano and Young Methodist Women’s Movements were the focus of Rev. Dr. Simanga Kumalo’s keynote. (For more about the relationship between Union and Kwazulu-Natal, see Rev. Dr. Kumalo’s interview in the Union Now from 2011.)

The Women’s Manyano is a United Methodist organization dedicated to women’s rights and the prevention of child abuse.

Interestingly, this larger organization found itself at odds with the younger, unmarried mothers in the movement who protested greater child support. Rev. Dr. Kumalo’s advocacy as an ally of these young, unwed mothers drew heavily on a theology of Mary, who was unwed when she conceived.

Representatives from Pietermaritzburg at dinner in downtown Oslo.

In addition to these keynote addresses, the seminar included workshops that paired groups of professors and doctoral students for discussion of the students’ own work. Some wrote papers specifically on the topic “Becoming Human: Community,” while others read chapters from doctoral theses that already addressed that topic. In feedback sessions reflecting on the experience, many of the students said that working with peers from around the world, as well as professors from different countries and disciplines, was an invaluable experience that could not be created outside of an international partnership like this one. A powerful outcome of this international partnership is that it will influence the future work of at least a dozen doctoral students who are still formulating their exams and dissertations.

Through cooperation between the administrations of all three schools, Union, University of Oslo, and the University of Kwazulu-Natal, have brought together people of all different walks of life who are concerned with liberation. An initial meeting at Union in 2012 led to a more official partnership agreement at the 2013 meeting in Oslo. Faculty representatives from the schools have arranged for a 2014 seminar in Pietermaritzburg on the theme “Becoming Human: Dislocation.” There are also plans for this international partnership to continue further into the future, with more opportunities for Master’s students to contribute to this international conversation about human liberation.

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent

Visiting Pastors from Norway

BY JA SON W YMAN

N

ew York City is one of the most diverse and internationally connected cities in the world. Yet, nothing can replace the importance of actual international dialogue and communication. In that spirit, a large group of Norwegian ministers visited Union in October for an intensive class on preaching and worship accompanied by a Union alum and former exchange student from Oslo, Carl Petter Opsahl. Carl became friends with many at Union, including the Practical Theology faculty while he was here, and organized the trip so that a variety of ministers from Norway could come to New York and learn about different styles and traditions of preaching as they are practiced in the United States.

For many it was their first trip to the U.S., and also their first experience of radically different ways of preaching than is common in their home country, which still has the Church of Norway as its state church and where the great majority of Christians identify as Evangelical Lutherans. The ministers came to learn about different styles that fall outside that tradition of preaching, that though they love it immensely, tends to be similar across Norway.

The class met for two consecutive days, the first being led by Drs. Barbara Lundblad and Janet Walton, and the second by Dr. Walton and Troy Messenger.

Taking up the questions the students brought with them, the first day focused on preaching “off the page,” a common theme in Union’s preaching and worship classes and a concern for all those who preach no matter how experienced.

The idea of a sermon being a form of “narrative retelling” was emphasized and a video of a chapel honoring those who are buried in New York City’s “Potter’s Field” shown, which strongly moved the students gathered. The video encouraged the ministers to rethink space and story and how they can be used in sermons for emotional and spiritual effect. In the end, the message was conveyed that, as Dr. Lundblad put it using

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Pastors who visited Union from Norway toured New York City during their visit, led by Carl Petter Opsahl, a former visiting scholar at Union (front row, second from left).

a passage from a book by Jana Childers that adapts a quote from Mary Oliver: “Sermons are not words after all but fire for the cold, ropes let down for the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry.”

The second day Dr. Messenger raised the aspect of preaching being a performance and warned against worrying about lacking authenticity in acknowledging that performance is a central aspect of the act of preaching. Because worship and music are planned and are “performances” doesn’t make them less open to the moving of the spirit in services. It was emphasized that performances can speak to different people in attendance in very different ways and that what counts most is that people in attendance (not necessarily all people every week) hear a gospel word intended for them.

I sat down to speak with Opsahl about his own experience at Union and the class trip from Norway. He expressed how important it is to get out of one’s own context to really deepen one’s own preaching and ability to keep services

interesting and fresh for parishioners.

His time spent at Union was formative for his own voice in preaching and he thought others could benefit from the same experience. In addition to class at Union, the group traveled to important spots around the city to get an idea of the context in which the preaching they learned about was heard. The different takes on preaching the same Gospel can make it resonate in new ways, reach a person who it may not have before, or create a space that people will feel more welcome to attend. Opsahl also plays saxophone, and like he did many times during his time at Union as a student, he participated in that day’s chapel.

International, Interfaith, Interdependent

Interreligious Engagement

F

or a long time now, the field that deals with religious diversity has been growing and has recently become established. Some narratives date the first such endeavors into this field come from a sequence of events related to the World Council of Churches or the 1893 Parliament of the World’s Religions. Arguably, the type of inter-religious engagement that now holds sway over the academic and cultural discourse is even older. For much of the history of this movement in understanding the world’s religious diversity, Union Theological Seminary has been at the forefront and in many ways has been a pioneer in the field.

Wherever we trace Union’s first involvement in this endeavor is irrelevant. What matters is how it has helped shape the narrative and still continues to do so. Today, Union has on its faculty both established and burgeoning voices that are famous and even infamous in their relationship to its broad history. Dr. Chung Hyun Kyung is an example who spurred a tremendous debate and also made a very important point on the topic of religious diversity, how Christians and other religious people relate to their traditions, and how identities are shaped not only by affiliation, but also their own worldview and culture.

In response to a controversial speech she gave at the World Council of Churches in 1991 Dr. Chung said this: “If they ask me, “Are you a syncretist?” I say, “You are right, I am a syncretist, but so are you.” My response is that I know I am a syncretist, but you don’t know you are a syncretist because you have hegemonic power ... non-Christian cultures, when they try to interpret the gospel out of their life experience, they are syncretists! But they are just being true to their identity, history, and culture.”

In many ways, this structures an internal problem in the discourse related to inter-religious engagement and the overall fact of religious diversity. Often, traditional religious people hold the field as suspect for the simple fact it can often be individualistic and therefore not faithful to its particular religious identity. Dr. Chung was accused of being a syncretist—one who combines spurious positions into some final synthesis which, by implication, is not a good thing to be. Her response, however, is that we are all syncretists.

Whether or not this is true, it is a relevant point in the conversation related to Union Theological Seminary. At Union, there is a growing sense that there are many identities and traditions which do, in fact, shape our religious experience and affiliation. Dr. John Thatamanil frequently points out that forms of American Capitalism have significant impacts on our understanding of what is most ultimate or most concerning.

A scholar on the work of Paul Tillich, Dr. Thatamanil is also highly involved in the field of interreligious engagement. The points being made here, while not identical to the critique lodged against syncretism, are that we are shaped by a variety of forces, those forces are indeed diverse, and are not only those identified as “religions.”

BY TED DEDON

Diversity is crucial to understanding the field of interreligious engagement and also the basic reality that America is the most religiously diverse nation in the world. Currently, we are seeing a statistical rise in those who identify as “Nones”—those with no religious affiliation at all. While there is also a rise in atheism, the large majority of these unaffiliated people selfidentify as “spiritual,” just not “religious.” Union Theological Seminary is situated at a cross-roads in history and in context.

While having a major historical relationship to the field we now call interreligious engagement, it also rests in New York City, a central hub of international diversity and engagement. Courses like Religions in the City of New York, now taught by Dr. Thatamanil, are designed to uncover this fact so that incoming students are acquainted with the reality of multiple religious identities in the midst of the city’s diversity.

Another of Union’s major additions to the conversation and trajectory of this movement comes from the recently retired Dr. Paul Knitter, a giant in the field. Dr. Knitter’s contributions came over the course of an active career in which he modeled the many ways religions and religious people engage—or fail to engage—in dialogue, specifically between Buddhists and Christians. One of his major works, Introducing Theologies of Religious Pluralism, is considered by many to be a foundational text in the field. The book is taught all over the country in both undergraduate and graduate contexts alike. Before his retirement, Union had the opportunity to host what was one of the largest interreligious conferences in its history, the 2013 International Buddhist-Christian Conference. This particular event drew people from all around the world, including scholars and practitioners such as Venerable Pomnyun Sunim from South Korea. Videos from this event are currently in the process of being digitized for the Union community to remember and cherish for some time to come.

Union Theological Seminary has an important role in this historic trajectory and continues to develop its status in the field.

With the recent hire of Dr. Jerusha Lamptey, it is also pushing the boundaries beyond Christian identity into new and exciting territories. Her recent book, Never Wholly Other: A Muslima Theology of Religious Pluralism¸ was published by Oxford University Press and situates her in the early years of her scholarship as a leader in the field. There is also a strong commitment to justice in the work done by our professors working in the field of interreligious engagement. This is perhaps what most distinguishes Union from other institutions which are merely analyzing the problem. From Dr. Chung’s work on eco-feminism to the challenges from Dr. Thatamanil on the facts of economic disparity, Union is bringing inter-religious engagement to new levels in both practice and in theory. The history of Union—from the time of the “New Light” Presbyterians breaking away from the institutional church all the way until the present time—is one which has been and will be engaged in the diversity of religions as well as people of all faiths in the world.

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent

Interfaith Residency

“W

hen you think of ‘interfaith dialogue’” remarked Ayesha, one of the five residency participants, “you usually just think of men in suits. And what can men really do, but talk politics?” Feminist theologian and Union Theological Seminary President Serene Jones has noticed the same thing: in a world where the largest religious institutions still orient themselves around traditional patriarchal hierarchies, the interfaith conversation has become largely dominated by male voices. What might interfaith dialogue look like, Jones wondered, if women were to set the agenda?

In January 2012, Jones partnered with the Institute for Women, Religion, and Globalization to pursue discussions with the student body at Union, as well as conversations with a faculty advisory committee made up of professors from Union, NYU, Jewish Theological Seminary, Manhattan College, and Yale, to envision a program that would allow women to have an interfaith experience in which they could find their own voices.

It was not until a year later, when Tanya Williams was appointed as the director for the new Office of Institutional Diversity and Community Engagement, that this vision was able to start becoming a reality.

In the fall of 2013, five women from Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religious backgrounds moved into a small, secluded section of the McGiffert Residence Hall—an area of the building which the women have affectionately dubbed “The Womb”—in order to build an intentional interfaith community together for a full academic year through the sharing of living space, meals, spiritual practices, and theological reflection. The women come from diverse backgrounds, not only religiously, but geographically, culturally, and academically.

Lauren Henderson is a fourth year rabbinical student at Jewish Theological Seminary. A Conservative Jew, she grew up in an interfaith family with a

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BY KRIS TEN SOUTHWORTH

Presbyterian father and a Jewish mother.

Lauren shared that at seminary, “90% of my conversations are about Jewish topics and texts,” and that she hoped the residency program would reconnect her with a wider conversation around religious practice.

Ayesha Yousuf moved to New York City two years ago from Pakistan to pursue a Master’s in Social Work at Columbia University. She saw the program as an opportunity to live on a micro level the kind of diversity she had already experienced on a macro level by moving to such a diverse city from a country that

living in intentional community—as her spiritual practice. Coming from a Methodist and Quaker religious background, Lily has come to understand words like religion, faith, theology, and God not as nouns, but as verbs.

The program centers on the intentional sharing of communal life between these five women. At its core is the commitment to share at least one weekly meal together as a group, on Sunday nights. This casual atmosphere, in which everyone contributes something to food preparation, provides a context in which the women can build relation-

In the fall of 2013, five women from Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religious backgrounds moved into a small, secluded section of the McGiffert Residence Hall— an area of the building which the women have affectionately dubbed “The Womb.” is 97% Muslim. “There are things here that I would not be exposed to otherwise, personally or professionally.”

Lindsey Nye is a second year Master of Divinity student at Union who entered seminary as a Unitarian Universalist and has increasingly come to claim a Christian identity. A self-proclaimed “liturgy junkie,” Lindsey has found within the narratives, traditions, and practices of Christianity resources for healing, liberation, and faith.

Norah Elmagraby is a Palestinian refugee who was raised in Saudi Arabia.

“I have never been to Palestine due to the conflict there,” she shared, “but it is the place that I call home.” She moved to New York City to pursue her studies in Sustainability Management at Columbia University, and found out about the residency program through the Muslim Student Association.

Lily Tinker Fortel is in the second year of her Master of Divinity degree at Union, and considers “faith” itself—along with

ships of support while also appreciating and reflecting on the importance of food practices within one another’s traditions. Through navigating one another’s halal, kosher, vegetarian, and gluten-free dietary needs, the residents have come to identify the kitchen as a primary site for interpersonal and interreligious engagement.

Starting in the spring semester of 2014, the women also added a Thursday morning breakfast to their weekly routine. This slightly more formatted setting provides an opportunity for the women to share texts from their tradition that relate to wherever they may find themselves in their personal or spiritual lives that week. After breakfast, the group then moves into the common room, where they take turns facilitating group activities, which range from theological discussions to the sharing of religious or spiritual practices. One week, Lindsay led the group in lectio divina, while another Ayesha shared some notes one morning

International, Interfaith, Interdependent

from an inspiring kutbah (Islamic sermon) that she had recently heard.

During the Fall semester, the women also met twice a month for a book discussion group, in which each resident chose a book related to their faith experience for the entire group to read. Ayesha recalled the profound and tearful moment shared by the group while discussing Norah’s book choice, I Saw Ramalah—a memoir of a Palestinian poet lamenting in impressionistic detail the predicament faced by occupied and displaced Palestinians. “That was a moment when I knew,” recalled Ayesha, “that this was a group where we could really talk about anything.”

Indeed, accountability in the group is maintained primarily through their own commitment to openness, honesty, empathy, and the willingness to be involved with one another, even when that means being uncomfortable. “We’re very honest with each other,” says Norah.

“Honesty is the most important thing.”

These expectations regarding communication practices were established in the very first week of the program.

For Ayesha, “those early discussions helped me to see... these are like-minded people; we all think the same way about communication.”

This relational foundation provided the intimacy from which spiritual learning and religious understanding could flow naturally, not as a rational exercise in theological pluralism, but as an expression of the appreciation for the ways in which religious practice and personal well-being are deeply intertwined. It is clear that the women support one another in their religious practices: by preparing and labeling food according to their different dietary needs, by respecting Lauren’s abstinence from technology on Sabbath, by giving advance notice to Norah when men are visiting so that she may cover her hair. “We influence each other in a positive way,” Ayesha says.

“It’s amazing how easy it is to learn from

other faith traditions when you are all trusting of one another. There are many unexpected parallels.”

For Lindsay, the most important aspect of the program has been the fact that it is a safe space for women to grow together in community. “I had no idea how powerful relationships with women could be until I did this. Coming from a corporate environment I had always been in situations where I felt I was in competition with other women. This is really the first place in my life where I have felt like I could really be myself.”

The success of this pilot year seems to reveal its great potential to impact the conversation around interfaith dialogue at Union and beyond. Tanya Williams clarified that the program is not only for women from Abrahamic traditions, but is open to women from any faith tradition, or even no tradition. It is the building of interpersonal connections between religiously diverse women that matters most. “The relationships that have developed between the women have an effect on the Union community in and of themselves,” says Williams. “There is an energy that comes from just knowing the space is there.”

The women have been encouraged to reflect on their experience and share their stories with those outside The Womb through open houses, chapel services, and through blogging. To keep up to date with the women of the Interfaith Women’s Residency Program, visit their blog at: utsinterfaithresidency.wordpress.com.

Last November, twenty-eight women gathered together in “The Womb” to begin a conversation about faith, appearance, and identity. Rabbinical students across a denominational spectrum, future ministers, social workers, educators of Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and multi-faith backgrounds came together in a spirit of listening to each other and giving voice to their own stories.

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent

Union Food Lab: Q&A with Richard Madonna and Bethany Vaughan

BY LISA CUNNINGHAM

Founded in 2013, the Food Lab at Union Theological Seminary is a newly renovated, clean and spacious commercial kitchen and training ground in West Harlem. It serves as an incubator for food businesses, providing low barriers to entry work opportunities and a place for community food education and cooking classes. It aims to teach, train, and mentor with the goal of achieving high-impact social outcomes. The Food Lab is also working to provide programming for formerly incarcerated individuals.

How does the Food Lab further Union’s mission?

Richard: Union values social justice, and we’re building on this legacy by promoting economic opportunity in Harlem, as well as student engagement with the community in which it resides. We’d like Union students to participate in the work and get involved in programming around healthy and sustainable eating. We’re excited to begin working with the Edible Churchyard and other interested parties.

Bethany: I think it’d also be great to tie it into Union’s curriculum. We should be talking about the religious significance of food and meals. There should be courses on food and our relationship to it.

Bethany, what did you think when you first started hearing about this vision for a Food Lab? Bethany: When I first heard about the Food Lab, it was hard to wrap my mind around it because it didn’t exist.

What is a Food Lab? What does that mean? How do you make it happen? I had a lot of questions. Rich always has big ideas and I’m usually the one to ask, “Is this actually possible?

Can we make this happen?”

Richard: Yes, Bethany is the realist.

Above, left to right: Rich Madonna, Harry Belafonte, Bathany Vaughn, and Fred Davie.

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent A sampling of the Select Food Ventures working in the Union Food Lab: Brooklyn Sesame, Calmer Sutra Tea, Dosha Pops, and Raw Luv Bar.

What are the biggest challenges you’ve faced?

Richard: Involving the Union community. How do we start bringing the Union community in on a regular basis to engage this project?

When did it all start making more sense?

Bethany: As we talked to more and more people about it, it started to make more sense. We got more in touch with the real demand for a commercial kitchen space to rent. Faculty shared that Union had culinary programming ten years ago and nothing came of it. We noticed that students are passionate about food justice. There’s an interest in the surrounding community for classes, training, and more interaction with UTS. I’m a huge foodie but I like the Food Lab because I like to think about how to make food programming accessible to people who may not be able to access it otherwise. That’s the fulfilling part.

Bethany: If people have ideas for programming in the Union community specifically, or for the larger community, they should feel free to email us and present ideas. Would you like to bring in a speaker? Organize a cooking demonstration for a type of cuisine? Do you want ideas for cheap, healthy recipes?

Contact us!

For more information, feel free to email the Union Food Lab at moreinfo@unionfoodlab.org. You can also check out their website at unionfoodlab.org, or find them on Facebook!

Why the focus on food?

Richard: What I like about food, beyond the fact that it’s life sustaining, is that there’s no major barrier to entry to be a food innovator. Unlike the fields of technology or scientific research, which require significant training and degrees to break into, anyone with drive and motivation can come out with the next great food idea.

What’s the Union Food Lab “dream?”

Richard: The Union Food Lab dream is to have a year-round culinary program that benefits the greater Harlem community and Union students. Actually, this programming will go beyond the culinary arts. The dream is to find creative ways to provide hands-on training, internships and employment opportunities for people who are un/underemployed.

Bethany: We want to contribute to and be a part of the growing culinary scene in Harlem. We also want to partner with other institutions that further Union’s mission.

left to right: Arshad Bahl, Michael Schwartz, Essie Hayes, and Rich Madonna.

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International, Interfaith, Interdependent

Rethinking Our Ministry: Food Justice BY MAT T HOFFMAN

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ood justice has quickly become a buzzword nationally, especially among movements seeking to end urban inequalities that are common in cities across the United States. Indeed, the quest for food justice has brought terms like “food desert” into modern vernacular and has led to the creation of the farm-to-table and school lunch reform movements.

As a former teacher, I saw the devastating impact that food insecurity, impaired access to food, and unhealthy food choices had on classroom performance and test scores. Although present in rural communities, the lack of access to healthy options and stable food sources plagues urban areas more acutely. In 2010, more than 16 million children (21% of all children) in the United States struggled with hunger and food insecurity (from No Hungry Kind-Share Our Strength Foundation). This issue is a national crisis. And, for those of us engaged in this work at Union, addressing food justice is of grave theological concern as well.

Theologically speaking, there is a consistent call throughout the Hebrew Bible and New Testament to take care of the poor and the hungry. This call for justice is built into the ethos of Union and directly tied to the work that many students feel called to address. One such example that guides the work of food justice can be found in the following passage from Matthew 25:35–40: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.”

Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?”

And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”

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It is no surprise that Union students have historically been engaged in fighting food injustice locally, nationally, and internationally. The work of the Poverty Initiative (PI) (povertyinitiative.org), who just celebrated their 10-year Anniversary, comes out of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Poor People Campaign. The PI is a global network of activists and religious leaders committed to ending poverty, as evident by their mission to “raise up generations of grassroots religious and community leaders dedicated to building a social movement to end poverty, led by the poor.” Additionally, the Edible Churchyard (www.ediblechurchyard.org) is housed at Union. Not only does the Edible Churchyard study food justice theologically and theoretically, but the organization has managed to maintain a strong practical component on the seminary grounds. From preserving areas of the seminary quad to planting vegetables on the McGiffert Hall roof to cooking meals and sponsoring workshops on juicing to running a comprehensive composting system, food justice is alive and well in the work of the Edible Churchyard.

Moreover, the 2013-2014 academic year has brought about additional initiatives to further engage in food justice within Union’s urban context. The creation of the Union Food Lab (www.unionfoodlab.org) allows the seminary to directly engage with the larger Morningside Heights/Harlem community. Proposed ideas for the food lab include the creation of food justice programs like culinary arts training, nutrition education, and workforce re-entry programing for formerly incarcerated individuals. Another student-led initiative, Friends by the River, is attempting to provide direct assistance to homeless individuals within the neighborhood through shared meals and accompaniment.

These initiatives and pathways for community engagement provide a practical component to the theological coursework taking place in the classrooms of Union Theological Seminary.

As the world continues to grow and change, the necessity of tackling food justice issues has become increasingly important.

Due to its location and social commitments, Union is poised to be a leader in advancing a theological response to growing global and local food injustice.

International, Interfaith, Interdependent

Union Forum Unites Institutes and Initiatives in Working for Social Justice BY JA SON W YMAN

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nion is known as a hotbed for social justice work and being on the forefront of uniting activism and religious scholarship. Because so many of its students are passionate about one justice issue or another (or all of them, for many), there are constantly new groups, caucuses, institutes, and initiatives popping up, taking shape from the vigilant work of a few who have thrown themselves head first into one or another cause. This past year saw the creation of the Union Forum, a way to bring all of these various great projects into dialogue with one another, and to encourage working together to reach results that are greater than the isolated efforts of any individual group. Broadly, Union Forum captures three distinct areas of activity that happen at Union: 1) Institutes, Centers, and Initiatives, which includes the Center for Race, Religion, and Economic Democracy; Kairos: the Center for Religions, Rights and Social Justice and within it, the Poverty Initiative; the Institute for Women, Religion and Globalization; the Edible Churchyard; and has also included planning and discussion contributions from the Sophia Institute and the Union Food Lab 2) Projects and programming overseen by the President’s office, including the Economics and Theology series produced in partnership with the Institute for New Economic Thinking and the Disaster Relief and Resiliency Project, and 3) Union Forum’s own programming such Every Valley: The Dr. King Legacy Symposium on Community Economic Empowerment and the upcoming Religions for the Earth Conference to be held September 19–21, 2014.

Union Forum describes itself as “a platform for discourse about social ethics that opens the conversation in the halls of Union to the public at large in order to inform, shape and accelerate civic action.

It does this in two ways; as an umbrella for the organizations at Union that are

focused on bridging theological inquiry to action (the institutes, initiatives and centers) and through civic engagement of its own.” The biggest ongoing activity of Union Forum consists of bringing all of the Institutes, Initiatives, and Centers together into dialogue and into shared projects. The heads of these organizations meet regularly (in the Bonhoeffer Room) to discuss how to work well together and also how Union can most effectively influence key issues, with a focus on those that affect vulnerable people, communities, and ecosystems.

Union Forum also pursues its mission through public programming and civic engagement of its own, drawing on the centers, institutes and initiatives to broaden the reach of the Seminary.

An example of Union Forum’s programming is the “Every Valley” event. On April 4, 2014 (the anniversary of King’s “Beyond Vietnam” speech at Riverside Church and, exactly a year later, his death) Union Forum co-convened a gathering of roughly 100 local ministers and community leaders to talk about Martin Luther King, Jr.’s economic legacy and what it means today. Panel discussions featured Rich Madonna of the Food Lab, Rev. Liz Theoharis of the Poverty Initiative, and Charlene Sinclair of C-RRED. The event was live streamed and an op-ed co written by Rev. Theoharis, Sinclair, and the Director of Union Forum, Karenna Gore, appeared in the Daily News that day. In addition, Union Forum produced and distributed a lectionary on King’s speech Beyond Vietnam that included reflections from Rev. Theoharis, Dr. Gary Dorrien and Dr. James Cone. Another example included a visit from Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in the Fall. Union Forum organized two panel discussions, one on Bonhoeffer’s Legacy today that actively engaged faculty and current students who are studying Bonhoeffer, and the other on Climate Change and

World Religions, which engaged several local religious leaders as well as our own faculty and students.

Looking ahead, Union Forum will host the Religions for the Earth conference, bringing religious and spiritual leaders from around the world to Union in order to reframe the issue of climate change as a moral issue and create an action plan to counter it. “Union has such a rich legacy of social justice and so much depth in its faculty and student body,” says Gore.

“Union Forum is a platform to draw on that and create the kind of robust discourse that can really build movements and inspire positive change.” Andrew Schwartz, Grants Coordinator at Union who works closely with Gore on Union Forum adds, “Union is full of amazing people doing amazing things. The students, faculty, and administrators are like a bunch of walking NGOs who can’t help but try to change the world. Union Forum helps to provide a platform for all the different initiatives so that they can know what the others are doing and support one another along the way.”

Union Forum promises to promote greater cooperation and action amongst the wide variety of Institutes and Initiatives that are bubbling up at Union.

With this sort of concerted effort, Union will only get stronger and more strongly and effectively spread the social justice that the students, faculty, and others on campus have held so central to their missions in life for so long.

For more information or to find out about Union Forum events past, present, and future visit utsnyc.edu/ union-forum.

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Economic Democracy: A Union Tradition

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yles Horton came to Union, “because I had problems reconciling my religious background with the economic conditions I saw in society.” Dr. Reinhold Niebuhr quickly welcomed Horton, who later went on to found the Highlander Folk School, a radical educator and leader in the Civil Rights Movement, by inviting him into a senior seminar.

Horton soon felt out of his league in the small seminar with Niebuhr. At the second session, Horton told Niebuhr that he wasn’t coming back. Dr. Niebuhr wouldn’t let Horton leave, “Myles, you’ve got to stay.” Dr. Niebuhr urged, “You’ve got to go back in, because these people”—the preachers, professors, and newspaper editors then enrolled at the seminary—“won’t tell me the truth.”

It was Dr. Niebuhr’s combination of practical experience with working class folk and intellectual expertise that grabbed Horton. And so, following in the footsteps of Norman Thomas— the individual who almost single-handedly saved the Socialist party by giving hundreds of speeches across the country for years—and by forming friendships with Niebuhr and Michael Harrington, Horton grafted himself onto a tradition of radical economic and religious thinkers here at Union.

The economic activism of Union students and faculty goes back to the birth of the 20th century with leaders like Thomas, Niebuhr, and Horton. This longer view allows us to see that Union activism today is again taking up some unfinished business. Action toward dispersing democratic forms throughout all sectors of society is something that Union students and faculty have always cared about. But today’s challenges are new and more forcefully than ever demonstrate the insidious reality that race and class lines have been used to divide all poor and dispossessed people throughout the U.S.’s history.

The act of reclaiming a tradition of radical activism fastened to theological claims can be unsettling. This unsettlement comes from the danger of reclaiming the past in order to re-live it. Visionaries like Rev. William Barber are aware of this danger.

Rev. Barber recently exhorted the congregation at Riverside Church to recognize that we may not be Rosa Parks or Dr. King or Fannie Lou Hamer or Ella Baker, but we most certainly are their sons and daughters. Ours is the responsibility to sift through the long record of suffering and struggles of the past in order to carry forward a usable past. Union’s position in this usable past to counter economic and social injustice is rhythmic and not simply coincidence.

But a democratic tradition is a weak promissory note if under utilized and if we fail to speak to the deeper systemic realities.

A recent report by Oxfam International presents readers with numbers that are all too familiar: of all economic growth since 2009, the richest 1% have captured 95% of it—while the bottom 90% actually became poorer. Another report by Emmanuel Saez at U.C. Berkley noted that since 2009, the richest folk in this country have come closest to economic recovery while those who were struggling before the Great Recession have not even entered

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BY A ARON S TAUFFER

The economic activism of Union students and faculty goes back to the birth of the 20th century with leaders like Norman Thomas, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Myles Horton. what might be classified as recovery. But this isn’t the end of the story—for these economic conditions ripple through all aspects of our lives. In his book, Great American City, Robert J. Sampson profiles the incarceration rates in Chicago neighborhoods in the mid-1990s. Sampson’s work helps to show that the highest black neighborhood’s incarceration rate is 40 times higher than the highest rate in a white neighborhood. Divisions such as race and class have been utilized to systematically benefit a few while repressing the rest, most especially black and brown men. This has resulted in a systematically established and institutionally reinforced separation of lived realities between the poor and rich, the white and black, the undocumented and the citizen. Teasing apart these lines of difference is an important task requiring astuteness to influences of classism and racism. It will take an intellectual rigor, a spiritual resilience, and a moral endurance to confront these realities.

When 70 Union students, organized by the Poverty Initiative and the Kairos Center, piled on buses to North Carolina in late February for the Moral March, they joined 100,000 others to voice their recognition that economic and racial justice are interwoven. When Drs. Cornel West, Gary Dorrien, and Serene Jones team-taught a course in 2009, titled “Christianity and the U.S. Crisis,” they were exposing this reality all the while attempting to make good on the promissory note of Union’s tradition of fighting for economic and racial justice. When Dr. James Cone teaches his Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. course each year, he is urging the importance of a usable past—and urging Union students to see that it is our duty to graft ourselves onto this tradition. When James Chapel was recently filled to witness the strength of the Womanist thread of this tradition of fighting for justice, it demonstrated how this tradition underlines that none should go unnoticed, and that silence is at times the loudest cry for justice.

What Union can cultivate are students who become scions to be planted in a fertile tradition of student and faculty strivings for moral, economic, and racial justice. The students and faculty of Union are a part of this tradition, articulating it in different tones and registers, all the while singing a similar song —beckoning justice to flood our streets. Our work is not done as students of this tradition—and Union by no means owns this vision. This is a vision much larger than ourselves. It asks of us an honesty that Horton gave to Niebuhr—an honesty of truth telling. The fight for justice in any community is a fight for justice in all communities. Those students who traveled miles and miles for a two-day Moral March recognize the challenge and distance this tradition will take us.

UNION NEWS

Someone is Missing: The Queer Commissioning Service An empty chair sits in James Chapel, draped with a rainbow cord—a braid of many colors. “Whose chair is that? Where are they?” I hear the whispers behind me.

Someone is missing.

Each year on the night before Union’s commencement ceremony, where eager students will receive their hardearned Masters of Divinity, Arts, and Sacred Theology, or longtime McGiffert and Hastings residents will finally get that Ph.D., a group of queer students is commissioned. And every year, along with the waiting students, there is an empty chair.

The chair represents the people who are not able to be at the commissioning service for whatever reason; because they don’t feel safe coming out, because they never found their way to Union out of oppressive religion, or because they died, with no hope of a place where one’s personhood could be celebrated in the light of God’s love. The empty chair represents all of those people we wish could be with us, and all of those people we at Union are learning to serve.

But what is Queer Commissioning exactly? And why is it a vital tradition at Union? Born as a response to many denominations’ strict rules prohibiting the ordination of Gay and Lesbian people, the service was a time where students who were openly gay could receive recognition for their call to ministry. The worship community of Union commissioned these folk to go out into the world and to continue to love and serve God and others as openly gay people.

The purpose and function of the commissioning service has evolved along with the changing face of the LGBTQ equality movement. Today, two student caucuses co-sponsor the service: the Queer Caucus and Fierce, the Caucus for Queer People of Color. Reflecting the linguistic movements in the burgeoning fields of Queer Theory and Queer Theology, the title “Queer” opens up the

BY JULIA S TROUD

commissioning to bisexual, transgender, intersex, questioning, and any selfidentifying queer folk who feel called to ministry. Queerness celebrates powerful love and gender expression at odds with repressive normativity.

Luckily, many denominations now ordain LGBTQ ministers, though often these decisions are made locally and have not reached national or denomination-wide decisions. The Presbyterian Church only recently raised restrictions on ordaining LGBTQ clergy, while restrictions still remain within Episcopal dioceses, and many Baptist congregations, among others. The Methodist Church

is currently engaged in debates across the country about ministers’ ability to perform same-sex weddings, with many men and women facing clerical trials and threats of lost jobs and titles. The struggle for full inclusion of queer people in Christian communities is ongoing and crucial.

Queer Caucus co-leader Ranwa Hammamy described this year’s queer commissioning service as centered around the theme of “hopeful endurance.” We at Union are filled with hope for the future of LGBTQ people in ministry, especially when confronted with the

group of more than ten students who chose to be commissioned this year. Students at Union reflect the changing face of liberal Christianity, committed to a radical vision of God’s love in action.

The ritual of the commissioning allows each student to invite a couple mentors, either from within the Union Community (Su Pak, Fred Davie, Janet Walton, and Barbara Lundblad are frequent commissioners) or without (field education supervisors, pastors, and employers) to place the rainbow cord around their necks. With the rainbow cord, the student is charged with the role of being queer in the world, advocating for people who cannot speak their truths, and loving the people they meet along the way. Many of these students choose to wear the cord along with their Union commencement robes the next morning, exhibiting their new commission.

This year, beloved preaching professor, the Rev. Dr. Barbara Lundblad, whose example as an openly Lesbian pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America has served as a touchstone for so many queer students at Union, preached the commissioning sermon.

Her words, reflecting the mission of hopeful endurance to the room of Queer students and their families, was her last sermon as a faculty member at Union, as she retired this year. Fittingly, she also was one of the departing Union community members to be commissioned, receiving a rainbow cord that she, too, wore the next day.

The Queer Commissioning service is one of James Chapel’s holiest moments of the year—a ritual filled with the weight of God’s call to everyone in the room.

The Union community commissions its queer students with God’s abundant and overwhelming love in the braided strings of a rainbow cord—with the hope that we will all be bound up in its cohesive and liberating power.

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UNION NEWS

Taboo Topics

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BY BENJAMIN PERRY

ometimes it seems the best conversations are those to which we are most averse. Some topics seem too divisive, personal, or painful; it is far easier to remain in the realm of the mundane. If, however, we do not dare to discuss the truly personal, if we lack the courage to converse about sensitive topics, the most important stories, feelings, and truths we have to share with one another go unsaid.

Moreover, how can we expect our churches and communities to talk about the taboo if we cannot talk about it ourselves?

Dr. Tanya Williams, Union’s Deputy Vice President for Institutional Diversity and Community Engagement, believes sometimes we just need a push in the right direction. This year, her department hosted a series of conversations on “Taboo Topics”; these dialogues create intentional space to talk about serious issues affecting our community. Williams created similar talks at her last position at Mount Holyoke and was amazed by how readily the talks were embraced by the community. When I asked her about her decision to create similar conversations here, she replied “When I got to Union…I realized that we could use every opportunity available to us to actually talk to each other face to face about things that we care about.” Over the course of this year, her department has hosted dialogues about Martin Luther King Jr., being interfaith at Union, disability justice, and domestic violence.

The talks are loosely structured and lightly facilitated, prizing open discussion over format. The dialogue, furthermore, investigates these issues from an emotional, as well as academic, location. Williams believes that this balance between emotion and intellect is crucial. “I had heard that you can be talking about something [in class] at great depth, but you end up talking about it from a head space,” rather than from a heart space. These talks do not privilege intellect or emotion over one another, but rather seek to recognize the dynamic interplay between the two. “I hope that taboos help us to reflect differently,” Williams said; it seems the student body agrees. First-year M. Div. student Rodney McKenzie commented “the interesting thing about these Taboo dialogues is…when you provide space for something that’s taboo, then you can do something meaningful. Then it’s not taboo anymore.”

While these conversations do not have an explicit action agenda, there is an implicit hope that by talking about these

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issues we will change the way we live in community. I can say that, at least for me, this is exactly what happened.

I attended the Taboo talk on disability with the intention of having a good discussion with other students. I did not expect the dialogue would change the way I looked at our physical space, but that is precisely what happened.

Walking up the many staircases to the Upper Refectory colored sheets of paper greeted me on each stair. They asked me pointed questions like, “How am I supposed to get up here?” It sounds ludicrous to say in hindsight, but it was the first time I ever considered how inaccessible many of our campus locations are to those with physical disabilities. As an able-bodied person, I merrily skipped up to pub for over a year without once reflecting on the fact that, for others, the trek up is not equally feasible.

Dr. Tanya Williams Perhaps more importantly, the dialogue changed the way I plan events as Minister of Fun. Before the conversation I planned several events in the Refectory and Upper Refectory, largely because I preferred the aesthetics of those locations. After the Taboo talk, though, I became acutely aware of how difficult it may be for some to attend events in those locations. Since then, I have planned my events in the Pit and Social Hall, spaces of far easier access. There is no value in a pretty room if everyone is not able to share in it equally. After hearing my classmates express the pain and difficulty they experience in navigating our Gothic castle, planning events on the first floor was the easy choice.

Without this talk, however, I likely would have remained blind to my privilege. After all, Williams says, “that is the nature of our privilege,” we don’t see it until we are faced with it. These conversations are so critical to building true community at Union; they force us to face hard truths we would rather leave unexamined.

Williams is already busy planning more Taboo topics for next year (spoiler alert: she plans to hold a conversation concerning “whiteness” that’s sure to be lively). In addition, she mentioned that her “dream is to have faculty, staff, and students to be in conversation with one another,” so we can hopefully look forward to conversations co-led by students, faculty, and staff. There is no better way to build community than through honest dialogue. If we all commit hopefully these talks will move us forward, together, towards a more inclusive and open Union.

faculty

New Faculty: Dr. Sarah Azaransky Brings Real-world Experience to the Classroom BY JULIA KHAN

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he 2013–2014 academic year saw the arrival of Dr. Sarah Azaransky to the faculty of Union Theological Seminary. Assistant Professor Azaransky is a graduate of Swarthmore College where she earned her BA in Religion in 1998. Following her undergraduate work, she conducted research on cross-community women’s peace organizing in Northern Ireland, Israel, the West Bank, and Sri Lanka as a Watson Fellow. In 2001, she received her Master’s of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School. Azaransky earned her Ph.D. from the University of Virginia in 2007.

Azaransky’s writing has appeared in commondreams.org, Religious Studies News, and in the Christian Century. Her published works include The Dream is Freedom: Pauli Murray and American Democratic Faith (Oxford University Press, 2011); an edited volume of Religion and Politics in America’s Borderlands (Lexington, 2013); and articles such as “Jane Crow: Pauli Murray’s Intersections and anti-Discrimination Law” in Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion (2013) and “Citizenship in Jesus and the Disinherited: From Black Internationalism to Whiteness on the Contemporary Border” in Black Theology (2013). “Citizenship in Jesus and the Disinherited” is a unique look at the discussion of citizenship in Howard Thurman’s Jesus and the Disinherited. Azaransky is currently working on a book that has received support from the American Academy of Religion and the Louisville Institute. This work focuses on the international roots of the Civil Rights movement.

Azaransky is a member of the American Academy of Religion’s AfroAmerican Religious History steering committee and the Research Grants

committee. Prior to her arrival at Union, Azaransky was a member of the University of San Diego faculty where she taught in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies. Since her arrival, Azaransky has hit the ground running offering two exceptional classes: “LGBT Sexual Ethics” and “Women in the Black Freedom Movement.” The fall semester of the 2014–2015 academic year will see the addition of two new classes to the course offerings: “Christian Ethics of Immigration and the Borderlands” and “Religious and Sexual Legacies of American Racial Slavery.”

Azaransky is a gifted professor who brings her real-world experience and academic scholarship into the classroom in ways that are both engaging and challenging for the student body. Her classes are marked by a wonderful balance between lecture and discussion that offers students the opportunity to explore the course material as well as its social justice applications. Azaransky brings energy and commitment to class learning that should serve UTS well in the coming years.

In addition to welcoming Azaransky to the faculty in the spring term of 2013–2014, several academic search committees were formed to fill vacancies left by retiring faculty. These search committees were formed for the following professorships: the Joe R. Engle Professor of Preaching, Christiane Brooks Johnson Memorial Professor of Psychiatry and Religion, and the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Professor of Theology and Ethics. The work of these committees will continue through the coming academic year. We look forward to welcoming these new professors to the faculty very soon. Until then, Union Theological Seminary is happy to welcome Sarah Azaransky to the faculty, and the wonderful scholarship and teaching acumen she brings.

Her classes are marked by a wonderful balance between lecture and discussion that offers students the opportunity to explore the course material as well as its social justice applications.

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Religious Scholarship on the Edge Recent Publications from the Union Faculty If every publication that comes out of work being done at Union Theological Seminary is an event, a happening, the seminary’s calendar over the past year has been crowded with milestone after milestone.

Hal Taussig’s A New New Testament: A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, March 2013) set a high bar early last year—a textual event in the making for some time, it also found expression as a literal event in James Chapel during the spring semester when a panel discussion was held on the book’s groundbreaking combination of canonical texts and extracanonical scriptures from the early years of Christianity.

Taussig’s A New New Testament emerged out of the “council of New Orleans,” a group of scholars and religious leaders who chose the ten new books to appear alongside the canonical texts of the traditional New Testament. Such a project has never been done before, but Taussig hopes it is only the first of many new New Testaments—students of Taussig know well his conviction that one must be open to the study of both the traditional canon and the newly discovered texts of the past hundred years.

Madness and Creativity by Ann Ulanov (Texas A&M University Press, March 2013) Ulanov’s book unfolds in dialogue with Jung’s Red Book, which was kept under lock and key by Jung’s heirs until 2001 and only published in 2009. Ulanov’s book makes “the point that madness and creativity share a kinship”—“that the suffering places of the human psyche are inextricably—

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BY NICHOL A S L ACCET TI

and, often inexplicably—related to the fountains of creativity, service, and even genius.” This might seem disturbing at first, but Ulanov makes the argument with Jung that “the multiplicities within and around us are, paradoxically, pieces of a greater whole that can provide healing and unity.” Deeply reflective, expertly reasoned, this work offers readers countless insights to inform their own personal journeys.

Dean Mary Boys’ Redeeming our Sacred Story: The Death of Jesus and Relations between Jews and Christians (Paulist Press, November 2013) probes another difficult topic, readings of the Christian passion narratives that have justified violence against Jews throughout Christian history. Dean Boys proclaims that this “sacrilegious telling cries out for redemption,” and pursues a reinterpretation in her book that is sensitive and honest about centuries of biblical interpretation, the awful history of anti-Semitism, and the genuine power of the Christian sacred story. It ultimately witnesses to the possibility of reconciliation, and finds ways to incorporate its insights into Christian spirituality and practice.

Never Wholly Other: A Muslima Theology of Religious Pluralism (Oxford University Press, March 2014) is Jerusha T. Lamptey’s contribution to a “new genre of theology,” deploying “insights from the work of Muslim women interpreters of the Qur’an, feminist theology, and semantic analysis” to intervene in debates about religious Others and the Qur’anic discourse on religious difference. What emerges is both an important introduction to Muslima theology and a new theology of religious pluralism.

Finally, Sarah Azaransky’s edited volume Religion and Politics in America’s Borderlands (Lexington Books, June 2013), featuring Daisy Machado’s chapter “Borderlife and the Religious Imagination,” touches on themes that are central to much of the work being done

by Professors Azaransky and Machado here at Union, in courses and class trips to the border. The book highlights “varied experiences of living, working, and teaching on the US-Mexico border and in the borderlands,” concluding with the striking claim that the borderlands “are not only a location to think about religiously, but they’re also a place that reshapes religious thinking.” Many Union students can attest to the fact that encounters with the borderlands confront and transform conventional interpretations of Christianity; this book provides a way into these issues through engagements with Scripture, theology, history, and church practices.

These five books come out of different disciplines, academic debates, religious traditions, and even geographic locations.

Yet they all share a dedication to exploring religious scholarship on the edge, at the intersections of academic work, social justice, and contemporary struggles— whether those are ethical, religious, or psychological.

Since the seminary’s calendar in the past year has been packed with textual happenings, you’d better start clearing your own calendar so you can start reading. A New New Testament alone is 603 pages of revelations.

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faculty

Deep Roots and New Soil: Drs. Barbara Lundblad and Ann Ulanov Retire, but Continue the Work Made Possible at Union BY LINDSEY NYE “I’m like a geranium, I don’t move easily, I have one taproot. And the taproot goes really deep,” said Dr. Ann Ulanov of her fifty-plus years at Union Theological Seminary. “I’m very grateful to have landed here.” And grateful are we, for the service and contributions of Dr. Ulanov, Professor of Psychiatry and Religion, and Rev. Dr. Barbara Lundblad, Professor of Preaching, who is retiring alongside her colleague in practical theology after seventeen years at Union.

Both professors share gratitude for Union’s many unique positions: “For many students,” said Lundblad, “it may be the last time they are in such an ecumenical place.” Located in New York City, “you’ll see things on the subway that are better sermon stories than anything you’ll read on the Internet.”

Dr. Ulanov mused, “I think Union has a unique capacity for what I would call space-making. …to be able to find and create ideas that are alive and that must be written and spoken and taught. It’s as if the school as a whole wants everybody to grow, not just to repeat what is known, but to venture into your specific discipline, to push the edges of it, to discover what new currents appear in the classroom.” And speaking of her own department: “I do think the program itself is

“I think Union has a unique capacity for what I would call space-making. …to be able to find and create ideas that are alive and that must be written and spoken and taught.” —Dr. Ann Ulanov quite remarkable. It’s not duplicated anywhere else in the world.”

Both women alluded to an intersection of magic and courage in their own disciplines and at Union more broadly. Lundblad recalled the courage of her students to “stretch beyond their own traditions,” reflecting on a recent “celebration” sermon that a rabbinical student gave in her Patterns of Preaching course, and a moment years ago when a conservative Baptist student sat in awe while his female colleague, an Episcopalian, held the Eucharist high in the air, offering a moment to gaze at it prior to the Fraction. Ulanov also called her students “courageous” in their willingness to learn from the literature and from each other: “My criterion in a class, if it’s going well, is that I learned something

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new I would have never learned all by myself. It happens between the student and the material, or myself and the student.” This kind of chemistry harkens to Barbara’s own legacy, her writing on “the sermon as meeting place,” where “the text of the scripture and the text of the community come together in a moment of electricity, where you see something you’ve never seen before. It is holy ground; you must take off your shoes; it’s magical.”

On the challenges of Union, Lundblad said, “You learn a lot from people, and sometimes there are clashes.” But she was passionate that these ecumenical engagements have the potential to push us to find our passion about our respective traditions and theologies. “You have to find meaning and purpose in

faculty

“You have to find meaning and purpose in yourself. The challenge is finding one’s own voice, not an echo of a past voice.”

—Dr. Barbara Lundblad

yourself. The challenge is finding one’s own voice, not an echo of a past voice.”

Said Ulanov, “I think this [space-making] builds up a community of recognizing differences that are part of our unity … that includes our diversity. … You are looking at the psychodynamic aspects of the things you believe in, or the positions you are arguing for or trying to teach the effectiveness of; you recognize psychological processes that are going on across all our divisions. We share not the same mind, but the same kind of mind, psychologically and spiritually …

We are all refugees. We are all the ‘one percent.’ We are all poor. And we are all in need of the same sorts of saving experiences.”

Both professors agree that Union’s ecumenism and diversity are strengths that come with their challenges. Ulanov commented, “Union is, at its best, like a big harbor—a cave for some students—and they come through it. They have breakdowns and breakthroughs.

Union allows that in a way that other professional schools do not. Union is very compassionate. It really makes space for people to find where they belong and where they’re elected to be. And that is wonderful.”

Barbara Lundblad’s Ph.D. advisee, Derrick McQueen, wrote, “She is quite simply an instrument of God. Her influence upon my life has been profound. Her passion for preaching the Word and living it out in her life unapologetically is the inspiration that has helped me to live out a dream deferred. For that I am extremely grateful. There are very few people who yearn to see people grow into themselves as part of their own fulfillment of humanity. Barbara Lundblad is such a woman. I love watching her watch preachers. She sits on the edge of her seat confident that God can use you!

And I must say, she is one preaching child of God.” Heather Wise, Ph.D. advisee of Ann Ulanov, wrote, “[she] is a towering figure in theology, a great among

the greats … one of those rare teachers who invites you to become who you are in relation to your studies and vocation … you not only study texts, but you are the text. She teaches how to exegete people, which I find to be the most important pastoral skill … Hers is an incarnational theology in which God comes even into the human psyche, personal and communal. Ann is not only a brilliant teacher and scholar, but also a person of deep faith. Working with her restored my faith and she has given me back to myself by helping me integrate all my gifts.”

Dr. Ulanov is like a geranium and yet, at Union, both she and Dr. Lundblad have been taproots personified—sources of nourishment for blossoming scholars, stretching into the deep and supporting new, lateral growth—growth that is at once connected to its foundation and reaching for new earth.

Plants with taproots are difficult to uproot and transplant, and it is not without a sense of struggle that we wish our brilliant professors an easy, peaceful, and restorative transition into fresh soil. They will, most certainly, leave behind big pots to fill.

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ADMISSIONS

Admissions Team Continues to Break New Ground in Seeking Students Who Honor Union’s Legacy BY DANA RIBEIRO

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ince taking the helm, Associate Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid Nichelle Jenkins M. Div. ’11, has propelled the Office of Admissions and Financial Aid to new heights. Run

by Dean Jenkins and a team comprised mostly of students past, present, and future, the Admissions Team has dedicated its recruitment mission to seeking students who embody both the legacy of Union and the spirit required for future social justice work. After much success with events that have now become a standard part of the recruitment fabric, such as the annual Admitted Students Day Conference and monthly Open Houses, the team took a step outside of the box this year, and hosted the first ever Union recruitment event geared towards Diversity: Intersections 2014.

Made possible by a very generous anonymous donation from a Trustee, Intersections 2014 endeavored to engage prospective students in conversations that echo Union’s beginnings, while charting a radical course towards enduring social change. The event was designed to introduce prospective students to Union’s campus and community, and give them a chance to interact with other change-makers, while exploring the transformational possibilities of graduate theological education in a safe and welcoming atmosphere. The generous donation allowed the Office of Admissions and Financial Aid to cover the cost of travel, lodging, and meals, freeing potential participants from the concerns of financial constraints, and allowing them to focus on the work that we have all been tasked to do.

The Academic Year 2013-2014 was a busy time for the Office of Admissions with Dean Jenkins on the road for much of the fall and winter recruitment season.

Unlike previous years, she was joined on the road by six student recruiters at various events throughout the United States.

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Both alumni/ae and prospective students have expressed delight at the opportunity to interact with current and/or former students during the admissions process. This student-centered approach to recruitment also helps Union Theological Seminary to stand out from its peers.

As the team gears up for next year’s recruitment season it remains committed to growing Union’s student body

each year, even in these times in which mainline denominational seminary and divinity enrollment has generally been declining. Union’s diverse applicant pool attracts students who at their core are propelled by a deep appreciation for difference and the spaces for growth that it creates. Applicants to Union are uninterested in seminary-as-usual and are seeking an intellectually challenging place that will allow for open and honest conversations. The social justice ethos of Union precedes us and applicants often note that it is our commitment to faith in praxis that guided them here.

This year’s recruitment plan included denominational conferences, on campus events, graduate and professional school fairs, alumni events, and individual undergraduate university campus visits.

The office also continued their tradition of recruiting with our peers in theological

education such as Emory/Candler School of Theology, Harvard Divinity School, University of Chicago Divinity School, and Yale Divinity School at several Joint Recruitment Information Sessions (JRIS) across the country. As the Admissions Team looks ahead to Academic Year 201516, we are excited to continue these efforts while branching out into new recruitment opportunities such as our upcoming participation in the Seminaries that Change the World cross-country tour in conjunction with The Faces of Ministry, and a new partnership with Marvin Ellison Ph.D. ’81, Director of Alumni/ae Relations, to formally launch alumni/ae recruitment strategies in the coming months.

In addition to our student centered recruitment approach, applicants are also influenced by their ability to interact with faculty and staff. This year’s increased involvement in recruitment on behalf of the faculty greatly impacted our applicant’s decision-making process.

As a result of this year’s combined efforts, we have a higher rate of First Degree enrollment then in previous years. Our First Degree acceptance rate has improved over last year, with 55 admitted Master of Divinity and Master of Arts students having accepted offers of admission, and approximately 30 still contemplating admissions offers. This year also brought an increase in Master of Arts students with many choosing the new field of Interreligious Engagement as their focus. This year Union will also welcome more international students, with Master of Sacred Theology students from the UK/Northern Ireland, Nepal, and Egypt and international Master of Arts students from Ghana, Sri Lanka, and Korea.

The Office of Admissions and Financial Aid and the Recruitment Team are looking full speed ahead to a busy 2014-2015 Academic Year filled with exciting events designed to attract the future change-makers of the world.

development

Planned Giving: Securing Union’s Future

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he commitment and social conscience of Union graduates is reflected in the rate of alumni/ae giving, which is both generous and sustained. Union graduates “pay it forward” in large numbers—26% gave in fiscal year 2012-13.

The reputation of the seminary for social justice and educational excellence also attracts supporters from the wider community. This generosity ensures the availability of funds for academic scholarships, faculty and field study support, and maintenance of the beautiful historic campus.

If you wish to be a part of the future of Union, then an excellent way to do this is via Planned Giving. A Planned Gift is a monetary gift you decide upon during your lifetime, which will benefit the institution after your death. There is a misconception that Planned Giving is for the wealthy but, in reality, Planned Giving allows people of any means to make a future charitable contribution. No gift is too small.

Bequests are the simplest and most common method of Planned Giving. Your estate will receive a tax deduction for the value of your gift to Union. Other types of Planned Gifts can provide multiple tax benefits during your lifetime, with Union being the beneficiary of the remaining principle of the gift. A Gift Annuity is an irrevocable contract whereby the donor transfers cash (or appreciated securities) in exchange for a fixed annual income. Annuity rates are age-based. As an illustration, if you give a cash gift of $10,000, and the annuity rate for your age is 7%, you will receive $700 from the annuity

BY SHELLEY YE ATES

Retained Life Estates, whereby a property is donated yet the donor retains the right to live in the property for life, or a gift of Life Insurance, if a policy is no longer needed for family protection. Individual Retirement Account (IRA) assets are important sources of gifts for the seminary. IRAs are best designated to charity, with other assets left for heirs, due to high taxation of IRAs left to individuals.

Union currently has seven active investment gifts—five Gift Annuities and two Unitrusts—with a combined market value of $159,000 (at fiscal-year end). If you’d like to find out more about Gift Annuities, Unitrusts or other methods of Planned Giving, please contact Kevin McGee, Director of Special Events and the Annual Fund, at kmcgee@uts.columbia.edu or 212-280-1590, or go to www.utsnyc.edu/donate. It is important that you confer with your legal/financial advisor when making a charitable gift to ensure that your tax, income, and gift objectives are met.

“ For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

— Matthew 6:21 every year for the rest of your life. Another life-income gift is a Unitrust; the payout rate is typically 5%, and annual income is flexible rather than fixed, based on the annual market value.

There are many advantages of Gift Annuities and Unitrusts: you as the donor (or your named life beneficiary) will receive a predictable annual income for life without any investment management responsibilities; a portion of the gift is taxdeductible in the year the gift is made; when a gift is funded with cash, a large percentage of the annual income is taxfree until the annuitant’s actuarial life expectancy has been reached. If appreciated securities are transferred, some capital gain tax may be avoided.

Other Planned Giving options may also confer significant tax benefits during the donor’s lifetime. These include

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176th Commencement!

On May 16th, Union students and their families, faculty, and staff congratulated the graduating class of 2014 in the Chapel.

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COMMENCEMENT 2014

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Alumni/ae

Nonagenarians: Still Exceptional

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n the 1940s, women had been attending institutions of higher education for some time, but they were still certainly the exception instead of the rule. Union had a good number of women who attended at that time, and many are still alive. Two, Jane Lockwood Barney and Maxine Denham, agreed to share their experiences at Union and the wisdom they’ve acquired throughout their lives after.

Mrs. Jane Lockwood Barney graduated from Union in 1940 with a Bachelor of Divinity, which would later become a Master of Divinity, degree. She had studied at Wellesley College and was encouraged by a faculty member in Bible, Louise Pettibone Smith, to go to Union to study with the great theology faculty that was here at the time, including Reinhold Niebuhr, Paul Tillich, and Paul Lehmann. Mrs. Barney lived in McGiffert Hall, but recalls that many of the students, because of the size of the school at the time, lived off campus. Aside from working a parttime job to pay her way through school, Mrs. Barney mostly remembers “studying a lot.” Some things haven’t changed in 70 years. Along with herself, Mrs. Barney recalls there being four other women enrolled in the B.D. program, as well as a good number who were enrolled in a one year program in conjunction with Columbia University’s School of Education. As a result of her time at Union, Mrs. Barney has spent much of the rest of her life working for church reform and doing gerontological research, as well as community activities. Her husband, Roger Barney, also attended Union and they married one year after graduating. Roger and Jane worked with the Reverend Francis Ayres in a Parishfield Community near Brighton, Michigan, a conference center that sought to create a ministry of lay people who would further the mission of church in society on such issues as civil rights, corrections, and poverty. After earning a Master’s in Social Work she has continued to conduct research and advocate for elderly folks, like working for raising the quality of care in nursing homes, serving as the president of the nonprofit Avalon Housing, helping to establish the University of Michigan’s New Hope Outreach clinic, and serving on the boards of many community organizations, including as chair of the Ann Arbor Ward 5 Democratic Committee. She remains a member of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church.

Mrs. Maxine Denham graduated from Union, also with a Bachelor of Divinity, only a couple of years later in 1942. She decided to come to Union, she says, because at the time she was working with students and religious students groups at colleges all throughout New England yet one day she realized she knew practically nothing about the Church. At the time, Union was the premier seminary on the East Coast and had legendary faculty members like Reinhold Niebuhr, Paul Tillich, and Harry Ward. She also fondly recalled an Old Testament professor who had everyone laughing and learning at the same time.

She described spending a lot of time studying in the library.

She lived one year in Hastings Hall and one in McGiffert, and during her time at Union met her husband-to-be. After earning

BY JA SON W YMAN

their degrees at Union, Mrs. Denham and her husband were executives of the Student YWCA and YMCA respectively. She described the most significant part of Union as “learning that [she] could think.” Most of her education was “‘memory, memory, memory’ but at Union you not only learn to memorize but also to think. And that’s a tremendous gift, to learn that you can think.” To young scholars and ministers at Union today she recommends really using the time and not simply going through the motions because Union “can be a very profound experience because of its intellectual and academic climate.”

Mrs. Denham resides in California.

Many things have changed at Union over 70 years, but many have also stayed the same. The number of women attending Union as a proportion of its student body has of course gone up to the point that today more than fifty percent of enrolled students are women. The seminary, through many progressive steps through the years, makes that possible and encourages the kind of pursuits these women have undertaken in their lives: deep thinking, community involvement, and passionately working for justice. These alumnae voices are crucial as women who attended Union at a time when that was still uncommon, even frowned upon, and also as elders, as people who have learned, engaged deeply and critically with the world around them, and accomplished much.

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Class Notes 1940s Edward LeRoy Long, Jr., M.Div. 1948, Ph.D. 1951, Distinguished Alumnus 2004, has published The Nature and Future of Christianity: A Study of Alternative Approaches. Long is James W. Pearsall Professor Emeritus of Christian Ethics and Theology of Culture in the Theological School of Drew University.

He previously taught at Virginia Tech and Oberlin College, and is past President of the Society of Christian Ethics and the American Theological Society. Long is also a Presbyterian Minister of Word and Sacrament.

1950s James Parker Keller, M.Div. 1955, has published Three Islands in My Life and Ministry, an account of his non-traditional ministry, including opening up educational records in the Bronx, building bano secos in Mexico, and building Habitat for Humanity in Providence, RI. David M. Gehrenbeck, S.M.M. 1957, S.M.D. 1971, has received the 2014 J. Stanley and Doris Hill Legacy Award for his volunteer service in the White Bear Lake area, MN, and elsewhere.

Charles P. Anderson, M.Div. 1959, recently published St. Paul for the Perplexed.

John C. Raines, M.Div. 1959, Th.D. 1967, and his wife, Bonnie M. Raines, revealed that they had participated in the now-famous burglary of F.B.I. offices in Media, PA, on March 8, 1971, making off with nearly every document inside. The burglars “were never caught, and the stolen documents that they mailed anonymously to newspaper reporters were the first trickle of what would become a flood of revelations about extensive spying and dirty-tricks operations by the F.B.I. against dissident groups,” according to Mark Mazzetti in The New York Times on January 7, 2014, “Burglars Who Took On F.B.I. Abandon Shadows.” The article was followed by the release of a book,

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The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover’s Secret F.B.I., written by one of the first journalists to receive the stolen documents, Betty Medsger, a former reporter for The Washington Post.

1960s James A. Forbes, Jr., M.Div. 1962, Distinguished Alumnus 2001, briefly returned to Riverside Church as its transitional Senior Minister while the church selected its next Senior Minister.

Forbes, who was installed as the fifth Senior Minister of Riverside on June 1, 1989 and retired on June 1, 2007, was the first African-American to serve as Senior Minister of this multicultural congregation. He continues as Harry Emerson Fosdick Distinguished Professor at Union.

Freeman W. Patterson, M.Div. 1962, was honored at a gala hosted by the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada, in conjunction with a major retrospective of Patterson’s life and photography, and the publication of Freeman Patterson: Embracing Creation (Goose Lane Editions and the Beaverbrook Art Gallery).

Jerry L. Bedford, M.Div. 1963, has won the Dan West Fellow Award, bestowed by the Heifer Foundation’s Trustees Emeriti in recognition of Bedford’s long dedication and many contributions in helping the world’s impoverished people. Bedford has worked diligently for over three decades to ensure robust financial support for Heifer, first as Heifer’s Director of Development, and later as the first leader of Heifer Foundation.

Sheila S. Collins, part. 1964, is the coeditor with Gertrude Schaffner Goldberg of When Government Helped: Learning from the Successes and Failures of the New Deal (Oxford University Press, 2013).

Collins is Professor Emerita of Political Science at William Patterson University in New Jersey.

1970s Leicester R. Longden, M.Div. 1971, was inducted into the University of Dubuque Faculty Hall of Fame in May 2013. He has taught at UD Theological Seminary since 2001. A Canadian who lives as a permanent alien resident in the U.S., Longden has been, among other things, a pastor in a small rural church and a minister of education and senior pastor in two large churches.

Ira Merle Good, M.Div. 1972, returned to professional theater after a 30-years hiatus with The Preacher and the Shrink, which was performed Nov. 2, 2013 through Jan. 4, 2014 at The Beckett Theatre in Theatre Row, a complex of five small off-Broadway theaters near Times Square in Manhattan.

David H. Binkley, S.M.M. 1973, was recently honored at Camp Hill Presbyterian Church, Camp Hill, PA, on his 40th anniversary as the church’s Organist/ Choirmaster.

Beverly Roberts Gaventa, M.Div. 1973, has edited Apocalyptic Paul: Cosmos and Anthropos in Romans 5-8, published by Baylor University Press.

William A. Wylie-Kellermann, M.Div. 1975, has edited William Stringfellow: Essential Writings (Orbis, 2013) and contributed a chapter to Bury the Dead: Discipleship and Resistance (Wipf & Stock, 2013). He is pastor of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Detroit.

Larry L. Rasmussen, Ph.D. 1970, Distinguished Alumnus 2009, has been awarded the Nautilus Book Awards 2014 Gold Prize in the category Ecology/ Environment as well as the Grand Prize for the best book across all twenty-seven categories, for Earth-Honoring Faith: Religious Ethics in a New Key (Oxford University Press). The book is dedicated to the United Church of Santa Fe, GreenFaith, and St. Olaf College for “exemplary leadership in creation awareness and care.” CHOICE,

Class Notes the trade journal of the American Library Association, praised the book’s manifesto, keen ethical insight and analysis, and declared Earth-Honoring Faith “a must for anyone interested in the environment who is not willing to settle for lazy aphorisms and superficial panaceas. Summing up: Highly recommended.” Rasmussen is Reinhold Niebuhr Professor Emeritus of Social Ethics at Union.

1980s Marvin M. Ellison, Ph.D. 1981, has been appointed Director of Alumni/ae Relations at Union. He taught Christian social ethics at Bangor Theological Seminary until 2013, and the year before published Making Love Just: Sexual Ethics for Perplexing Times (Fortress Press, 2012).

Deborah M. Jenks, M.Div. 1982, was appointed transitional pastor at The United Church of Christ of Northeast Harbor and Seal Harbor, Mount Desert, ME. Bernard R. Wilson, S.T.M. 1984, has been named chairman of the new national United Church of Christ Board.

The board will oversee and govern all of the denomination’s ministries worldwide. He is senior minister at Norfield Congregational Church in Weston, CT, and also serves as a Weston police chaplain and on the Weston Veterans Affairs Committee.

Jay H. Kidd, M.Div. 1985, was the winner of Ruminate Magazine’s annual McCabe Prize for poetry. His poem, “Runaway Dorothy Was the Name of the Band,” appeared its Fall 2013 issue. His poetry has also appeared in the Burningword Literary Journal and the Bellevue Literary Review, which nominated him for a Pushcart Prize.

Karen L. Bloomquist, Ph.D. 1985, has been appointed dean and chief administrative officer of Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary. PLTS recently merged with California Lutheran University.

As of May 15, 2014 Edward G. Horstmann, M.Div. 1985, S.T.M. 2009 is now Senior Minister at Round Hill Community Church, Greenwich, CT. Prior to that he was the senior pastor at the Immanuel Congregational Church in Hartford.

Storm K. Swain, S.T.M. 1999, Ph.D. 2009, has received tenure at Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, where she is Director of Anglican Studies and Associate Professor of Pastoral Care and Theology.

Mary F. Foskett, M.Div. 1989, was named a Wake Forest Professor, an endowed chair that is awarded to those who are “model teacher-scholars and citizens of academe locally and more broadly.”

She teaches in the area of New Testament Studies and has been a core faculty member of Women’s and Gender Studies.

She also directs the WFU Humanities Institute.

2000s

1990s

Keith C. Braddy, M.Div. 2002, received the degree of Master of Sacred Theology from Yale University Divinity School. He is currently the pastor of the Faith Temple Church of God in Christ (Conway, SC) and the Christian Life Center of Florence (Florence, SC). He is also Assistant Chaplain at the Turbeville Correctional Institution. He recently celebrated 10 years of marriage to Kamiti J. Braddy, with their two children Xavier and Rylee.

Emmanuel Martey, Ph.D. 1992, has been elected as the Chairman of the Christian Council of Ghana. He is a professor at Trinity Theological Seminary and has been a minister of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana since 1980, and has pastored most of the churches in the Greater Accra Region in various capacities.

Sheryl A. Kujawa-Holbrook, Ed.D. 1993, has been appointed Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the Faculty of Claremont School of Theology, where she has been on the faculty since 2009. She also has two new publications: Pilgrimage — The Sacred Art: Journey to the Center of the Heart (Skylight Paths, 2013), and God Beyond Borders: Interreligious Learning in Faith Communities (Wipf & Stock/Cascade, 2014).

Jace G. Weaver, M.Div. 1993, Ph.D. 1997, has published The Red Atlantic: American Indigenes and the Making of the Modern World, 1000-1927. The book considers the significance of the cultural exchange, political ideas, literature, technology, and material trade with Native American Indians, or the historical and cultural transatlantic significance of the Red Atlantic.

Patrick Shu-Hsiang Cheng, M.A. 2001, Ph.D. 2010, was granted tenure at the Episcopal Divinity School. He has been discerning ordination with the Episcopal Church for the last few years, and will be ordained to the transitional diaconate, God willing and the people consenting, on June 7, 2014.

Steven W. Peiffer, M.Div. 2003, has been appointed pastor at First United Methodist Church in Wallingford, CT. Stephen Butler Murray, Ph.D. 2004, has been appointed president and professor of Systematic Theology and Preaching at the Ecumenical Theological Seminary (ETS) in Detroit. Currently he is the founding Dean of the College and Associate Professor of Theology at Barrytown College, a new liberal arts college in upstate New York which focuses on the study of world religion and philosophy. He also serves as Senior Pastor of The First Baptist Church of Boston, Massachusetts and as American Baptist Chaplain to Harvard University, and Denominational Counselor and Lecturer in Ministry at Harvard Divinity School.

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CLASS NOTES Steed V. Davidson, Ph.D. 2005, has been appointed Associate Professor of Hebrew Bible at McCormick Theological Seminary. He will join the McCormick faculty in July of 2015. Currently he teaches at the Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, CA, as an associate professor of Old Testament. Davidson is an ordained clergyperson within the United Methodist Church.

John T. Shorb, M.Div. 2007, was included in a group exhibition, “As Subject and Object: Contemporary Book Artists Explore Sacred Hebrew Texts” at the Museum of Biblical Art; his piece was one of three scrolls in his thesis project at Union in 2007. He also had a solo exhibit, “WAKING,” at Long Island University in downtown Brooklyn. “WAKING” was later shown at James Memorial Chapel at Union.

Greg Jude Geiger, M.Div. 2008, has been appointed minister at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Huntington, Long Island, NY. Kymberly E. McNair, M.Div. 2008, S.T.M. 2009, will be ordained on June 8, 2014 at Antioch Baptist Church in Bedford Hills, NY. Sarah Winsett Wiles, M.Div. 2008, and her husband Joseph Childers became the proud parents of twins, Zoe Winsett Childers Wiles and Isaac Walker Childers Wiles.

Nicholas Stuart Richards, M.Div. 2009, gave the keynote address at New York state’s 2014 Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Memorial Observance Ceremony.

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2010s Ian H. Doescher, Ph.D. 2010, is the author of William Shakespeare’s Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope, published by Quirk Books, which recasts the original “Star Wars” movie as a five-act Elizabethan history drama, with the lines all in Shakespearean iambic pentameter.

Doescher currently works for a marketing and web agency in Portland, OR. He also tweets in iambic pentameter.

Heather L. Wise, M.Div. 2010, S.T.M. 2012, and her husband Michael Wilhoite became the proud parents of Skylar Sophia Wilhoite.

Preston A. Davis, M.Div. 2011, was appointed Minister to the University at High Point University, High Point, NC. He has been approved for ordination by the Board of Ordained Ministry in Western North Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church, and will be ordained June 21, 2014 at their Annual Conference.

Jennifer S. Lindsay, M.Div. 2011, has released her 10th studio album, ALLORA ECCOLA. Entertainment Today calls the album “deliciously earnest,” and CURVE Magazine declares it “a complete joy from beginning to end.”

Hannah E. McIntyre, M.Div. 2011, S.T.M. 2012, was ordained on Sunday, March 30, 2014 at the Troy Presbyterian Church, Versailles, KY. She is Associate Pastor and Director of Christian Education the Presbyterian Church, Danville, KY.

Suzanne Marie Hope Ujvagi, M.Div. / M.S.S.W. 2012, was named the first fulltime faith organizer at Equality Ohio, where she is responsible for building support within faith communities for the Equal Housing and Fair Employment Act, which would bar discrimination in housing, employment, and public accommodations based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

Anika L. Gibbons, M.A. 2013, produced and directed Journey to Liberation, a 50-minute documentary on the founding of Womanist theology, and the role played by Union in that founding.

Through interviews with Dr. Emilie Townes; Dr. Jacquelyn Grant, Ph.D. 1985; Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas, M.Div. 1982, Ph.D. 1988; Dr. Katie Cannon, Ph.D. 1983; and current Union students, the film takes viewers from the genesis to the evolution and the impact of Womanist theology and ethics.

Rix T. Thorsell, M.Div. 2013, has been called as associate pastor to First Congregational United Church of Christ in Downers Grove, IL.

In Memoriam

As of May 15, 2014

Alumni/ae James Noah Gettemy ’44 Kelvin Van Nuys ’44 B. Burns Brodhead ’44, ’46 Cora Klick Dice ’46 Patricia N. Page ’46 Robert G. Davis ’47 Glenn S. Fuller ’47 Edmund H. Linn ’47 Elizabeth Riley Sites ’47 Roger J. Steiner ’47 Robert G. Mickey ’48 Victor L. Baer ’49 John T. Brown ’49 Lois Montgomery Dowey ’49 Paul William Meyer ’49, ’55 C. Paul Bush ’50 Peter D. Latuihamallo ’50, ’59 Jay V. Nickelson ’50 Daniel W. O’Connor ’50, ’60 Carolyn Whitmore Shilling ’50 Dora Thatcher Vetter ’50 Norman C. Eddy ’51 Lawrence Gruman’51 Beverly Joan Muetzel Nereng ’51 Ellouise S. Beatty ’52 Emil C. Beck ’52 Virginia Kreyer ’52 Paul Marion ’52 John A. Vander Waal ’53 Lyle T. Christianson ’54

Faculty, Staff, Trustees, and Friends of Union Esther S. Beilby Andrew J. Bellotti Rebecca Davis Romeyn Everdell Arnold Frank William Haase Jane S. Hart Horace Havemeyer III Fred P. Knieriem Mildred Marshall Mary E. McNamara Susan Nelson Victoria Parsons Pennoyer Brenda Jane Stiers Thomas W. Stoothoff Howard Turner Mildred Weisbart

David H. Eaton ’54 Lillian Zachrisson Pease ’54 John G. Huneke ’56 Ivan T. Kaufman ’56 Geoffrey J. Ainger ’58 Paul F. Liljestrand ’58 Alan Craft Thomson ’58, ’62 Jean P. Angus ’59, ’70 Eleanor J. Miles ’60 Glen H. Stassen ’60 Paul A. Byrnes ’61 Bruce Cooley ’61 Kenichi Kida ’61 Barbara Bild Chesterfield Forsyth ’62 William A. Murray ’62 George W. Bahner ’63 W. Richard Comstock ’63 Robert W. Johnson ’63 Eva Saito Noda ’63 William C. Youngkin, Jr. ’63

G. Keith Churchill ’64 Blanche Barbara Hall ’66, ’73 Robert Gerald Hamerton-Kelly ’66 Wade A. Jarrett ’66 Suzanne Helene Dettmer ’67 Thomas L. Hoyt, Jr. ’67 Frank C. Peters ’67, ’69 David O. Tomlinson ’67 Joseph J. Pfister ’69 Ronald R. Hann ’70 David D. Hurst ’70, ’71 Stephen Arthur Schmidt ’70 Paul J. Thielo ’70 John Olin Campbell III ’72 Raymond Francis Bulman’74 Lucia Lermond ’78, ’85 Edward T. Oakes ’87 Annie Haynes Rawlings ’97 Paul Frederick Silberman’97 Paul W. Bradley ’02

Union Mourns John Hall Fish ’58 Urban activist John Hall Fish died of pulmonary fibrosis on June 10, at home under hospice care. He was 82.

While in college Fish was riveted by the work of Reinhold Niebuhr, and applied to Union to study under him. He went on to the University of Chicago, where he earned a doctorate in social ethics in 1971. By then Fish had already co-founded the Urban Studies program of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest. He remained as professor and mentor at the program until his retirement in 1997.

The program is “a hands-on semester in the city,” Fish told the Chicago Tribune in 1995. “The city is the teacher. Students learn not only about urban reality and issues, but also about themselves and their capabilities. They become, we hope, active, caring, street-smart citizens.”

Fish was also active in the Sanctuary movement, and made many trips to Central America during the 1980s, to facilitate safe haven for Central American refugees fleeing unrest. In addition, he managed the public interest portion of the Princeton Project 55, placing dozens of young Princeton alumni/ae in various Chicago nonprofits.

In 2012, after the death of his beloved wife Sally, John Fish established the Sally and John Hall Fish Scholarship at Union. It is awarded to a student who best embodies the values reflected in the life work of Sally and John: a passionate commitment to social justice and the common good, with a focus on urban studies and activism in cities.

Sally and John were longtime residents of Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood. They are survived by two sons, John and Dan; a daughter, Wendy Naylor; four grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

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IN MEMORIAM

USQR Celebrates 75 Years

This year, Union Seminary Quarterly Review, the graduatestudent-run academic journal of Union, celebrates its 75th Anniversary. Started in 1939 by Roger Shinn and Ernest A. Becker, Jr. under the name Union Review, early issues dealt with World War II, pacifism, and campus life. In the succeeding decades it changed names to its current name in 1946 and has come to focus more on contemporary scholarship in theology and religion, from professors and graduate students alike, with a special emphasis on topics and work being done at Union.

USQR has an eminent history, with articles from important figures like Reinhold Niebuhr, Dorothee Soelle, Beverley Harrison, James Cone, and Delores Williams, among others. The first issue of the second volume

even includes a conversation in articles between Albert Einstein and Paul Tillich. Recent issues have included themes such as Economics and Theology, Food Justice and Theology, and a special double issue that came from a graduate student conference at Union titled “The Future of Liberation Theology,� which featured promising young scholars and established influential thinkers in Liberation Theology from around the world. Upcoming issues will include festschrifts for professors emeriti/ae Christopher Morse, Paul Knitter, and Ann Ulanov with articles from their past students, current students at Union, and colleagues in their respective fields.

For more information about USQR or to subscribe, please email usqr@utsnyc.edu or visit usqr.utsnyc.edu.

For more information about USQR or to subscribe, please email usqr@utsnyc.edu or visit usqr.utsnyc.edu.

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union now | 2014

A Look Back: uniondays OCTOBER 10 & 11, 2013

Top row (third step), l to r: Richard Crouter, Alan Gilburg, Lorenz (Lefty) Schultz, William H. (Bill) Harter, Sarah Drew Reeves, David Reeves Middle row (second step), l to r: P. Paul van Lleyveld, Walt Herbert, Dudne Breeze, Jerry Jordan, Gail Hayman Wilson, John Peale, Stew Pierson Bottom row (first step), l to r: Jerry Rardin, Shoji Ikeda, Roger Zimmerman, Nancy Warren, Marjorie Herbert, Ronald Stone, Lucy Guthrie Keil, Carl R. Hickey

UNION DAYS 2013 was held October 10–11 last year when the Class of 1963 celebrated the 50th anniversary of their graduation. Twenty-three members of the class returned to Union for the event. We also created a yearbook with responses from approximately 45 class members.

A simultaneous reunion was held for Union women who had lived at Reed House as students.

The Class of 1963 established a gift fund with two options: A “Student Emergency Fund” and an “International Student Scholarship.” Gratitude is expressed to the donors who collectively raised $17,400. We are now reviewing applications and beginning to disburse the funds.

Special thanks are in order for the reunion leaders: Dick Crouter, Judy Davis, Walt and Margie Herbert, Stew Pierson, Jerry Rardin, David and Sarah Reeves, Joanne Rodland, Lorenz “Lefty” Schultz, and Bill Youngkin.

On October 9–10, at this year’s Union Days we will welcome the Class of 1964 for their 50th anniversary!

Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York 3041 Broadway at 121st Street New York, NY 10027-5792 utsnyc.edu

Stay Connected For more information about upcoming events: utsnyc.edu/events-calendar Like us on Facebook: facebook.com/uniontheologicalseminary Follow us on Twitter: twitter.com/unionseminary Watch us on YouTube: youtube.com/unionseminary

Marilynne Robinson, award winning author, gave the Fourth Annual Judith Davidson Moyers Women of Spirit Lecture, “The Spiritual Battles that Rage at America’s Heart,” in James Chapel.