Alumni News
Reverend James B. Fulmer (STH ’64)
James Benjamin “J.B.” Fulmer, 89, of Orlando, FL passed away on February 12, 2021. Born on September 29, 1931, in Newberry, SC, J.B.’s passion for music was fostered all his life. He was a soloist in numerous programs, had a weekly radio program titled “When Song Is Sweet” in high school, and enlisted in the South Carolina National Guard as a Bandsman playing the Baritone Saxophone in the 246th Army Band.
In college he pursued a Bachelor of Science degree in Christian Education while studying voice at Newberry College. He continued his graduate studies in voice and viola at Florida State University before completing his Master of Divinity degree at the Boston University School of Theology in 1964. He served numerous churches across the South as pastor, educator, choir director, church soloist, and section leader. In addition to his church leadership, J.B. recorded albums of favorite solos and arias from operas and oratorio, performed concerts and recitals, and sang baritone leads as Tonio in Pagliacci and Sharpless in Madama Butterfly with the Merritt Island Opera Company. Additional engagements included supporting roles in Susannah, La Rondine, and Camerata with the Orlando Opera Company.
J.B. further expressed his love of music by investing his time in the piano industry for more than 60 years. He was a member of the Central Florida Camellia Society and the Central Florida Bonsai Club.
He was preceded in death by his wife of 42 years, Dinorah Fleitas Farina Fulmer, and is survived by his children Benjamin (Arisa) Fulmer, Matthew (Renee) Fulmer, and Daniel (Kim) Fulmer; his stepchildren Lucretia (Gene) Head, Robert (Jennifer) Farina, Victor (Caron) Farina, Michael (Dawn) Farina; 20 grandchildren and 10 great grandchildren.
A graveside service with military honors will be held at Woodlawn Memorial Park Cemetery, 400 Woodlawn Cemetery Road, Gotha, FL 34734, on February 27th at 11 a.m.
This obituary was originally posted here, by Dignity Memorial.
Reverend Patricia P. Adams (STH ’89)
Rev. Patricia P. “Pat” Adams, 94, formerly of Granite Point, died early Friday morning, Nov. 27, 2020 at Gosnell Memorial Hospice House in Scarborough.
Pat was born Anne Patricia Parker in Fitchburg, Mass. on Dec. 19, 1925, to Verne C. and Dorothy (Sutton) Parker. She and her older brother, Jack, enjoyed a loving childhood, despite the Depression – “no one really had much, so we were all in the same boat”. She learned a bit about kindness from her parents who gave butter and sugar sandwiches to men in need who appeared at their back door from time to time.
While in high school during WWII, she volunteered as a plane spotter, working two-hour shifts on a farm on the outskirts of town. She suspected she and her friends didn’t take it anywhere near as seriously as the Civilian Corps might have liked.
She loved summer vacations with her family at Silver Bay on Lake George, N.Y., especially when she worked as an “EMP” with other teenage friends. Pat was a graduate of Fitchburg High School, class of ’43.
Off she went to college, working toward her bachelor’s degree at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, 1947. Like many college towns, Durham was a quiet place during the war; most of the men were away training and fighting in the war. She joined Alpha Xi Delta where with a crew of sorority sisters, they pooled their money to buy an old car to expand their adventures. She made many lifelong friends during her time there, including her future husband, Bill.
Pat and Bill married at the New Ipswich, N.H. Congregational Church on a hot and sunny Saturday, Sept. 3, 1949. Married life began in Nashua, N.H. before settling in Manchester. Together she and Bill raised three kids, Deborah, Steve and Sally.
While raising her family Pat was busy lending a hand in her community. She was a board member and past president of the Eliot Hospital Junior Association in her 30s, a former director of the Manchester YWCA Board of Directors, a volunteer with the Manchester Children’s Orphanage, and was active at her church. Always a fan of manners and punctuality, her kids recall that arriving “on time” as a family to be Sunday morning greeters at First Congregational Church really meant showing up at least 10 minutes early (which she considered barely on time).
The ‘60s and ‘70s were filled with kids and pets, music lessons, weekly trips to the library, ballroom dance lessons and choir practice, skiing and hiking, summer vacations at the family camp and at Wallis Sands in Rye and annual Thanksgivings with the cousins (“best gravy you ever made!”). All the while, Pat and Bill made time for monthly bridge group, yearly Boys Club balls and New Year’s Eve parties on Mayflower Drive. In 1968, Pat and Bill braved three weeks with the kids in the family station wagon on a cross-country trip. She may have almost gotten them lost before they got out of New England, but what a time they had.
Pat was a believer in healthy meals, exercise, dark chocolate, laughing at her own jokes and bare feet. She took to jogging the neighborhood at 6 a.m. She was a lifelong skier and swimmer, and a not-so-great golfer. Pat was known for her rhyming poetry creations and her pie crusts, having the best husband and kids (in her opinion), and thought nothing of laying out in her sleeping bag on the back deck in February to start on her summer tan.
The kids grew up and headed off to find their way. There was more time for Pat and Bill to travel with friends and explore their options. In 1981, this led to an unexpected and much-loved retirement house on the coast of Maine at Granite Point.
A few years after Bill died unexpectedly, Pat enrolled in Bangor Theological School before transferring to Boston University School of Theology. She earned a master’s in Divinity there in 1989. Pat was called to the First Congregational Church in Kennebunkport, serving from 1989 to 1995. It was simply “the best job I ever had”. She had found a second family and treasured them all beyond words. Her retirement coincided with her 70th birthday, so that summer she invited family and friends to a weekend celebration at the Claremont Hotel in Southwest Harbor.
Pat swam 2-3 mornings a week at Bodywise at UNE, volunteered as a chaplain at Webber Hospital (SMHC) and joined the Board of Directors of the Arundel Cemetery in Kennebunkport. She loved to travel – overseas with Elderhostel, with the neighborhood “girls” on Maine adventures and with her favorite traveler, Joan Lovett.
Living at Granite Point was one of her greatest joys. She filled her time with Golden Retrievers, beach walks, Alex’ Pizza, visiting friends and family, piano playing, and falling asleep to the sounds of the ocean. She always remarked how lucky she was.
In addition to her husband, Bill, she is predeceased by her brother, Rev. John W. Parker and her sister-in-law, Barbara L. Adams.
Pat is survived by her son, Stephen P. Adams of Wells, two daughters, Rev. Deborah L. Adams of Shoreline, Wash., Rusty Adams of Kennebunk; two grandchildren, Hans Adams-Christensen and wife Renee of Washington, Kathryn Cain and husband Jayson of Washington; six great-grandchildren, Ava, Sadie, Tytus, Sidney, Cassie and Joshua.
A memorial service and celebration of life will be scheduled for the Summer of 2021 when it is safe once again to gather.
We thank Lynda Bryan for years of loving Pat – dog walking, Jeopardy watching, and sharing meals.
To share a memory or leave a message of condolence, please visit Pat’s Book of Memories Page at http://www.bibberfuneral.com.
Arrangements are in care of Bibber Memorial Chapel, 67 Summer St., Kennebunk, ME 04043.
Should friends choose, memorial donations in her name are welcome at your local library or animal shelter.
This obituary was originally published here, by The Portland Press Herald.
Dr. Nancy R. Dickson (STH ’57)
Nancy Dickson was a Florida Cracker who was born at the height of the Depression on July 18, 1933, at the Orange General Hospital in downtown Orlando, Florida. She was the youngest of four girls born into Duane Whitney Hadsell (Red) of Massachusetts and Constance Follett (Connie) of London, England. Her parents had met in Florida during the early 1920 Florida real estate boom.
Times were tough upon Nancy’s arrival with over 25 million unemployed and soup lines for the hungry were a common occurrence. The Depression era motto was: “Use it up, wear it out and made do or do without.” Jobs were hard to find and the family of six moved around a lot. At one time Red got a job as plant manager of a Tungsten grove in the Florida Panhandle. This lasted until the end of World War II.
Eventually Nancy’s dad got a position as a chemist in the Department of Florida Agriculture at the capitol in Tallahassee. Nancy enrolled as a Sophomore in the city’s Leon High School of Leon County, which had a non-integrated student body.
There Nancy was affectionately called “Bubbles” by her classmates and excelled in French and played a clarinet in the Leon High School Band. After hours she babysat, worked at a jewelry store and a soda fountain. Upon graduation she enrolled in the local college known as the Florida State University (FSU). Here she began her long ascent into education which included a subsequent enrollment in Florida Southern College in Lakeland, Florida, and then onto Massachusetts’s Boston University for a Master’s Degree.
Robert met her in 1960 in the cafeteria of the Rockefeller Riverside Church on the upper west side of Manhattan, of New York City. Nancy had just enrolled in the Columbia University and the Union Theological Seminary joint program. She was in pursuit of her Doctorate. We were married in Tallahassee, Florida, in 1963. Nancy bore her first child in 1965 and with babe in hand she received her PH. D in education.
Nancy had many interests. She was literate in art, music and literature and belonged to the book clubs in Fairfax, Minnesota, and Venice, Florida. Reading was a favorite pastime as she was bilingual both in English and French. Her favorite pastimes besides reading and traveling were playing the piano, and painting in acrylic, oils and watercolor. In Florida, Wednesdays and Thursdays were set aside for playing Bridge and sometimes Spite and Malice and Backgammon. She also like the outdoors where she would pedal her bicycle, swim the lakes and walk the ocean beaches during the Florida winters.
Nancy is survived by her: Husband, Robert Dickson; Sons, Robert, David and Sam; 7 Grandchildren; Sister, Patricia Melody of NC; Nieces, Gail Ray and Linda O'Driscoll; Other relatives and many friends.
This obituary was originally published here, by Hantge-McBride-Hughes Funeral Chapels & Crematory.
Dean Pak Statement Against Asian-American Violence
Dear Beloved BUSTH Community,
I write to you today with a grieving heart. In the past few weeks there have been over twenty attacks against Asian persons in the United States, including an 84-year old Thai man named Vicha Ratanpakdee killed in San Francisco, a 91-year old Chinese man in Oakland rammed to the ground, a 61-year old Filipino man named Noel Quintana slashed in the face, and a 70-year old Asian woman robbed and assaulted. News sources report that there have been more than 2800 violent incidents against Asians in the US between March and December 2020. These incidents and those of just the past few weeks cry out that we cannot remain silent in the face of such violence and injustice.
And yet there is a long and complicated history of remaining silent concerning painful and unjust experiences of Asians in the United States. Why is that?
In an article in the New York Times, Anne Anlin Ching helpfully describes the predicament of Asians in the United States: “They are always caught in a no-win position between whites and Black Americans. They are thought to be ‘white adjacent,’ but of course they can never belong to the club. They are persistently racialized, yet they often don’t count in the American racial equation. The central, though often unspoken, question underlying all of this is: Are Asian-Americans injured, or injured enough, to deserve our national attention?” Ching goes on to lament the fact that this is too often the way the question is asked, revealing “how this country thinks about a racial calculus based on damage and hierarchy.”
As people of faith, we are called to a different way of thinking and being. Jesus once said to his disciples, “It is not so among you” (Matthew 20:26), calling them to an alternative, radical, other embodiment. Such a calling entails being called away from a competitive mindset that assumes that if another’s needs are elevated, it must automatically mean that my own needs will be ignored. It entails being called to a profound understanding of our interconnectedness. If another hurts, I hurt; it does not negate my own history of harm. Rather, it calls me to solidarity. It calls me to advocacy. It calls me to compassion and empathy. It calls me to action. It calls me to envision and take concrete steps toward Beloved Community. So, then, be not deceived by certain forms of dominant white culture that wants various minority groups to pit themselves against one another!
Please reach out to the Asian, Asian American members of our community and let them know you stand with them.
Please embrace solidarity rather than competition, advocacy rather than silence, interconnectedness rather than isolation.
In tears and in hope,
G. Sujin Pak
Rev. Dr. Brandon Thomas Crowley (STH ’12, ’19) Received Louisville Institute Project Grant
Rev. Dr. Brandon Thomas Crowley (STH '12 and '19), Senior Pastor of Myrtle Baptist Church of West Newton, MA, has received one of Louisville Institute's 2021 Project Grants for Researchers. Crowley's project is entitled "Inclusive Black Congregations and Black Ecclesial Queering."
Here is what was said about the project:
"Inclusive Black Congregations and Black Ecclesial Queering" explores how seven mainline Black churches, from six different states, queered their ecclesiologies despite the history of homophobia within Black Christian contexts in North America. The research will provide an ethnogenic examination of their radical ecclesiologies and theologies, while interrogating how and why these churches chose to practice a more radically inclusive form of Black ecclesiology. The extracted qualitative data will prove that these churches have successfully redefined, reimagined, re-thought, and subverted the puritanical nature, mission, and practices of Black churches in North America and the Christian church universal. The research's constructive component will evolve from the recurring themes within the queering approaches used by the congregations. From these insights I will develop a methodology for queering Black congregations, Black ecclesial queering (BEQ). BEQ is a point of departure that centers on the Black Body and Black queerness as the ecclesiological strategy to intentionally subvert the heteronormative and puritan-based ideologies of traditional mainline Black churches. It is also a constructive theological tool that teaches Black churches how to create non-separatist homo-social safe spaces where Black-eroticism and sexual expression are considered sinless behavior. Additionally, the research investigates the history of African American LGBTQIA+ Christians who left their homophobic Black congregations to create their own queered ecclesial spaces. These spaces are described as Affirming Black Church plants. Like Black churches whose ecclesiologies were birthed from the struggles of seeking affirmation in the era of North American chattel slavery, the queered ecclesiologies of Affirming Black Church plants are also birthed from the struggle of Black queer persons and possess profound and revolutionary reinterpretations of Black Christianity, family, and sexuality.
This announcement was originally published here, by Louisville Institute.
Dr. G. Clarke Chapman, Jr. (STH ’59, GRS ’63)
Born in California and trained at Boston University, Clarke Chapman served on the faculty of The Department of Religion at Moravian College for his entire career, from 1963 until his retirement in 2006. He is survived by his wife of 64 years, Ardis Leone Vetesk Chapman, a brother David, three daughters Martha, Gretchen, and Susannah, and by his three sons-in-law and three grandsons.
Passionate about living out his faith, Clarke held leadership positions in LEPOCO (Lehigh-Pocono Committee of Concern) and helped to found the Bethlehem Peace Center. He was enthusiastic about gardening, classical music, puns, and good wine and coffee.
This obituary was originally posted here, by Legacy.com.
BUSTH Announces Faculty Publications for February 2021
The School of Theology is pleased to announce the following faculty publications for the month of February 2021:
-
-
Christian Sacred Music in the Americas. Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, 2021.
-
- Karen Westerfield Tucker
-
Karen was involved in the writing of “We Believe, We Pray, We Act.” Copyright © 2020 by the Council of Bishops, The United Methodist Church, and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
-
- Charlene Zuill
- Editorial Review, Walking with Francis of Assisi: From Privilege to Activism: “Discover the face of Christ on this word-journey through Assisi with Bruce Epperly. He traverses the landscape, shares snapshots of his childhood in dialogue with the life and spiritual development of St. Francis, and offers spiritual practices that call us to greater reflection and activism.” – Rev. Dr. Charlene Zuill, Spiritual Life Coordinator Boston University School of Theology
WGBH Honors the History of the Black Church, with Dean Hickman-Maynard as a Featured Speaker
February 17, 2021 – Last Monday, February 8, the WGBH Forum Network hosted a live online event titled “A Discussion on the History of The Black Church.” Expert panelists included BU School of Theology Associate Dean for Students and Community Life and Assistant Professor of Black Church Studies, Theodore Hickman-Maynard. The Forum Network is a public media service of WGBH that offers video and audio lectures from experts and thought leaders made available to the public for free.
GBH News host and commentator Callie Crossley led the discussion on the role of The Black Church in Black communities in American history. View this important and timely discussion below.
"It is needed for The Black Church to have a witness to the value of Black lives."
– Associate Dean for Students and Community Life and Assistant Professor of Black Church Studies, Theodore Hickman-Maynard
DMin Student Quoted in Boston Globe Article on Vaccine Rollout Inequities in MA
The following is an excerpt from the Boston Globe article “‘There are a lot of people who can’t get to Fenway or Gillette’: Some residents feel overlooked in vaccine rollout,” by Boston Globe staff member Kay Lazar, published February 14, 2021. It features a quote from current School of Theology Doctor of Ministry student Dennis Heaphy. His scholarly focus is working toward improving chaplaincy care for people with disabilities.
Thousands who can’t easily leave home struggle to get their shots
Roughly 15,000 Massachusetts residents are receiving vaccines in their federally funded senior housing developments under the same federal-pharmacy partnership that sent vaccination teams to the state’s nursing homes. They became eligible weeks before thousands more in state-funded senior developments, who won’t get their turn until later this month or early March.
Elissa Sherman, president of LeadingAge, which represents nonprofit nursing homes and other senior living centers, said advocates worked with the Baker administration to ensure the state signed up for the early access for seniors in federally funded housing.
“I know the Baker administration is trying to create opportunities for onsite clinics so people don’t have to leave the community they are living in, so I have been pleased to see that,” Sherman said.
Among those who will receive an early dose is Dennis Heaphy, 59, a quadriplegic who lives in Symphony Towers, a federally funded senior housing development in Boston. Heaphy is scheduled to get his shot Feb. 20. He is relieved, but frustrated because he said other homebound seniors and disabled residents who don’t live in senior housing are being overlooked — especially those in communities of color. Heaphy is a health justice policy analyst for the Disability Policy Consortium.
“A lot of people with complex medical conditions don’t get out in the winter,” he said.
Prof. Menéndez-Antuña Awarded Wabash Grant to Nurture Queer Education
February 2021 — Luis Menéndez-Antuña, Assistant Professor of New Testament at BUSTH, together with Ken Stone, Professor of Bible, Culture, and Hermeneutics at Chicago Theological Seminary, have been awarded a one-year grant from the Wabash Center to create a space for LGBTQIA+ theological educators to come together and imagine the future of theological education. The project, titled Nurturing Queer Education: exploring the embodiment of queer life in theologically diverse settings, identifies the unique professional vocational challenges that LGBTQIA+ educators face in theological educational settings with respect to institutional environment and mentoring students. Kate Ott, Associate Professor of Christian Ethics at Drew Theological Seminary, and Pamela Lightsey, Vice President of Academic and Student Affairs and Associate Professor of Constructive Theology at Meadville Lombard Theological School, will serve as consultants for the duration of the grant.
The project seeks to “explore the vocation of the queer theological educator, how such educators thrive, what distinctive topics and methods they bring to the theological curriculum, how they embody their vocations, what specific needs they have, and how they help and mentor peers and students.” The project will kick off in April 2021 with the online meeting of a cohort of 15 theological scholars from across the country, whose diverse demographic backgrounds will aid in the reflection of how LGBTQIA+ persons are supposed to navigate their identities in their churches and their theological development. The culmination of the project in August 2022 will offer an online presentation of findings from the year’s-worth of discussion and research. These findings will propose strategies for both individuals and schools to adopt in pursuit of queer futures for faith communities, mainline churches, and educational institutions.
“This is the first time, to my knowledge, that queer scholars in religion and theology from different faiths and denominations, working in different kinds of institutions, with very diverse cultural backgrounds, and at different levels in their career paths gather together to reflect on what it means to be a queer educator,” said Prof. Menéndez-Antuña. “Personally, the most exciting aspect is the possibility to think communally about the future of theological education, a future that cannot longer ignore our queer present. It was thrilling to feel the excitement expressed by all the participants from the very beginning: we soon realized that this was a project that many theological and religious educators were thirsty for. We come to the table with no idea of what will happen, and that’s part of the beautiful thing of walking unexplored paths.”