Harvard Divinity School

Religion in Times of Earth Crisis: Animal Stories, in Crisis

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This is the third event is a six-part series that took place live on Zoom discussing religion in times of earth crisis. Across the Indian Ocean worl...

The Necessity of Exile: Essays from a Distance & End of Days Ethics, Tradition, and Power in Israel

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Full event title: Religion, Conflict, and Peace Book Series Spring 2024: The Necessity of Exile: Essays from a Distance & End of Days Ethics, Traditio...

Religion in Times of Earth Crisis: Ancestors and Climate in Our Boston Backyard

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This is the second event in a six-part series about religion in times of earth crisis. Two hundred years ago, the residents of metropolitan Boston f...

Religion in Times of Earth Crisis: A Procession of Catastrophes

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

This is the first event is a six-part series that will take place live on Zoom and is free and open to the public. Environmental catastrophes can cr...

RCPI Book Series: Decolonizing Religion and the Practice of Peace

26 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Join this author discussion about the book "Decolonizing Religion and the Practice of Peace." The book is an investigation of what consolidating relig...

Inside the Mind of a Spirit Channel – a Conversation with Paul Selig

20 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Pop Apocalypse, hosted by Matthew J. Dillon, postdoctoral fellow at the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School, explores t...

Enheduanna: Voicing the Feminine Divine Presentation and Musical Performance

26 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We invite you to listen to the special evening celebrating the life and writings of Enheduana, also En-hedu-Ana; (c. twenty-third century B.C.E.) who ...

Peripheries Launch Event 2023

29 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Peripheries Journal: A Journal of Word, Image, and Sound is celebrating the release of Issue 6. This 2024 edition includes work from Victoria Chang,...

Psychedelics and the Future of Religion: Mescaline and Psychonauts with Mike Jay

29 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Watch an interview with author Mike Jay about his two most recent books, "Psychonauts: drugs and the making of the modern mind," and "Mescaline: a gl...

LGBTQ+ Rights Under Attack - Session 2: Protecting Against Violence and Discrimination

29 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full title: LGBTQ+ Rights Under Attack - Session 2: Protecting Against Violence and Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity: A ...

Dr. Keith Edward Cantú, Like a Tree Universally Spread Sri Sabhapati Swami and Śivarājayoga

29 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full title: Book Launch and Discussion: Dr. Keith Edward Cantú, Like a Tree Universally Spread Sri Sabhapati Swami and Śivarājayoga Watch this dis...

Psychedelics and Philosophy: Metaphysics and Meaning-Making in Psychedelia

14 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Philosophers Prof. Christine Hauskeller and Dr. Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes presented a multi-perspectival hermeneutics of psychedelic-occasioned experienc...

Pop Apocalypse: Ecstatic Knowledge and the Study of Religion - Feat. Jeffrey J. Kripal

11 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As part of the Transcendence and Transformation initiative, the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School is proud to announc...

Refuge in the Storm Webinar Series Part II: Sickness, Aging, and Death: Caring for Life-Cycle Crises

04 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This webinar is the second in a series offered by the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School. It featured a panel discussion of contr...

"Wild Life" Film Screening and Discussion

04 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This discussion followed the screening of Oscar-winning filmmakers Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin's extraordinary film "Wild Life". The film is a stor...

Chimera Geographies: Black Spiritual Borderland Performances of the Caribbean

15 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this project, Elena Guzman explored the way Black women and non-binary people through the Caribbean and its diaspora use spiritual and ritual perfo...

From Ms. Marvel to the Smithsonian: Teaching Religious Literacy through Arts and Popular Culture

15 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full Title: From Ms. Marvel to the Smithsonian: A Conversation on Teaching Religious Literacy through Arts and Popular Culture with Dr. Hussein Rashid...

Psychedelics and the Future of Religion: Race and Exoticism in Global Psychedelic Spirituality

03 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full title: Psychedelics and the Future of Religion: Panel discussion on Race and Exoticism in Global Psychedelic Spirituality with Professors Lucia a...

Call, Respond, and Serve: The Role of Spirituality in Public Theology and Politics

03 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Major religious traditions call on their adherents to respond to the causes of suffering, those who suffer, and the prevention of suffering. The ways ...

Pop Apocalypse: Monsters, Fictional Worlds, and the Repressed Supernatural - Feat. Victoria Nelson

30 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As part of the Transcendence and Transformation initiative, the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School is proud to announc...

Dhamma Chakra Day: Buddhism and Emancipation of Marginalized Classes in India

27 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This special event, jointly organized by CSWR and HDS Buddhist Ministry Initiative, aimed to commemorate Dhamma Chakra Day and delved into the endurin...

Gnoseologies: Angela’s Symposium: YouTube, Esotericism, and the Academia

27 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Through her channel, "Angela's Symposium," Dr. Puca pioneered an innovative approach to academia by utilizing popular social media platforms, aiming t...

Illuminating the Empire: The Spanish Inquisition and the Spread of Global Heresy

27 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This lecture was given by Jessica J. Fowler (University of Montana Western), who's an HDS Visiting Associate Professor of Women’s Studies and Cathol...

"Rivermouth: A Chronicle of Language, Faith and Migration"—A Conversation with Alejandra Oliva

20 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Hear from Alejandra Oliva, MTS '19, Mexican-American writer, translator, and immigration-justice activist, speak about her work and her recent book, "...

Third Annual Transcendence and Transformation Presentations

13 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full Title: Third Annual T&T Presentations Launch: Five New Researchers Present on their Scholarly Work At the beginning of the last three academic y...

Black Religion and Critical Theory Colloquium: Panel II

13 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Convened by Ahmad Greene-Hayes, Assistant Professor of African American Religious Studies at HDS, this colloquium bridged connections between the crit...

Black Religion and Critical Theory Colloquium: Panel I

13 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Convened by Ahmad Greene-Hayes, Assistant Professor of African American Religious Studies at HDS, this colloquium bridged connections between the crit...

CSWR List Lecture with Adam Afterman

13 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full title: CSWR List Lecture with Adam Afterman: Kabbalistic Neoplatonism: Divine Emanation and Mystical Integration Dr. Afterman addressed the prof...

WSRP 2023-24: Ethical Scholarship: Gender, Religion, & Difference

13 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This panel was presented by the Women’s Studies in Religion Program (WSRP), which brings six scholars in gender from around the country each year to...

Sacred Sabotage: Direct Action and Spiritual Practice Amidst Ecological Breakdown

02 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Amid ongoing ecological collapse, calls for more intense activists are on the rise. What is the role of civil disruption in addressing ecological cata...

Refuge in the Storm Webinar Series, Part I: Buddhist Approaches to Large-Scale and Community Crises

29 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This webinar is the first in a series offered by the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School. It featured a panel discussion of contri...

The Ziyārat of Imām al-Ḥusayn as Liturgical Text in Early Shī‘ī Ḥadīth

22 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Full Title: The Ziyārat of Imām al-Ḥusayn as Liturgical Text in Early Shī‘ī Ḥadīth and its Role in the Promulgation of Shī‘ī Piety The...

Pop Apocalypse: Aliens, Eros, and Life After Death - An Interview with Whitley Strieber

18 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As part of the Transcendence and Transformation initiative, the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School is proud to announc...

HDS Convocation 2023

14 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The entire HDS and Harvard community, friends, alumni, and guests were invited to the opening of HDS's 208th year. The 2023 Convocation featured remar...

Decolonial Dames of America: Book Launch & Reading

06 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Constellation Project is pleased to announce the publication of our second “Prayer Book,” by HDS student Morgan Curtis. “The Decolonial Dame...

Pop Apocalypse: Psychedelic Gnosis and the Imaginal Double with Laurence Caruana

07 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As part of the Transcendence and Transformation initiative, the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School is proud to announc...

Pop Apocalypse: Waking from the Flesh Dream with Alex and Allyson Grey

07 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As part of the Transcendence and Transformation initiative, the Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School is proud to announc...

"I am Your Sister": Audre Lorde in the Context of Black Feminist Activism and Ethics

26 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Audre Lorde is one of the most significant and influential Black feminist writer/activists of the twentieth century. In this talk at Harvard Divinity ...

The Islamic Conception of Arabness: A New Reading of the Qurʾānic Discourse on the aʿrāb

26 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Center for the Study of World Religions hosted a talk by Raashid Goyal, who researches the history, languages, and literature of the early Islamic...

The Power of Mind: A talk with Khentrul Lodrö T’hayé Rinpoche

15 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The principle factor determining what we experience is our mind. During an event hosted by the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School...

Bulletin Long Read: Following the Gaian Way

15 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

A new religious philosophy aims to help humans understand again that they are part of and utterly dependent on the living Earth. This is a special a...

In the garden we sat weeping: A Poetry Reading with Suzannah Omonuk

13 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

"I see my craft as a poet as being first and foremost grief work. To re-imagine and commit ourselves to a more peaceful and just world, we must first ...

Book Event: The Planet You Inherit

13 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Religion and Public Life program at Harvard Divinity School hosted a talk with Larry L. Rasmussen, Christian Environmental Ethicist, and Reinhold ...

2023 Billings Preaching Prize Competition

13 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Each spring, the Office of Ministry Studies organizes the Billings Preaching Prize Finals, an annual preaching competition open to second- and third-y...

Educator Webinar: Religious Literacy and Nurses' Stories in the Age of COVID and Anti-Asian Hate

13 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Anti-Asian hate spiked 145 percent in 2020 during the height of the pandemic. At the same time, nearly one-third of the COVID deaths among nurses were...

Are Psychedelics Theologically Significant for Judaism?

08 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Throughout millennia, Jews have explored individual and communal consciousness through a variety of techniques and traditions. More recently, Jews hav...

Multiple Subjectivities & the Ethnographic Study of Lived Religion: Conversation with Fadeke Castor

08 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School hosted his conversation with Professor Fadeke Castor. CSWR Research Associate D...

Poetry Craft Talk and Reading with Tracy K. Smith

08 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Tracy K. Smith took part in a poetry reading and craft talk as part of the Peripheries Poetry Series at the Center for the...

Harvard Divinity School 2023 Multireligious Commencement Service

05 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Graduating students, members of the HDS community, family, and friends took part in the Harvard Divinity School 2023 Multireligious Commencement Servi...

World Christianity, Christianity in the West: Continuities and Differences

02 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Professor Francis X. Clooney, S.J., Parkman Professor of Divinity and Professor of Comparative Theology at the Harvard Divinity School led a online co...

Harvard Divinity School 2023 Commencement Diploma Awarding Ceremony

01 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Harvard Divinity School awarded 149 degrees during the 2023 Commencement Diploma Awarding Ceremony on May 25, 2023. The student speaker was MTS candid...

Examining the Religious and Spiritual Implications of Climate Change

12 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What kind of religious and spiritual questions are raised by climate collapse? How might understanding the religious dimensions of climate collapse an...

Liquid Light Book Discussion with Bill Barnard (Psychedelics & the Future of Religion Series)

11 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Center for the Study of World Religions hosted an author discussion (Psychedelics & the Future of Religion Series) with Professor Bill Barnard. Ch...

New Voices in Poetry: Tawanda Mulalu, Isabel Duarte-Gray, and Jess Yuan

04 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Sherah Bloor, editor of the Peripheries Journal at the Center for the Study of World Religions hosted three exciting new voices in poetry. Bloor invit...

Explorations in Interdisciplinary Psychedelic Research: Group 3

04 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and stu...

Conjuring Nonbinary Futurities and Decolonizing Methodologies

04 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This lecture on conjuring, gender, and decolonization was given by Visiting Associate Professor of Women and Gender Studies and African American Relig...

The (Re)Imagination of Matter: Introducing the Codex Charles H. Long Papers Project

01 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In collaboration with Harvard Divinity School and the Moses Mesoamerican Archive and Research Project at Harvard University, this symposium was design...

Explorations in Interdisciplinary Psychedelic Research: Regulation Panel

27 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and stu...

Dis/appearing: Black Life, Theodicy & the Study of Religion (Greeley Lecture)

27 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

“Thank you, George Floyd, for giving your life for justice.” These words, uttered by former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, were offered in mem...

Climate Justice as Racial Justice: Student Panel

26 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This panel presented an opportunity to learn from the critical work being done by students to advance justice through analysis, reflection, and action...

Religious Literacy and Climate Justice

26 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

How does religion shape the political, social, and economic systems that have contributed to climate collapse, in both explicit and embedded ways? How...

Reiki, Energy Medicine, and Post-Materialism

21 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Join Research Associate Dr. Giovanna Parmigiani in a conversation with Dr. Natalie Dyer. Dr. Dyer is a Research Scientist with Connor Whole Health at ...

Applying to Doctoral Programs in Religion

20 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this conversation Catherine Brekus, Chair of the Committee on the Study of Religion, discusses the process and possibilities when applying to docto...

Examining the Religious and Spiritual Implications of Climate Change

19 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What role does religion play in the movement for climate justice? How can religious communities serve as sites of organizing and activism? Panelists w...

The Palestinian Question as a Jewish Question

14 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The question of Palestine and the Palestinians is shifting more and more from an external matter to an internal question of Israel, Zionism, and the J...

Explorations in Interdisciplinary Psychedelic Research: Group Two

14 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and stu...

Faculty Focus: Charles Hallisey on the Beauty of the World and Buddhist Studies at Harvard

14 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Charles Hallisey, Yehan Numata Senior Lecturer on Buddhist Literatures, talks about Buddhist Studies at Harvard, his path to teaching, and the beauty ...

Judeopessimism: Antisemitism, History, and Critical Race Theory with Shaul Magid

14 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Black Studies and Critical Race Theory constitute some of the most theoretically sophisticated conversations in the Humanities today on issues of indi...

Explorations in Interdisciplinary Psychedelic Research: Group One

13 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Harvard Psychedelics Project at Harvard Divinity School, a student organization, presented this conference to gather faculty, researchers, and stu...

William Belden Noble Lecture Series: Dekila Chungyalpa

08 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This lecture is the third of a four-part series this academic year. This series explores the moral and ethical questions surrounding the global climat...

The World of Jewish Midwives in Early Modern Europe

06 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This lecture on Jewish midwives was given by Visiting Assistant Professor of Judaism and Women's Studies in Religion Program 2022-23 Research Associat...

Faculty Focus: The Graciousness of the World and a Life Well Lived

05 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this special episode of Faculty Focus, HDS professors John P. Brown and Charles Hallisey talk about why this summer’s Making Change Professional ...

Translation As Linguistical and Bodily Metamorphosis

02 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

There are two distinct concepts of translation at work in the encounter between an Amazonian Indigenous people, the Wari’, and the New Tribes Missio...

Reflecting on Religion and the Legacies of Slavery

23 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This conversation was the last of the six-part series Religion and the Legacies of Slavery | A Series of Public Online Conversations. The featured spe...

What Does It Mean to Awaken Our Dignity?

22 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What is dignity? Is it something conferred upon us externally by others, or an inner quality that we all possess? Drawing from the Tibetan Buddhist tr...

Crossing a Line: Laws, Violence and Roadblocks to Political Expression

22 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Amahl A. Bishara, Associate Professor of Anthropology at Tufts University, and author of "Back Stories: U.S. News Producation and Palestinian Politics...

Dancing Altars

20 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this lecture Visiting Assistant Professor of African Religions and Women's Studies in Religion Program 2022-23 Research Associate Elyan Hill discus...

Music, Voice, and Healing: A Conversation with Grace Nono

14 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Join Research Associate Dr. Giovanna Parmigiani in her conversation with Dr. Grace Nono as they discuss Dr. Nono’s work as an ethnographer and perfo...

Slavers and Slavery: A Dialogue with Descendants

10 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Slavery is most readily associated with the U.S. American South with the geographies of the North often eclipsed. Tracey Hucks, Victor S. Thomas Profe...

Displacement and Belonging in Israel/Palestine: Harvard Student Stories of Learning in Context

10 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

On March 2, 2023, a cohort of Harvard Divinity School students engaged in an evening of storytelling, poetry, and photography as they shared their exp...

Leading Toward Justice: Intersections of Religion, Ethics, and Community Organizing

10 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The Leading Toward Justice webinar series features panel discussions spotlighting alumni impact in the world and the ways alumni leverage their HDS tr...

Faculty Focus: Monica Sanford on Multireligious Ministry for the Twenty-first Century

06 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Monica Sanford, Assistant Dean for Multireligious Ministry and Lecturer in Ministry Studies at HDS, talks about the evolution and importance of multir...

Memory, History, and the Ethics of Reparations

04 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The 1619 Project spawned an unprecedented national conversation in and outside the classroom on slavery’s ongoing afterlives in American society. Th...

Essays on Women in Western Esotericism: Beyond Seeresses and Sea Priestesses

26 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this event, Dr. Amy Hale and Dr. Christa Shusko present their book Essays on Women in Western Esotericism: Beyond Seeresses and Sea Priestesses, ed...

Wearing Divine Protection

23 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As a state-of-the-art “wearable technology” of the time, talismans provided protection, perquisites, and prescriptions for the devotees of premode...

Initiated by the Spirits with Frédérique Apffel-Marglin, PhD & Randy Chung Gonzales

23 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Randy Chung Gonzales was leading an ordinary life in his hometown of Lamas, Peru, when his employer, anthropologist Frédérique Apffel-Marglin, asked...

What is “’Awra”?: Women, Gendered Space, and Islamic Law

15 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This lecture, given by Visiting Lecturer on Islam and Women's Studies in Religion Program 2022-23 Research Associate Rahina Muazu, discusses awra (an ...

HDS and Slavery: Family Stories

15 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Harvard Divinity School was founded nearly forty years after slavery was abolished in Massachusetts, yet many of our school’s founders and early stu...

Religion, Race, and the Double Helix of White Supremacy

10 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It has long been a historical truism that, in the early modern West, pseudoscientific racial hierarchies replaced religious hierarchies as the dominan...

William James and the Sick Soul

08 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

As part of Harvard Divinity School's annual William James Lectures on Religious Experience, Professor John Kaag presented "William James and the Sick ...

Enslavement in the Formation of Earliest Christianity

08 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This conversation was the first of the six-part series Religion and the Legacies of Slavery: A Series of Public Online Conversations. The featured spe...

BMI 10th Anniversary: Phillip Henderson

05 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

This fall, Harvard Divinity School celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Buddhist Ministry Initiative (BMI). In honor of this anniversary, the commun...

Release Party for Peripheries 2022

12 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Peripheries is a non-profit literary and arts journal established in 2017 that publishes artistic work that is, broadly understood, "peripheral"; work...