School Notes: Yale Divinity School
November/December 2013

New faculty

YDS welcomed three new faculty members to campus this fall: Almeda Wright is an assistant professor of religious education and an ordained minister of the American Baptist Churches. Her research focuses on African American religion, adolescent spiritual development, and the intersections of religion and public life. Assistant Professor of Philosophy of Religion John Pittard ’10MPhil specializes in epistemology and the philosophy of religion with interests in ethics and early modern philosophy. Christian Wiman is the author, editor, or translator of eight books, and from 2003 until 2013 he was the editor of Poetry magazine. His interests include modern poetry, the language of faith, and “accidental” theology—theology conducted by unexpected means.

Been in the Storm So Long

Been in the Storm So Long, a project chronicling the history of theological education for blacks in America with particular attention to Yale Divinity School, has a new, more robust presence on the Internet at storm.yale.edu. There, one can read about James Pennington, who circumvented Connecticut’s “Black Laws” to attend lectures at YDS in the 1830s; Mary Goodman, a domestic worker who died in 1872 and left her entire estate to educate individuals of African descent for the “gospel ministry” at Yale; Solomon Coles, a former slave and first black to graduate from YDS in 1875; Orishatukeh Faduma, the first in a steady stream of West Africans to attend YDS, who graduated in 1894; and Rena Weller Karefa-Smart, who in 1945 became the first black woman to graduate from YDS. The project is led by Yolanda Smith, lecturer in Christian education at YDS, and Moses Moore ’77MDiv, associate professor of American and African American religious history at Arizona State University.

Before the Fall orientation

This August YDS welcomed one of the largest entering classes in recent years; the class of 195 includes students from 12 countries and 35 religious traditions. Twenty-five percent of the class is from under-represented groups in the United States. The class’s annual “Before the Fall” orientation featured nuts-and-bolts sessions on degree requirements, inclusivity, and academic life, and an opportunity for the students to vote on the best New Haven pizza, engage with local organizations in the community, and dine with YDS faculty members in their homes.