Until the world is different
David struck Goliath down on his first try and was celebrated in victory. That’s a nice way for the story to end but it’s important to remember that he took five stones with him. He understood that sometimes your faith has to endure a failure. All his hope can’t go into one stone. He’s going to have to keep throwing them until the world is different.
Alexis Vaughan, 2024 Convocation Address
Inaugural Powell Scholar. Entering MDiv Scholar Fiyori Kidane has been named the inaugural recipient of the Jim and Peggy Powell Scholarship. From 2023 until recently, Fiyori served as the People-to-People Program Coordinator for Global Ministries. The scholarship honors the ministry of Jim and Peggy Powell and expresses their lifelong desire to find, support, and educate leaders for the church to serve the world. Read the news release.
Edward H. Kolbe. We are saddened to learn of the death of alumnus Ed Kolbe, who died on July 10 while in hospice near Lincoln, Nebraska, surrounded by family. He was 91. He and his family established The Edward H. and Mary Ruth Judd Kolbe Fund to celebrate the 125th Anniversary of the House in 2019.
Ubuntu. Delaney Beh is serving First Congregational Church Loveland, Colorado, UCC, as Interim Sabbatical Minister this summer while Senior Minister Thandiwe Dale-Ferguson, an alumna, has a sabbatical grant that allows Thandiwe and her extended family to spend time in South Africa, where she was raised when her parents served with Global Ministries. The Loveland congregation's theme this summer is Ubuntu, "we belong together."
Rhind recipient. Marissa Ilnitzki, a Disciples House Scholar and June graduate of the MDiv and MSW programs, was honored by the Divinity School with the 2025 Joseph Gray Rhind Award on June 6. Each year a recipient is selected from MDiv graduates for their excellence in training and promise for religious leadership. Marissa's care for persons and communities is matched and sustained by her lively intellectual curiosity, courage, and practice of improvisation. (Pictured at center with two MDiv cohortmates.)
Graduates. Sandhya Jha, alumna, trustee, founder of the Oakland Peace Center, and author of five books, spoke at Convocation on June 6. Seven Disciples Scholars and three Ecumenical Residents earned master's or doctorate degrees (12 degrees total!). They go forth to chaplaincy, high school teaching, doctoral studies, ordination, to clerk for a federal judge--and to serve as a Divinity School Teaching Fellow.
How can a 1928 Gothic building be readied for a future that is beyond present imagining? How can this old House provide for forms of learning and ministry that we cannot yet glimpse? To catalyze student living and learning for the next one hundred years, the Board of Trustees has chartered a design and construction team that has expertise with historic buildings and an imagination of future possibilities. Follow construction updates.
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