Jennifer Howe Peace will deliver 2013 Surjit Singh Lecture

Jennifer Howe Peace, (Ph.D. ’05), Assistant Professor of Interfaith Studies, Andover Newton Theological School (ANTS) and Director of CIRCLE (Center for Interreligious and Communal Leadership Education), a joint venture of ANTS and Hebrew College will deliver the 2013 Surjit Singh Lecture on Thursday, February 21, at 7:00pm. Her lecture, “Spiritual Other/Spiritual Self: Models of Transformative Interfaith Work,” will draw on her recently published book, My Neighbor's Faith: Stories of Interreligious Encounter, Growth, and Transformation (Orbis, 2012), co-edited with Or Rose and Gregory Mobley. Given that people of diverse religious backgrounds encounter each other daily in coffee shops, hospitals, classrooms, and around the dinner table, Peace will address the question "What might these encounters teach us about ourselves, our neighbors, or about God?"

Peace was recently appointed to her current position, the first tenure-track faculty position in Interfaith Studies at Andover Newton. Read more »

The lecture will be held in Pacific School of Religion’s Chapel of the Great Commission, 1798 Scenic Avenue (at Le Conte), Berkeley. Responses will be given by Charles Gibbs (Executive Director, United Religions Initiative) and Rebecca Parker (President, Starr King School for the Ministry) with a discussion moderated by Judith Berling (Professor of Chinese and Comparative Religions, GTU). There will be a public reception before the lecture at 6:00pm in the Badè Museum across the courtyard.

The annual Surjit Singh Lecture in Comparative Religious Thought and Culture at the Graduate Theological Union fosters interreligious and cross-cultural communication and understanding. Previous lecturers include Robert Bellah, Shibley Telhami, Diana Eck, Judith Berling, and John Cobb.

The late Dr. Surjit Singh was professor emeritus of Christian Philosophy at the San Francisco Theological Seminary, dean of the seminary from 1972 to 1978, and professor at the GTU from 1962 to 1988. Among his many publications are Christology and Personality and Communism, Christianity, Democracy.