Stories

This month, April, students in colleges all over the country participated in their annual student government elections. Well Eden, you did too, you’ve done a great job. The votes have been counted and the results are here.

Congratulations:

Co-Presidents: Merrimon Boyd + Carol Brazeale

Academic affairs: Ernest McDonnell

Secretary: Madison Peterson

Worship council: Tom Baynham

Social justice: Zach Mullens

Student life: Paige Foster

The Eden Student Cabinet strives to bring the voice of all students to administrators, faculty, staff, and trustees to create cohesion and address all matters pertaining to student life – to celebrate the joys and needs that makes us Eden. The success and effectiveness of the student cabinet relies on students actively participating in the Cabinet and Committees.

On Wednesday, February 26, 2020, Eden Seminary hosted an African American Read-In. This event was the last in the Black and Brown Lives Matter series that was hosted throughout the month. The event was open to anyone who wanted to attend and read.

The event was held in the Rotunda, where students, staff, and visitors could stop by and listen. This particular event highlighted African authors and their literary works. Guests could bring their own pieces to read from, or there was a table set up with piece that participants were welcome to pick from. Each person was given 15 minutes to read from their chosen author(s).

Sonja Williams, associate Dean of Students here at Eden and organizer of the series, commented on the final event and what it meant to her.

Eleven straight hours of uninterrupted theological wondering that included both tears and joy. The Holy One showed up in ah-ha moments, the rejoicing of the amen corner, and the community hugs and most importantly, the sacred space of an alternative theology –the intentional space to have church a new way. The Rand Rotunda located in the center of the building, the center of theological discourse became priority for black wisdom and black experience to reverberate beyond the halls and into a space that willingly engaged a shared church history and Afrofuturism- love for the arts, for a perfect utopia.

The African American Read-In on Wednesday, for me, was putting theory and theology into practice. It was an opportunity to listen intently to the wisdom, griefs and joys of the past. Not simply to honor them, but to become involved in the making of a future they fantasized about. This was an opportunity for the wider community to engage in a praxis of inclusion, at least a praxis that wonders how to imagine a society absent of supremist oppression.

Cory Lovell, a student here at Eden, also attended and read during the event.

The Black & Brown Lives Matter Series: African American Read In, which occurred at Eden Seminary on Wednesday, February 26th, was one of the most compelling and engaging events I’ve experienced in my time at this institution. Having a background in contemporary art and literary event planning, it reminded me of the enduring transformative power of performance art in public spaces, especially spaces in which this type of performance rarely happens outside of prescribed roles. Prophecy was quite literally brought down from the pulpit and put into a public thoroughfare. The words and ideas of various authors of the African Diaspora, from every era, genre, region, and religious and ideological background you could imagine, were read by a diverse array of performers; white, black, brown, male, female, non-binary, and interfaith as well.

The experience was multifaceted, and interacted not only with thought and rhetoric, but with space and behavior as well. It was not only the power of hearing novels, biographies, poems, biblical commentary, political theory, and correspondence from prominent voices of color read aloud in a religious institution, but also the power of watching which of those voices each performer specifically chose to lift up. What that choice said about a particular individuals engagement and focus on African/African American thought. What it sounded like to hear often revolutionary Black words spoken in these hallways, where oil paintings reflecting a long leadership lineage of Euro-Whiteness is omnipresent in our psyche.  Hearing how timeless and relevant words from the 1960’s and the 1840’s, from Nairobi and Harlem, from the pulpit and the prison cell, still are to our time and our community, right here and right now.

The public nature of this prophecy led to inevitable engagement by passersby in many forms. No one could simply ignore these words. You had to engage and make a choice. Folks often chose to sit down and directly listen, many to stand up and read. Sometimes folks were taken by surprise and tried to respectfully sneak around the proclamations, treated them respectfully but went about their business as usual. Others avoided all together, often entering a doorway, and immediately turning around to utilize an alternate entrance. It was impossible as a viewer to not see in these interactions the macro-cultural connections made to how we engage with prophetic Black and Brown thought in America as a whole.

Finally, as a part of a religious community here at Eden who believes in the ever present Eternal Spirit of the Divine, it was powerful to hear that Spirit manifested in sound, in vocal vibrations of life affirming revolutionary thought, and to have those vibrations bounce about the marble, granite, and wood of this building, infusing with our physical infrastructure, so that it is now inextricable from our heritage and institutional theology.

Join us for this year’s Spring Convocation themed “Theological Education for a Joy-Filled Future.”  This two-day event will examine the means by which we inspire joy for the future.  As always, the Convocation will include worship, lectures and presentations, student juried papers, and opportunities to visit with new and old friends.

Dr. David Greenhaw has been serving as president of Eden Theological Seminary for 23 years.  In light of upcoming retirement at the end of June and a Spring Convocation theme on the future of theological education, Dr.  Greenhaw will lead a conversation on Tuesday afternoon and will preach at the closing worship on Wednesday afternoon.

Also speaking during this event will be Dr. Daniel Aleshire, Former Director of the Association of Theological Schools and Dr. Steven Ray, President, Chicago Theological Seminary.

This will be a time to interact with current students in their academic and ministerial work and re-connect with members of your graduating class at the Tuesday evening reception and program.

There will be Special welcome for recent Eden Alumni of classes of 2015-2019 and a Dinner with the President to honor classes celebrating 45th – 50th anniversaries. Special honors for those 50th anniversary alumni.

Members of the Eden Black Alumni Association meet for Breakfast, 7:30 am in Schroer Commons. Separate registration required.

If you need housing, options you might explore are available online as well.

Registration is open. All participants, including current students, please register.

Thank you Rev. Darrell Goodwin for speaking here at Eden!

About the Topic:
Rising theological education costs, reductions in scholarship funding, and lower-than-average pastoral salaries are just some of the factors leading to financial challenges among ministers today.  Leading a church and managing educational debt along with other personal financial obligations can be overwhelming for ministers.  In 2016, Eden Seminary, in partnership with the Association of Theological Schools and the Lilly Endowment began a three-year project to help students reduce their educational debt through the Economic Challenges Facing Future Ministers (ECFFM) Initiative.  Around the same time, the Pension Boards-United Church of Christ (PBUCC) launched the Ministers’ Financial Vitality Initiative (MFVI), intended to increase and improve financial wellness among UCC authorized ministers.

Although these combined efforts have been successful, it has become apparent that economic justice and financial vitality conversations with authorized ministers must occur earlier in their experience to be effective.  As a result, the PBUCC and Eden are partnering in their efforts to connect some of this information to current students and clergy to plant a seed in their financial wellbeing.

About the Speaker
Rev. Darrell Goodwin serves the Iowa, Nebraska, and South Dakota Conferences as the Associate Conference Minister.  Rev. Goodwin brings to this role over 20 years of experience in pastoral ministry and higher education.  he has served as pastor and Found of Liberation United Church of Christ in Seattle (2007-2019) and Everett United Church of Christ (2017-2019).  He currently serves on the UCC Board of Directors and on the Global Ministries Board. From 2006-2016, he served in several positions in higher education, including Associate Director of Multicultural Affairs and Dean of Students.

Welcome to campus!  Eden’s students for the Doctor of Ministry (D.Min.) degree gather on campus January 6-10 for an annual in-person engagement with faculty, staff, campus resources, and each other.  Students are working this week in areas Advanced Theological Education, Practical Theological Method and Skills for Writing the D.Min. Project and Proposal.  It is exciting to see what creativity and collaboration emerge.

Eden’s Doctor of Ministry degree is designed to guide leaders of the Progressive Christian Movement in ministerial leadership.  it is open to those who hold the Master of Divinity degree or its equivalent.

Leaders here transform their ministries to be:

Inspired by Theological Imagination.  The program aims to build capacity to see God’s creative and redemptive purposes at work in the world informed by deep knowledge of the scriptures, traditions and practices of the faith.

Empowered by Social Transformation.  The program aims to build capacity to engage one’s theological imagination and spiritual formation toward social justice action and institutional reformation in order to lead communities to collaborate in God’s redemptive work in the world.

Grounded in Spiritual and Vocational Formation.  The program aims to build capacity to nurture one’s walk of faith while critically engaging one’s faith tradition in its particularity, and to forge relationships of collegiality and accountability with others to collaborate more fully with God’s redemptive work in the world.