GSRJ Conference Program Book April 1 - 2, 2022

GENDER, SEXUAL, AND RACIAL JUSTICE CONFERENCE ures t u F g n i ish r u o l F r fo g n i z i g e t Stra

APRIL 1 - 2, 2022 VIRTUAL CONFERENCE CRCDS.EDU/GSRJ

WELCOME Friends and Colleagues,

I am delighted that you will be participating in our virtual Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice conference, coming up April 1st and 2nd. Thank you, in advance, for investing your time and wisdom in the conversations we will be having. It is good to be with you in the work of dreaming the future.

This program booklet includes information and access links for each component of the conference.

My greatest hope is that the virtual space we share together will also be a collaborative one. We want to hear learn from your voice. And we want our time together to offer space for connection among participants in addition to connection with our speakers. To that end, in addition to using the Q&A feature of and the Zoom platform for linear conversation during our sessions, we have created a separate digital space in which all conference participants are welcomed (but certainly not required) to engage one another by sharing observations, ideas, recommendations, and questions in real time during each session. The platform we will be using for this is JamBoard. You will receive the link to access the platform on April 1, and I will offer some guidance on how to use this digital space during the conference introduction.

As you engage in conversations throughout the conference, whether via Zoom or JamBoard, we ask that you participate in ways that preserve and affirm the dignity of all people, particularly people of color, people who are LGBTQ+, women, and survivors of sexual violence.

I hope that you come into this space and find nourishment. I hope that you find affirmation. I hope that you find new friends and partners for the work that is ahead, and I hope to become one of the partners who advocates for the forms of gender, sexual, and racial justice that you are gifted to pursue.

Until Friday,

Hilary

HILARY JEROME SCARSELLA, PH.D. ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF ETHICS DIRECTOR OF GENDER, SEXUAL, AND RACIAL JUSTICE STUDIES EMAIL: HSCARSELLA@CRCDS.EDU

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GENDER, SEXUAL, AND RACIAL JUSTICE CONFERENCE ing Futures h is r u o l F r o f g Strategizin

On the shoulders of its previous, longstanding program in Women and Gender Studies in Church and Society, CRCDS launched a new program in Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice in the spring semester of 2021. Join us as we create space on April 1-2, 2022 for collective visioning of the program’s future, as well as the future of broader collaborative work to end social violence that targets women, LGBTQ+ persons, survivors of abuse, and communities of color. We offer this as a space for participants to (re)ground and cultivate deeper, accountable relationships with broader networks of academics, activists, and ministers working to make flourishing futures manifest in gendered, sexual, and racial terms.

The main components of our virtual time together include: A Call to Imagination by GSRJ Director, Dr. Hilary J. Scarsella A Community Leaders Panel, in which leading instigators for gender, sexual, and racial social change guide us in strategizing for flourishing futures.

A Scholar’s Panel, in which renowned experts whose theological work promotes gender, sexual, and racial justice guide us in strategizing for flourishing futures.

Collective Guided Reflection/Worship, in which hold space for spiritual nourishment and imagination.

Workshops, led by CRCDS faculty, that cultivate tools of thought and practice relevant for pursuing just futures.

A Reciprocal Call to Action, in which we together articulate the futures we have imagined over the course of the conference and shape our steps forward.

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ABOUT THE GSRJ PROGRAM AT CRCDS

The GSRJ program exists to promote justice in gendered, sexual, and racial terms within communities of faith, communities of academic scholarship, the community of learners that calls CRCDS home, and CRCDS’s local geographic community of Rochester, New York. It makes use of theological and multireligious education to support holistic and intersectional justice, dignity, and flourishing for women, LGBTQ+ communities, and survivors of abuse.

GSRJ curricular programs equip students to use the resources of theological and multireligious education to recognize, analyze, and intervene in forms of violence and oppression that target women, LGBTQ+ persons, and survivors of sexual violence—particularly women, LGBTQ+ persons, and survivors of color. Students learn to draw on both historically significant and contemporary scholarship and activism to assess the specific ways that violence against such persons is manifesting in their own social contexts. GSRJ curricular programs develop students’ capacity to create intellectually rich, concrete plans to interrupt, challenge, and transform the systems giving rise to that violence.

Beyond the classroom, the GSRJ program aims to build collaborative working relationships with scholars, programs, organizations, activists, initiatives, and communities of faith to promote community justice in gendered, sexual, and racial terms. The nature of the work we might do with any particular partner depends on the context and mutually discerned needs.

In addition, the GSRJ program offers community education through collaborative public lectures, student support and empowerment on campus, spiritual enrichment and activism, and institutional self-assessment.

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SCHEDULE Friday, April 1 Note: All times are in Eastern Time

6:00 pm - Welcome & Call to Imagination Dr. Hilary Jerome Scarsella Assistant Professor of Ethics and Director of Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice Studies at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School in Rochester, NY

6:45 pm - Community Leaders Panel Dr. Stephanie Krehbiel Executive Director and Co-founder at Into Account in Lawrence, Kansas

Jonathan Jordan Manager of MOCHA Center, in Rochester, NY

Rev. Teresa Kim Pecinovsky Author of Mother God and an ordained minister in Houston, TX

8:15 pm - Break/Individual Guided Reflection 8:25 pm - Collective Guided Reflection/Worship 9:00 pm - Adjourn for the evening

Saturday, April 2 Note: All times are in Eastern Time

1:00 pm - Welcome Dr. Hilary Jerome Scarsella Assistant Professor of Ethics and Director of Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice Studies at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School in Rochester, NY

1:10pm - Scholar's Panel/ Helen Barrett Montgomery Lecture The first Helen Barrett Montgomery Lecture was in 1995 and brought leaders of national and international renown to lead in a dialogue around the theme "Women Re-imagining a Violent World". Helen Barrett Montgomery who died in 1934, was a prominent Rochesterian, church leader and tireless worker for the advancement of women in education and society. With Susan B. Anthony and Mary Gannett she formed the women’s Educational and Industrial Union and was its first president. She chaired the committee to raise funds to force the University of Rochester to accept women as students. She was the first woman to be elected to public office in the community, and as president of Northern Baptist Convention now ABC USA, first woman to head a major Protestant denomination. Her husband was a trustee of CRDS and was a strong supporter of the school.

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SCHEDULE Saturday, April 2

Note: All times are in Eastern Time

1:10pm - Scholar's Panel/ Helen Barret Montgomery Lecture - Continued Panelists include: Dr. C. Melissa Snarr E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Associate Professor of Ethics and Society at Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville, TN.

Rev. Dr. Stephanie Crumpton Professor of Practical Theology at McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, IL.

Rev. Dr. Traci C. West Professor of Christian Ethics and African American Studies at Drew Theological School in Madison, NJ.

2:40 pm - Break/Individual Guided Reflection 3:00 pm - Workshops You may choose from one of three workshops during this time. You do not need to register.

Reading with Sexual Violence Victims: Intersectional and Restorative Readings of the Bible Dr. Jin Young Choi Professor of New Testament and Christian Origins at CRCDS Baptist Missionary Training School (BMTS) Professorial Chair in Biblical Studies

Sacred texts are accorded authority in faith communities. These texts contain stories about sexual violence against women. They are rarely identified as rape stories and do not appear in lectionaries. In sermons and popular imagination, sexual violence in the Bible is transformed into stories of marriage or love or justified as part of God’s master plan. This workshop is an invitation to believe sexual violence victims in the Bible. The workshop explores theological and ethical responses to the texts and readings that blame and retraumatize sexual violence victims and survivors. Additionally, participants will engage intersections of race and class reading these texts. Finally, they will be encouraged to share resources and strategies to promote restorative justice work in communities.

ZOOM Workshop Link: https://crcds-edu.zoom.us/j/88195993201?pwd=L04yUG1PN05wTlNCZXVkR24xWVhyUT09 Meeting ID: 881 9599 3201 Passcode: 812213

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SCHEDULE Saturday, April 2

Note: All times are in Eastern Time

3:00 pm - Workshops - Continued

Talking about Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice in the Age of Social Media Professor Shatavia L. Wynn Visiting Instructor of Ethics & Society at CRCDS

This workshop explores resources and sites for engaging gender, sexual, and racial justice utilizing internet and social media-based resources. In doing so, I locate social media as a site of meaning-making and engagement of cultural phenomena. This workshop will discuss using social media for pedagogical purposes, sharing resources, and combating injustices. This workshop will be interactive. I encourage participants to bring resources that have helped them or are valuable to share with other participants.

ZOOM Workshop Link: https://crcds-edu.zoom.us/j/84612267649?pwd=UmZHZlltRHZDMU00QUV5dWhHL0RmZz09 Meeting ID: 846 1226 7649 Passcode: 736532

Hildegard's Vision: Reimagining Worship and Pathways of Healing Dr. Melanie Duguid-May Professor of Theology at CRCDS

Christianity, particularly in its Western institutional, liturgical and textual expressions, has been painfully complicit with the abuse and violation of children, women, and the creation by confirming God’s transcendence of creation, together with the superiority of human being to all other beings. Hildegard of Bingen articulated another vision of God and human being in relation to creation. This workshop will engage her generative notion of viriditas, literally, “greening greenness,” as the self-refreshing life-force in all finite beings and in the earth, water, and air. We will consider her juxtaposition of viriditas with ariditas, the deadly, dualistic force that anticipates today’s global ecological crisis, with desertification, drought, unbearable heat, and wildfires; it also anticipates the desertification of human hearts that has engender abuse. Hildegard had a keen sense of the ways in which the church of her day participated in ariditas. Her hope for the renewal of the church, of human beings, and of the earth came from the “greenness” of Spirit, i.e., the Spirit’s revival of a new Pentecost, with a realization of the interconnectedness of all things in God. We will read together some excerpts from Hildegard’s writings and ponder her illuminations, as we share stories and resources and kindle our own capacities for stirring up “greening greenness” in all beings for the sake of healing works of justice.

ZOOM Workshop Link: https://crcds-edu.zoom.us/j/82809848457?pwd=YjdBYk1wc3NsR0JEUHFDczBYa0s4QT09 Meeting ID: 828 0984 8457 Passcode: 544052

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SCHEDULE Saturday, April 2

Note: All times are in Eastern Time

4:00 pm - Reciprocal Call to Action 4:30 pm - Closing

FAQ'S I am having technical difficulty. What do I do?

If you are encountering technical difficulties, please contact David Riddell, Director of Advancement and Communications via email at driddell@crcds.edu.

I can not attend all of the conferences due to a conflict. Will the sessions be recorded?

All sessions will be recorded and posted to the website following the event. Please allow 1 week. You can find out additional information or access the recordings at www.crcds.edu/gsrj.

I would like to make a donation to CRCDS. How do I do that?

Giving is easy, you can do it on our website at www.crcds.edu/give. If you have questions please contact Lisa Bors, Director of Development at lbors@crcds.edu.

I would like more information on programs that CRCDS offers, who do I contact?

Information on our programs can be found on the website at www.crcds.edu. If you would like to connect with our admissions team please contact Polly Bush, Director of Admissions at pbush@crcds.edu.

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GSRJ CONFERENCE JAMBOARD GS RJ

JAMBOA

RD

To that end, in addition to using the Q&A feature of the Zoom platform for linear conversation during our sessions, we have created a separate digital space in which all conference participants are welcomed (but certainly not required) to engage one another by sharing observations, ideas, recommendations, and questions in real-time during each session. The platform we will be using for this is JamBoard. You can access the Jamboard by clicking HERE.

CONFERENCE SURVEY At the conclusion of the conference, we ask that all participants complete the survey. Your feedback is important to us as we plan for the future!

You can access the survey here: https://tinyurl.com/gsrjsurvey

SOCIAL MEDIA Throughout the conference, we encourage you to post your thoughts, insights, and feedback to social media pages. Be sure to use the following hashtags: #GSRJ

#GSRJustice

#inthistogether

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#imaginingthefuture #theologythatmatters

SUPPORT CRCDS CRCDS has been able to provide this conference due to the generosity of our donors.

If you would like to support CRCDS and the GSRJ program we invite you to make a donation on our website at www.crcds.edu/give or by contacting Ms. Lisa Bors, Director of Development at lbors@crcds.edu.

This is a great opportunity to get a glimpse into how CRCDS students are shaped and prepared for a lifetime of impactful ministry.

Those who attend will also receive CRCDS SWAG which you won’t want to miss out on!

Register at www.crcds.edu/preview.

For additional information or questions contact Polly Bush, Director of Admissions at admissions@crcds.edu.

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GSRJ STUDIES AT CRCDS

The Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice (GSRJ) curriculum is available as a stand-alone graduate certificate, as a certificate attached to the Masters of Divinity, and as a Doctor of Ministry in Transformational Leadership.

GSRJ CORE COURSES Intersectional Theology Though the term “intersectionality” was developed in the late twentieth century, there are extensive histories within Christian traditions of both centering and rejecting the need to engage in theological reflection and practice through a lens critically mindful of the complexity of social identity and power. This course excavates that history, interrogates it, brings it into conversation with contemporary discourses on intersectionality, and prepares students to engage a diversity of theological disciplines, arguments, and practices with the tools of intersectional methods. Emphasis is given to womanist methods, queer methods, and earth justice methods.

Disciplines explicitly engaged include biblical studies; historical, constructive, and practical theology; ethics; preaching and proclamation; pastoral/community care; and activism.

Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice in Theological perspective This course solidifies students’ foundations in intersectionally feminist, queer, and critical race theories, and it develops the relationship of these to significant contemporary works in theology and ethics. Since concern for justice in gendered, sexual, and racial terms—though deeply marginalized and contested—has always been present within Christian traditions, this course also pays attention to various forms the voice for this concern has taken through Christian histories. By the end of the semester, students who so choose will be able to add their own voice to one or more of these traditions and claim a place in the embodied conversation.

Violence: Resisting, Responding, Transforming This course aims to develop students’ intellectual and practical resources for ethically engaging common forms of violence that disproportionally impact women and members of LGBTQ+ communities in the United States, particularly as these impact women and LGBTQ+ persons of color. We will address abuse/interpersonal violence, police/state violence, their intersections, ways the church has historically sustained these forms of harm, and what it looks like for religious and community leaders to meaningfully, responsibly intervene. This course will nourish students with theological and practical resources that aid them in developing a thoughtful praxis for engaging local contexts of violence with integrity.

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GSRJ STUDIES AT CRCDS

GSRJ Praxis Lab This course offers students the opportunity for theological play in an intentionally low-stakes environment.

The lab intends to provide richly resourced, creative space in which students experiment with putting ideas they have developed in their coursework into practice in service of their GSRJ interests and goals. Students are encouraged to explore their hunches, try new things, develop novel practices, take risks, assess their work, and adapt it as needed.

GSRJ Partners Interested in partnering with us?

Contact GSRJ Director, Dr. Hilary Jerome Scarsella to start a conversation.

Contact Information: Hilary Jerome Scarsella, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Ethics Director of Gender, Sexual, and Racial Justice Studies Email: hscarsella@crcds.edu The GSRJ Program aims to promote justice in gendered, sexual, and racial terms in communities of faith, scholarship, and activism. Thus, it is a priority of the program to build relationships and mutual working partnerships with communities of faith, scholarship, and activism outside of CRCDS. With respect to communities of faith, we are focusing in on those local to Rochester, NY, as well as those most relevant to the lives and work of our students. With respect to communities of scholarship, we aim to cultivate strong relationships with local institutions of higher education. We are interested as well in developing partnerships with nationally dispersed scholars and programs that prioritize social transformation at the intersection of theological studies, women and gender and sexuality studies, critical race studies, and/or trauma studies.

With respect to communities of activism, we are interested in collaborating with organizations and initiatives that promote racial justice, reproductive justice, sexual health and education, services for women, services for sexual violence survivors, services for LGBTQ+ persons, services for systemically disadvantaged children, and services for people victimized by the carceral system.

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SPRING 2022 LECTURES

NOTE: ALL LECTURES WILL BE HELD VIRTUALLY

GENE E. BARTLETT CHAPEL SERVICE

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Preacher: Rev. Dr. Daryl G. Bloodsaw (CRCDS '17), Senior Pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Athens, GA.

4:15PM EASTERN

CHRISTIAN FAITH & LGBTQ+ EXPERIENCE LECTURE

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5 5:00PM EASTERN

Lecturer: Elyse Ambrose, Ph.D. Visiting Assistant Professor of Ethical Leadership and Society and Louisville Institute Postdoctoral Fellow at Meadville Lombard Theological School, Chicago IL. Partner congregations include: Asbury First United Methodist Church, Third Presbyterian Church, Open Arms Metropolitan Community Church, Downtown Presbyterian Church

STANLEY I. STUBER LECTURE

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6 5:00PM EASTERN

Doctor of Ministry Student Panel We are pleased to have our Doctor of Ministry (DMin) students share with us the ways they are integrating their CRCDS coursework into their distinct ministry contexts. The students will share their thesis proposals followed by responses from our panelists.

AFRICAN AMERICAN LEGACY LECTURE

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Lecturer: Dr. Phillis Isabella Sheppard (CRDS '88), is the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Associate Professor of Religion, Psychology, and Culture at Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville, TN.

4:15PM EASTERN

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FOR MORE INFORMATION OR TO REGISTER: WWW.CRCDS.EDU/LECTURES

Peace. service. justice.

Located in the heart of Village Gate & neighborhood of the arts

We are committed to offering a quality, affordable, and accessible seminary education experience for ALL. CRCDS seeks to form a community of learners that lifts up, affirms, and celebrates all identities. We invite you to come alongside and journey with us as we become a seminary of and for the community.

PROGRAM OFFERINGS INCLUDE: Earth Justice & Spirituality

Master of Arts

Gender, Sexual & Racial Justice

Master of Divinity

Black Religious Thought & Life

Doctor of Ministry Graduate Certificate Program

320 North Goodman Street, Suite 207 Rochester, NY 14607

585-271-1320 WWW.CRCDS.EDU