Harvard Divinity School

Panelists Glenn Martin, JustLeadershipUSA; Kaia Stern, Harvard University; Rahsaan Hall, Massachusetts ACLU; Bev Williams, Criminal Justice Reform Campaign, GBIO; and Karlene Griffiths Sekou, Founder and Principal Consultant at The Dignity Project International, discuss carceral punishment in relation to activist strategies and the study of religion. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

On October 12, 2017, alumni spoke about their experience participating in the protests at Charlottesville or who support this protest in their own context. These alumni, including Willie Bodrick II, MDiv ’14; Tracy Howe Wispelwey, MDiv ’12; and Jalane Schmidt, MDiv '96, AM ’05, PhD ’05, will share their observations in order to open up a larger conversation on the important topic of public voice. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

Catherine Brekus, HDS Charles Warren Professor of the History of Religion in America, discusses her recent publication, Sarah Osborn’s Collected Writings. David Holland (HDS) and Margaret Bendroth serve as respondents. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

This session of the fourth annual RPP Colloquium dinner series explores restorative justice, its spiritual dimensions, and the potential contributions of its approach to advancing sustainable peace in our communities and our world. The session features presentations by Fania Davis, J.D., PhD, Co-Executive Director, Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth (RJOY); and sujatha baliga, J.D., Director, Restorative Justice Project; Vice President, Impact Justice; Just Beginnings Fellow. Fania Davis presents “The Spiritual Roots of Restorative Justice: Resources for Cultivating Peace in Our Communities,” and sujatha baliga delivers a talk entitled “Have You Been Angry Long Enough? Faith, Forgiveness, and Restorative Justice”. The event is moderated by Janet Gyatso, PhD, Hershey Professor of Buddhist Studies, Associate Dean for Faculty and Academic Affairs, Harvard Divinity School. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

This year's Dudleian Lecture is presented by Dr. Paul C.H. Lim, Associate Professor of the History of Christianity and Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Vanderbilt University. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

MDiv candidate Tim Gallati is studying experiences of “silence” in nature and contemplative practice with applications in virtual and augmented realities. This piece is titled "Retreat," and is the sound captured during the walk from Gallati's apartment in Central Square, through Cambridge, and into and within the retreat house of Society of Saint John the Evangelist. Headphones recommended. Read more here: https://hds.harvard.edu/news/2017/09/25/listening-ear-heart Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

Laura Dassow Walls, author of Henry David Thoreau: A Life and Richard Higgins, author of Thoreau and the Language of Trees to discuss Thoreau's life and work. Respondents include Barry Andrews, a Unitarian Universalist minister, who is the author of several books on Transcendentalism and a longtime participant in the Thoreau Society, and Terry Tempest Williams, author, conservationist, and activist who will be a writer-in-residence at HDS during the 2017–18 academic year. This event took place on September 14, 2017 and is a part of a series of events to honor the life of Henry David Thoreau in the year of his 200th birthday. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

How do our views of land and landscape influence our religious imagination, and vice versa? The panelists were: Matthew L. Potts, Associate Professor of Religion and Literature and of Ministry Studies; Charles M. Stang, Professor of Early Christian Thought, Director of the Center for the Study of World Religions; and Terry Tempest Williams, Writer-in-Residence.

Delivered on September 7, 2017, by Brad S. Gregory, Professor of History and Dorothy G. Griffin Collegiate Chair at the University of Notre Dame. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

Women’s Studies in Religion Program (WSRP) Research Associates discuss the courses they'll be teaching during the 2017-18 academic year, and share their thoughts on the ethical responsibility of scholars to be engaged in the study of gender. Each year, WSRP brings five scholars in gender from around the world to pursue research on women and religion and to enrich the experience of our students. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at www.hds.harvard.edu.

On August 29, HDS Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy Cornel West delivered the 2017 Convocation address. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

Congratulations to the Harvard Divinity School class of 2017, who received their diplomas during the HDS Diploma Awarding Ceremony on May 25, 2017. David Price, MDiv ’17, gave the student address. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

The 2017 Multireligious Commencement Service was held on Wednesday, May 24, at Memorial Church. Susan Shallcross Swartz Professor of the Practice of Christian Studies Stephanie Paulsell was the faculty speaker. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

On the occasion of the bicentenary of the birth of the founder of the Bahá'í Faith, this presentation by Center for the Study of World Religions Visiting Fellow Sasha Dehghani provides an introduction to the life and writings of Bahá'u'lláh (1817–1892), with a focus on the principle of unity in its diverse forms of expression. Bahá'u'lláh's teachings on unity have not only earned the appreciation of some of the leading thinkers across different religions and races, such as Leo Tolstoy, E. G. Browne, Muhammad Iqbal, Mahatma Gandhi, and W.E.B. Du Bois, but have also encouraged the Bahá'ís to strive toward peaceful and coherent models of community life, and enabled them to withstand oppression in a spirit of constructive resilience. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

Harvard Divinity School Professor Harvey Cox delivers the talk, "Whatever Happened to Secularization?" The talk took place during HDS's bicentennial celebration and alumni reunion on April 29, 2017. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

Harvard President Drew Faust spoke during HDS's bicentennial celebration on April 28, 2017. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

HDS Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy Cornel West and Center for the Study of World Religions Visiting Scholar Sasha Dehghani delivered a talk, "Religion and Nonviolence: Past and Present." The discussion took place during the HDS bicentennial celebration and alumni reunion on April 29, 2017. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at hds.harvard.edu/.

Alumni/Alumnae Council Chairperson Christopher J. Hanson, MDiv ’10, moderated a discussion with this year's Gomes Honorees about their time at HDS, their views on the importance of School, and their work in the world. The panel was part of HDS's bicentennial celebration and alumni reunion on April 29, 2017. This year, the council recognized the preacher and civil rights leader Rev. Dr. Charles Gilchrist Adams, B.D. ’64; the activist and educator Precious Rasheeda Muhammad, M.T.S. ’01; Mary E. Hunt, M.T.S. ’74, the feminist theologian and cofounder of the Women’s Alliance for Theology, Ethics, and Ritual; and the scholar David Little, Th.D. ’63, formerly the T.J. Dermot Dunphy Professor of the Practice in Religion, Ethnicity, and International Conflict at HDS. The AAC also recognizes two non-alumni who had an outsized impact on HDS: Constance Buchanan, founding director of the Women’s Studies in Religion Program, and the late Buddhist scholar Robert H.L. Slater, the first director of the Center for the Study

The panel "Violence and Justice: The Missing Piece in Our Anti-Poverty Agenda," was part of HDS's bicentennial celebration on April 28, 2017. The panel was moderated by Jeffrey D. Sachs, world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist. The panelists were Gary Haugen, CEO of the International Justice Mission and author, Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor and director, Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University, and Sheryl WuDunn, co-author of "A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity" and "Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide." Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.

Between 1970 and 1985, HDS changed from an almost exclusively male institution into a school with a majority of women students and a commitment to gender analysis. Panelists who propelled the women’s studies revolution follow its reverberations into the twenty-first century. The panel was introduced by Ann Braude, director of the HDS Women's Studies in Religion Program. It was moderated by Margaret R. Miles, Bussey Professor of Theology at HDS, 1978–1996. The panelists were Katie Geneva Cannon, Annie Scales Rogers Professor of Christian Ethics, Union Presbyterian Seminar, Karen L. King, HDS Hollis Professor of Divinity, and Ping Yao, Professor of History and director of the Asian and Asian American Studies Program, California State University, Los Angeles. The panel was part of HDS's bicentennial celebration on April 28, 2017. Learn more about Harvard Divinity School and its mission to illuminate, engage, and serve at http://hds.harvard.edu/.