Yale Bulletin and Calendar

October 8, 2004|Volume 33, Number 6

This year's Divinity School Convocation features concert of sacred jazz and talks
by noted preachers

A special jazz vesper concert featuring some of the nation's best known jazz instrumentalists and talks by nationally known preachers are among the events taking place during the Divinity School's Fall Convocation Oct. 11-14.

The event will draw Divinity School alumni from places near and far for reunion gatherings, worship services, and the annual Beecher, Shaffer, Kavanagh and Cheney Lectures, as well as a State of the School Address by Divinity School Dean Harold Attridge, among other activities.

Many Convocation events are open free of charge to the public, including those mentioned below.

Jazz Vespers

Noted musician and minister Dwight Andrews, a 1977 graduate of the Divinity School, will present a special concert titled "Spirits Rejoice: A Celebration of the Spirit through Jazz" on Monday, Oct. 11, at 8 p.m. in Battell Chapel, corner of Elm and College streets.

Performers will include Andrews on saxophones, flute and bass clarinet; vibraphonist Jay Hoggard; pianist Gary Motley; drummer Pheeroan akLaff; percussionists Brian Jawara Gray and Asher Delerme; trombonist Wycliffe Gordon, vocalist Kathleen Bertrand; and the 30-member Atlanta Community Jazz Chorus.

The concert will feature the works of such jazz masters as Duke Ellington, John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley, as well as jazz arrangements of traditional hymns and spirituals, and original compositions by the performing musicians.

Andrews, who also earned a Ph.D. in music theory from the University, was the pastor of the Black Church at Yale for 10 years and served on the faculties of the Department of Music and the Afro-American Studies program. Now a pastor of the First Congregational Church in Atlanta and a member of the Emory University music faculty, Andrews recently provided the music direction for the Tony-nominated Broadway revival of "Raisin in the Sun."

The concert will be performed in memory of the Reverend Ronald B. Packnett, a 1979 graduate of the Divinity School.

Convocation lectures

The three-part Lyman Beecher Lectures and the Kent Shaffer Lectures are among the highlights of this year's Convocation.

Otis Moss Jr. will deliver the Lyman Beecher Lectures on the topic "Preaching as Prophetic Ministry." Moss has been pastor of Olivet Institutional Baptist Church in Cleveland, Ohio, since 1975, and worked with Benjamin E. May and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his early years of ministry. In his later years, he co-pastored Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church with Dr. Martin Luther King Sr.

The Beecher Lectures will take place on Monday, Oct. 11; Tuesday, Oct. 12, and Wednesday, Oct. 13, at 4 p.m. in Marquand Chapel, 409 Prospect St.

"Christ in the Early Christian Tradition: Texts Disputed and Apocryphal" is the theme of the Kent Shaffer Lectures, which will be given by Bart Ehrman, the Bowman-Gray Professor and chair of the religious studies department at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Ehrman is noted for his research on New Testament interpretation, orthodoxy and heresy in the first three centuries of Christianity, formation of the Canon and the historical Jesus.

The Shaffer Lectures will take place on Oct. 12, Oct. 13 and Oct. 14 at 10:30 a.m. in Marquand Chapel, 409 Prospect St.

Rabbi Lawrence A. Hoffman of the Jewish Institute of Religion at Hebrew Union College in New York, will deliver the Institute of Sacred Music's (ISM) Aidan J. Kavanagh Lecture on Tuesday, Oct. 12. His talk, titled "Inculturation in Illness and Lex in Lexus" will take place at 1:30 p.m. in the Great Hall of ISM, 409 Prospect St. Hoffman is the founder of Synagogue 2000, a trans-denominational project to envision and implement the ideal synagogue as a "moral and spiritual center" for the 21st century.

Mark Allen McIntosh, associate professor of theology at Loyola University in Chicago, will present the Berkeley Divinity School's Frances Cheney Lecture. The Berkeley Divinity School is celebrating its 150th anniversary during the Convocation. McIntosh is a 1982 graduate of Yale College and author of "Discernment and Truth: The Spirituality and Theology of Knowledge." He is also a part-time assistant at St. Michael's Episcopal Church in Barrington, Illinois.

Other events

Dean Harold Attridge will deliver the State of the School Address at an annual general meeting of alumni at 2:45 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 12, in Niebuhr Hall, 409 Prospect St.

At noon that day, the Harry Baker Adams and Manette Adams Quadrangle -- named for the long-time associate dean and faculty member of the Divinity School and his wife -- will be dedicated. Adams, now the Horace Bushnell Professor Emeritus of Christian Nurture, has served as acting Divinity School dean and acting ISM dean, University chaplain, and acting master of Saybrook College, among other roles. He is a 1947 graduate of Yale College and a 1951 graduate of the Divinity School.

Other events include walking tours, worship services, an open house at the Center for Faith and Culture and the Works of Jonathan Edwards, and a Berkeley Divinity School evensong and ceremony to award honorary degrees. A full schedule of Convocation events can be found at www.yale.edu/divinity/convocation/schedule.htm.

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