Scott grant to fund “the House beyond the House”
Disciples Divinity House has been awarded a $15,000 grant from the Oreon E. Scott Foundation to launch, test, and evaluate two peer-driven projects in leader development: 1) The Constructive Theologies project and 2) a Resourcing Young Clergy Leaders event. Both projects effectively move “the House” beyond “the House,” insofar as the reach of each project extends beyond current Disciples Divinity House students, not only to DDH alumni/ae who serve across the U.S., but also to other emerging Disciples theological leaders, in one project, and, in the other, to their former ecumenical classmates (and now fellow graduates) at the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. The grant provides resources for these projects to develop in conversation among alumni/ae and student leaders. Associate Dean Yvonne Gilmore will serve as project manager.
Disciples students Andrew Packman (PhD student in Theology and co-founding pastor of Root and Branch, a new church start), Allie Lundblad (MDiv student), and Christian Watkins (2014 Yale MDiv graduate) initiated the Constructive Theologies project with an interest in connecting with peers from across the Disciples of Christ. The project envisions cultivating innovative ideas that “move” across racial, vocational, intellectual and economic lines--an "idea trust" ensures space for the peer development of creative, faithful, risk-taking theological thinking. Participants in this project are peers in the sense that they share a common generational frame of reference (ages 25 to 35) and a common hope to create effective roads to personal and ecclesial transformation, and especially to becoming a pro-reconciling and anti-racist church.
The Resourcing Young Clergy Leaders event was developed out of an appeal by alumnus Beau Underwood and former resident Ben Varnum to their fellow Divinity School MDiv alumni/ae. It will initially take the form of a “Ministry Alumni/ae Retreat” in collaboration with the Divinity School on October 3-4, 2014, in Hyde Park. A pilot group of MDiv alumni/ae who have been actively engaged in ministry landscapes and graduated between 2007 and 2010 have been invited to return for a time of peer-driven reflection and renewal.