Harvard Divinity School

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Tracy K. Smith took part in a poetry reading and craft talk as part of the Peripheries Poetry Series at the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School. Tracy K. Smith is a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, memoirist, editor, translator, and librettist. She served as the 22nd Poet Laureate of the United States. Smith is the author of five poetry collections including, Life on Mars, which won the 2012 Pulitzer Prize; and To Free the Captives: A Plea for the American Soul which will be published in November 2023. She is a Professor of English and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, and the Susan S. and Kenneth L. Wallach Professor at Harvard Radcliffe Institute. A full transcript is forthcoming. This event took place May 8, 2023. Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/home

Graduating students, members of the HDS community, family, and friends took part in the Harvard Divinity School 2023 Multireligious Commencement Service. The faculty speaker was David N. Hempton, Dean of the Faculty of Divinity, Alonzo L. McDonald Family Professor of Evangelical Theological Studies, John Lord O'Brian Professor of Divinity. The digital program for the Multireligious Commencement Service can also be viewed online (https://hds.harvard.edu/sites/hwpi.harvard.edu/files/hds2/files/final_final_mrc_bulletin_20230516.pdf?m=1684942144). A full transcript is forthcoming. Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

Professor Francis X. Clooney, S.J., Parkman Professor of Divinity and Professor of Comparative Theology at the Harvard Divinity School led a online conversation with the 2022-23 Yang Visiting Scholars, Dr. Heather Mellquist Lehto, and Dr. Ashok Kumar Mocherla. This conversation showed us how perspectives on the global scene might confirm, yet also challenge, how we think about Christianity and the study of Christianity here in the United States. The Yang Visiting Scholars in World Christianity program brings distinguished senior and junior scholars of world Christianity to Harvard Divinity School each year, opening up fresh perspectives, particularly from the global south. This is our second year of having Yang Visiting Scholars at HDS, and the cohort for the third year in 2023-24 has been selected and those scholars will also be in attendance. This event took place April 18, 2023. A full transcript is forthcoming. Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

Harvard Divinity School awarded 149 degrees during the 2023 Commencement Diploma Awarding Ceremony on May 25, 2023. The student speaker was MTS candidate Breana Norris. Full transcript forthcoming. Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

What kind of religious and spiritual questions are raised by climate collapse? How might understanding the religious dimensions of climate collapse and responses to it inform scientific, business, policy, activist, and other professional communities seeking to develop sustainable and just climate solutions? Religion and spirituality play a crucial role in shaping drivers of climate change and responses to it worldwide. In this online conversation, Harvard Divinity School faculty members Matthew Ichihasi Potts, Janet Gyatso, and Diane L. Moore examine the religious and spiritual implications of climate change. George Sarrinikolaou, executive director of the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability at Harvard University, offered remarks as a respondent. This event was part of Harvard Climate Action Week, a celebration and acceleration of climate research, education, and engagement across Harvard University. Led by the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability and hosted by schools and centers ac

The Center for the Study of World Religions hosted an author discussion (Psychedelics & the Future of Religion Series) with Professor Bill Barnard. Charles Stang, Director of the CSWR, and Barnard discussed his recent book, Liquid Light: Ayahuasca Spirituality and the Santo Daime Tradition. Liquid Light offers an in-depth immersion into the complex and fascinating world of the Santo Daime – a relatively new religion that emerged out of the Amazon rainforest region of Brazil in the middle of the twentieth century, and which now has churches throughout the world. This event took place March 27, 2023. Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/home

Sherah Bloor, editor of the Peripheries Journal at the Center for the Study of World Religions hosted three exciting new voices in poetry. Bloor invited Tawanda Mulalu, Isabel Duarte-Gray, and Jess Yuan to discuss their latest works. The works discussed include Please make me pretty I don't want to die (Mulalu), Even Shorn (Duarte-Gray), and Threshold Amnesia (Yuan). This event took place on April 10, 2023 Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and students from across Harvard University to explore their diverse, interdisciplinary, and promising research on psychedelics. Speakers came from across the University’s Schools, units, and departments, including the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Business School, Harvard College, Harvard Divinity School, Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard Law School, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and POPLAR at the Petrie-Flom Center. This third series of talks featured Suzannah Clark, Max Ingersoll, Logan Fahrenkopf, Jeffrey Breau, and Paul Gillis-Smith. This event took place on April 1, 2023 Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/

This lecture on conjuring, gender, and decolonization was given by Visiting Associate Professor of Women and Gender Studies and African American Religions and Women's Studies in Religion Program 2022-23 Research Associate Xhercis Méndez. This event took place on April 11, 2023 Learn more: https://wsrp.hds.harvard.edu/

In collaboration with Harvard Divinity School and the Moses Mesoamerican Archive and Research Project at Harvard University, this symposium was designed to give momentum to our efforts to explore, catalogue, and promulgate Dr. Charles H. Long’s enduring intellectual contributions to the academic study of religion, history, and culture. The event featured an opening keynote on the symposium’s theme, critical responses to key passages from Long’s writings, and a closing keynote followed by a ceremonial libation. Speakers included Corey D. B. Walker, Jacob K. Olupona, Dianne M. Stewart, Tracey E. Hucks, Jennifer Reid, Davíd L. Carrasco, and Lee H. Butler, Jr. This event took place on April 14, 2023 Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and students from across Harvard University to explore their diverse, interdisciplinary, and promising research on psychedelics. Speakers came from across the University’s Schools, units, and departments, including the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Business School, Harvard College, Harvard Divinity School, Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard Law School, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and POPLAR at the Petrie-Flom Center. This panel concerning the regulation of psychedelics included Glenn Cohen, Rick Doblin, Mason Marks, Leonard Pickard, Jeffrey Breau, and Paul Gillis-Smith. This event took place on April 1, 2023 Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/

“Thank you, George Floyd, for giving your life for justice.” These words, uttered by former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, were offered in memory of George Floyd. Pelosi would eventually apologize for her words, but the question remains: why did she make this claim? What was it—what is it—about antiblack state-sanctioned violence that lends itself so easily to justifying this violence? Which is to say, what is it about state-sanctioned antiblack violence that lends itself so easily to theodicean claims steeped in atonement logics? In this talk, Biko Mandela Gray suggests that one of the reasons this is possible is because blackness—and therefore black life—operates as a structure of dis/appearance. To an antiblack world, blackness appears largely in the moments that it is dead—which is to say, in the moments that it has disappeared. This (ghostly) structure of dis/appearance is, Gray argues, how religious ideas—such as theodicy, atonement, and yes, even justice—are steeped in (a need for) black death. T

This panel presented an opportunity to learn from the critical work being done by students to advance justice through analysis, reflection, and action at the intersection of race and climate. Mayra Rivera, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Religion and Latinx Studies, will offer an opening address. This event was part of HDS's Climate Justice Week. It took place April 11, 2023. Panelists Phil Scholer, MTS '24 Tracey Robertson Carter, HDS Special Student Nathan Samayo, MDiv '23 Eve Woldemikael, MDiv '24 Moderator Aliyah Collins, MDiv '23 Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

How does religion shape the political, social, and economic systems that have contributed to climate collapse, in both explicit and embedded ways? How can a critical understanding of religion help us reimagine and develop effective responses to climate collapse? RPL Fellows with expertise in policy, environmental science, Native and Indigenous rights, and education discussed the ways religious and spiritual literacy can enhance policy and scientific efforts to understand the drivers of climate collapse and advance climate justice. This event was part of HDS's Climate Justice Week. It took place April 14, 2023. Panelists Cynthia Wilson: RPL Native and Indigenous Rights Fellow Teresa Cavazos Cohn: RPL Climate Justice Fellow Rev. Naomi Washington-Leapheart: RPL Government Fellow Moderator Sarabinh Levy-Brightman: RPL Education Fellow Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

Join Research Associate Dr. Giovanna Parmigiani in a conversation with Dr. Natalie Dyer. Dr. Dyer is a Research Scientist with Connor Whole Health at University Hospitals, the President of the Center for Reiki Research, and a practicing Reiki master. In this discussion they talk about the role of Reiki and energy healing in improving health and well-being, the possibility of a non-materialist scientific paradigm, and Dr. Dyer’s latest research on universal love. This event took place on April 5, 2023 Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/

In this conversation Catherine Brekus, Chair of the Committee on the Study of Religion, discusses the process and possibilities when applying to doctoral programs in religion. This event took place on April 14, 2023 Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

What role does religion play in the movement for climate justice? How can religious communities serve as sites of organizing and activism? Panelists will discuss these questions through the lenses of religious literacy, climate grief, climate ministry, and practices to guide communities through the perils of climate catastrophe. This panel will feature: Terry Tempest Williams, HDS Writer-in-Residence Matthew Ichihashi Potts, Pusey Minister in the Memorial Church and the Plummer Professor of Christian Morals, MDiv '08, PhD '13 Rev. Vernon K. Walker, Program Director of Communities Responding to Extreme Weather (CREW) Anna Del Castillo, MDiv '21, Climate Justice Researcher for Religion and Public Life This event took place on April 14, 2023 Learn more: https://hds.harvard.edu/

The question of Palestine and the Palestinians is shifting more and more from an external matter to an internal question of Israel, Zionism, and the Jewish people writ large. Religion and Public Life Visiting Scholar in Conflict and Peace Raef Zreik interrogates the ways questions of war and peace, borders, security, or the ‘two state’ solution become more and more internal to Israel. Related intimately to the state's identity, character and constitutional structure and democratic nature, these questions highlight the merging conversation of existence and essence. This event took place on March 23, 2023 Learn more: https://rpl.hds.harvard.edu/

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and students from across Harvard University to explore their diverse, interdisciplinary, and promising research on psychedelics. Speakers came from across the University’s Schools, units, and departments, including the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Business School, Harvard College, Harvard Divinity School, Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard Law School, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, and POPLAR at the Petrie-Flom Center. This first series of talks featured Franklin King, Yvan Beaussant, Grant Jones, Fernando Espi Forcen, Stephen J. Haggarty, Jeffrey Breau, and Paul Gillis-Smith. This event took place on April 1, 2023 Learn more: https://cswr.hds.harvard.edu/

Charles Hallisey, Yehan Numata Senior Lecturer on Buddhist Literatures, talks about Buddhist Studies at Harvard, his path to teaching, and the beauty of the world. Faculty Focus is a special new podcast series from Harvard Divinity School, where we speak with HDS professors about their courses and research interests. Full episode transcript: https://hds.harvard.edu/news/2023/4/14/faculty-focus-charles-hallisey-beauty-world-buddhist-studies-harvard Learn more about HDS: hds.harvard.edu/ Music track: "Old Dog New Tricks"; Extreme Music Limited