EDUCATION | Driving tomorrow’s achievements
31 July 2008
Diverse, Independent Seminary Continues Historic Social Role
Union Theological Seminary students train to help society’s most vulnerable
This is the second story in a series on top-ranked programs in higher education.
Washington -- Union Theological Seminary in New York is the oldest nondenominational seminary in the United States and one of only a handful of seminaries that are independent of any denomination or university. Even at its founding in 1836, when it was a Presbyterian institution, the seminary welcomed students of all denominations. Today, Union students come from seven countries and 37 different religious affiliations.
After working for seven years as an anti-poverty activist, Liz Theoharis enrolled at Union.
“Union students and graduates have long been involved in forming initiatives to offer practical and spiritual help to society’s most vulnerable -- from the nineteenth century Union Settlement, to the unique ministry of the East Harlem Protestant Parish in the mid-1900s, and the Highlander Folk School, which played a significant role in the political and racial reform in the Southern United States from 1932 to the 1960s,” said Theoharis, who is a doctorate degree candidate in the New Testament and early Christian origins.
“I chose Union Theological Seminary because of its profound commitment to the life of the city and its historic role in social movements and ministry,” Theoharis said in an e-mail interview.
“When I was a little girl, church was my second home. I was raised to see faith must be linked to practicing social justice.” As a teenager, Theoharis became involved in helping families in one of Philadelphia’s poorest neighborhoods by distributing fresh food, helping find housing and advocating for uninsured children in the doctor’s office.
Throughout its history, Union has been home to leading theological scholars including such 20th-century giants as Reinhold Niebuhr and Paul Tillich, German World War II resistance leader and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and black activist pastor Adam Clayton Powell. More recently, the school’s faculty has included noted feminist and womanist theologians Beverly Harrison and Delores Williams and black liberation theologian James Cone.
Serene Jones became Union’s first woman president July 1. An ordained minister who was previously a professor of theology at Yale Divinity School and chair of its Department of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Jones is the author of such books as Feminist Theory and Theology (2000) and Calvin and the Rhetoric of Piety (1995).
“Union’s academic excellence coupled with its focus on social justice attracts a student body that excels in scholarship and is rich in diversity,” Theoharis said.
Nearly half of the students enter Union after age 35, and 59 percent of Union’s students are women. Twenty percent are African American, 5 percent are Asian American, 6 percent are Hispanic, and 1 percent are Native American.
Most (58 percent) of the 284 students are in the Master of Divinity/Master of Social Work program, while 16 percent are pursuing a Master of Arts and 7 percent a Master of Sacred Theology. Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) candidates comprise 15 percent of the student body, and 4 percent are in joint degree programs with Columbia University.
As a doctoral candidate at Union, Theoharis is “exploring the biblical and theological foundation for a growing anti-poverty movement in the United States.”
“My work focuses on systematically documenting the stories, lessons, and interpretations of poor people organizing to end poverty in order to illuminate implications for our churches and to chart the development of a liberation theology for the United States for the 21st century.”
Union has offered Theoharis scope for developing her ideas not only in the classroom but also in the community. In 2003, she was a co-founder of Union’s “Poverty Initiative,” which has taken as its mission to “raise generations of religious and community leaders committed to building a movement, led by the poor, to end poverty.”
“The signature events of the Poverty Initiative have been Poverty Truth Commissions [which] ... are organized to hear the stories of those whose lives are in jeopardy due to poverty including the lack of health care, housing, adequate food, education or living wage jobs,” said Theoharis.
“Because of the tremendous support for the Poverty Initiative from administration, faculty, staff, and alumni/ae network, we have been encouraged and challenged to develop an anti-poverty pedagogical paradigm different from other professional graduate schools by bringing students and faculty into direct contact with leaders of poor people’s organizations in their homes and neighborhoods as well as in the classroom.”
In 2007 and 2008, the initiative commemorated the 40th anniversary of the Poor Peoples’ Campaign, which the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. launched during the last months of his life with the aim of ending poverty and securing economic justice and human rights for all. (See "Martin Luther King’s Dream Lives on 40 Years After His Death.")
Union’s Poverty Initiative used King’s campaign as a focus for many of its activities, including poverty immersion courses in the Northeast, Appalachia and the Mississippi Delta regions; cultural events; workshops; conferences; research projects; community protests and activities; and its Poverty Scholars Program.
“This task of building what Dr. Martin Luther King called ‘The New Freedom Church of the Poor’ is exciting and fulfilling spiritually to me, especially contributing to breaking the isolation of poor people across the United States and world, striving to reawaken the spirituality of a nation, and helping others,” Theoharis said. “My own leadership has emerged as I have helped develop the leadership of those most affected by poverty, from Florida farm workers to Philadelphia public housing residents, from Appalachian mothers to homeless day laborers in Baltimore.”
For additional information on top-ranked programs in higher education see "Thunderbird’s MBA On-Demand Provides a Global Classroom."
