Alumni News
3 Open Positions at UMCom
Associate Marketing Project Specialist
Posting Date: April 12 – May 6
To apply or for more information contact: UMCom/Human Resources: 615-742-5412 Email: hr@umcom.org To apply please submit an internal application form.
Additional Information is helpful: Cover Letter→ Resume →Work Samples (if applicable)
Submit Internal Application: (Application Form Required) UMCom Employment Application Form
Attachment or Request Form upon submitting resume!
Position Title: Associate Marketing Project Specialist
Position Overview:
The position requires an enthusiastic, highly motivated, go getter! The Associate Project Specialist assist with the implementation of marketing tactics, coordination of project schedules, creation of weekly status reports, and publishing daily content for social media channels. The job requires interaction with clients through all stages of resource development (designer, writers, printers, etc.) while maintaining master schedules to meet deadlines for completion. The successful candidate will exhibit a natural orientation for details, flexibility and strong organization skills to handle multiple projects and meet deadlines.
Assoc Marketing Project Specialist Connectional Giving External Posting
Senior Creative Content Specialist
Posting Date: Until filled!
To apply or for more information contact: UMCom/Human Resources: 615-742-5137 Email: hr@umcom.org To apply please provide the following: Cover Letter→ Resume →Complete Application Form →Work Samples Welcome
Submit External Application
Position Title: Sr. Creative Content Specialist
Position Overview:
The Senior Creative Content Specialist uses creative copywriting and ideation across multiple channels to support marketing and advertising efforts for both internal and external clients. The position develops and manages high-quality marketing and advertising content including but not limited to email campaigns, websites, social media, newsletters, brochures, advertisements, infographics, videos, live presentations, events and webinars. The successful candidate will be able to collaborate and contribute to the creative conceptualization for both internal and external clients. This position serves as the lead proofreader and editor for all collateral created by the Creative Strategy team.
Sr Creative Content Specialist Creative Strategy External
Sr. Graphic Design Specialist
Posting Date: Until filled!
To apply or for more information contact: UMCom/Human Resources: 615-742-5137 Email: hr@umcom.org To apply please provide the following: Cover Letter→ Resume →Complete Application Form →Work Samples Welcome
Submit Internal Application located in Dropbox (HR Forms)
Position Title: Sr. Graphic Design Specialist
Position Overview:
The successful candidate will serves as the creative, graphic design expert for the Local Church Services team. This role requires someone able to work closely with local church leaders and pastors to develop UMC brand and custom logo packages, print collateral, online ads, and promotional items. The candidate will consult and equip local church leaders with best practices in design to help develop and/or improve the brand identity of local churches and its ministries across marketing channels. They will work in collaboration with other teams throughout the agency to achieve the goals of the Local Church Services team. This position requires the development of high quality design/copy layout artwork to be used to provide multimedia integrated marketing communications materials. The candidate must be able to collaborate with internal and external clients.
Africana Spirituality Chaplain, Part-Time, University Chaplaincy: Medford, MA
The Tufts University Chaplaincy is a dynamic hub supporting religious, spiritual, ethical, and cultural life for all members of the Tufts community on all of Tufts’ campuses. The University Chaplaincy provides pastoral care, supports religious and philosophical communities, educates about spiritual and ethical issues in society and the world, and promotes multifaith engagement within Tufts’ tradition of progressive thought in education. Through its programming and initiatives, the Chaplaincy is actively committed to Tufts’ initiative in becoming an anti-racist institution and is welcoming to, and inclusive of, all people regardless of gender identity or sexual orientation. Reporting to the President, the University Chaplain leads the University Chaplaincy team, which currently includes six Associate Chaplains (Buddhist, Catholic, Humanist, Jewish, Muslim, and Protestant); one Advisor (Hindu); four administrative, program, and music staff; one chaplain intern; and thirteen student workers. The University Chaplaincy works with 15+ campus religious and philosophical communities that offer over many weekly gatherings and special programs. Beyond its work supporting these communities, the University Chaplaincy offers multifaith programming and services for the whole University and its staff serve as liaisons to various departments and schools and are members of various University committees related to diversity, equity, and inclusion, campus life, and mental health and wellness. The department also manages the care and use of Goddard Chapel and the Interfaith Center.
BUSTH Welcomes New Assistant Professor of Ethics
April 2022 – Boston University School of Theology (BUSTH) is pleased to announce the appointment of new full-time faculty member Peng Yin, who will begin on September 1, 2022. Professor Yin will join the faculty as Assistant Professor of Ethics.
Dr. Yin is completing a manuscript on the intelligibility of moral language across metaphysical differences. He has received the Emerging Scholar Fellowship from Villanova University’s Center for Political Theology and the Doctoral Fellowship from The Ricci Institute for Chinese-Western Cultural History. Trained in Ethics at Harvard University and Yale Divinity School, his writing has appeared in Modern Theology and Journal of Religious Ethics. Prior to BUSTH, he taught at Candler School of Theology at Emory University as a Louisville Institute Postdoctoral Fellow.
“It is an exceptional gift to hear my scholarly interests resonating with student questions in interfaith dialogue, gender and sexuality, as well as mysticism and ethical formation,” says Dr. Yin. “At BUSTH, I sense a strong anticipation for the teaching of ethics that does justice to the least of these, and to Christianity’s moral wisdom accumulated across its historical and global pluralism. I am delighted to be joining this distinguished community in a shared work to do good in the world.”
“His presence and expertise will strengthen STH’s commitments to interreligious conversation.”
School of Theology Dean G. Sujin Pak shares her delight for the announcement of this appointment. “There is great anticipation of how Dr. Yin’s work can collaborate with the Religion and Conflict Transformation Program and Chinese Christianity projects within the Center for Global Christianity and Mission,” she says. “His presence and expertise will strengthen STH’s commitments to interreligious conversation and the interreligious leadership track and enhance our curriculum, particularly around topics of sexual ethics, queer ethics, and comparative ethics.”
BUSTH Announces Faculty Publications for April 2022
The School of Theology is pleased to announce the following faculty publications for the month of April 2022:
- Filipe Maia
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“The Rise of the Common: Spiritual Revival and Political Revolution in the Wesleyan Movement.” In Methodist Revolutions: Evangelical Engagements of Church and World. Edited by Joerg Rieger and Upolu Lumā Vaai. Nashville: Wesley’s Fondery Books, 2022.
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- Mary Elizabeth Moore
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“Liberating Service: In Christian Community and Diaconal Ministries,” Currents in Theology and Mission: The World is My Parish: Festschrift for the Rev. Dr. Norma Cook Everist, Emerita Professor, 49:2 (April 2022)
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“Responding to a Weeping Planet: Practical Theology as a Discipline Called by Crisis,” Religions 2022, 13(3), 244; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel13030244
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- Judith Oleson
- “The Power of Peacemaking: Shapeshifting for Justice.” Tikkun. https://www.tikkun.org/the-power-of-peacemaking/
- Dana Robert, et al
- Kara Jackman, Patricia Thompson. “Methodist Woman’s Foreign Missionary Society Windows.”
- Steven Sandage
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“Think therapy is navel-gazing? Think again.” The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/think-therapy-is-navel-gazing-think-again-173312
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- Steven Sandage, et al
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Jankowski, P.J., Sandage, S.J., Wang, D.C., & Crabtree, S.A. (2022). “Virtues as mediators of the associations between religious/spiritual commitment and well-being. Applied Research in Quality of Life.” https://doi.org/10.1007/s11482-022-10046-y
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- Brandon Simonson, et al
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Elizabeth Schrader and Brandon Simonson, “‘Rabbouni,’ which means Lord: Narrative Variants in John 20:16,” TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism 26 (2021): 133-54.
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Associate Dean of Students, Director of the Office of Spirituality and Meaning-Making and Cornell United Religious Work, Full-Time, High Ed: Ithaca, NY
The Associate Dean of Students and Director of the Office of Spirituality and Meaning-Making and Cornell United Religious Work is a member of the senior staff of the Office of Dean of Student (DOS). The Associate Dean provides leadership for religious, spiritual, and ethical life at Cornell. Through vision, leadership, programming and advocacy, this role inspires and supports Cornell’s increasingly diverse student body in the process of meaning making of beliefs, values, experiences, spiritual discovery and asking life’s big questions. Additionally, as the Director of Cornell United Religious Work, this position oversees the sixty religious life affiliates who partner with OSMM to advance their shared vision and mission.
We are seeking candidates who are team-oriented, student-centered, and highly collaborative. We need an intentional, caring, innovative, and equity-minded professional to lead our religious life affiliates and help students achieve their personal, professional, and academic goals. Attached is the full job description.
Candidates may apply HERE.
Interested candidates can contact Oliver Goodrich, Associate Dean of Students, at osmm@cornell.edu. Please be aware that we are moving on a rapid timeline: for full consideration, applications should be received by April 27, 2022.
BUSTH Welcomes New Assistant Professor of Spiritual Care and Counseling
April 2022 – Boston University School of Theology is pleased to announce the appointment of new full-time faculty member Eunil David Cho, who will begin on July 1, 2022. Professor Cho will join the faculty as Assistant Professor of Spiritual Care and Counseling.
Dr. Cho is an ordained Presbyterian (USA) minister with a background in congregational ministry and chaplaincy, and worked with immigrant and refugee populations before his current appointment at Brite Divinity School at Texas Christian University as Visiting Assistant Professor of Pastoral Theology and Care and Louisville Institute Postdoctoral Fellow. He was the Director of the Candler Writing Center at Emory University from 2017-2019, and his first book “Making Sense of Life with God: Religious Stories that Dreamers Tell in the Face of Uncertainty” is in progress. He earned his PhD at Emory University in 2020 and is the author of numerous articles and book chapters on the topics of pastoral and practical theology, psychology of religion, Asian American theology and ministry, and narrative theories and practices.
“I am absolutely thrilled to join Boston University School of Theology for its historic reputation as a theological education community that trains all persons of faith and fosters both personal and social transformation,” says Dr. Cho. “I look forward to collaborating with the diverse faculty, staff, and students at BUSTH to cultivate further a scholarly community of diversity, equity, and inclusion, where all students have equal access to learning and feel valued in pursuing their vocational goals.”
“Dr. Cho’s presence and expertise will strengthen the School’s commitments to academic and vocational formation, interdisciplinary collaborations, and practices of care in these challenging times.”
School of Theology Dean G. Sujin Pak shares her excitement for the announcement of this appointment. “Dr. Cho brings outstanding gifts in pastoral ministry, spiritual care, youth ministry, writing pedagogy, teaching, and mentoring in support of a diversity of persons and vocations,” says Dean Pak. “His scholarship demonstrates an exciting trajectory, with a current project exploring experiences of and responses to anti-Asian violence. Dr. Cho’s presence and expertise will strengthen the School’s commitments to academic and vocational formation, interdisciplinary collaborations, and practices of care in these challenging times.”
BUSTH Professor Dana Robert Receives Boston University William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professorship
The following is an excerpt from BU Today’s article “William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professorships Honor Mark Grinstaff, Gary Lawson, and Dana Robert” by Joel Brown, featuring Truman Collins Professor of World Christianity and History of Mission and Director of the Center for Global Christianity and Mission Dana Robert, published on April 14, 2022. Click here to read the full article.
“One of the things I’m excited about is that I’ll be the only Warren chair actually teaching what William F. Warren taught,” Dana Robert says, sitting in her book-lined office at the School of Theology. “He came here and taught mission, and then he taught world religions. He was a mission theologian.”
Mindful of the connection, she even went to Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge a few years ago and found Warren’s grave and those of several of his BU colleagues, along with that of his wife, Harriet Merrick Warren. Harriet Warren was a founder of the Methodist Woman’s Missionary Society at about the same time BU was founded and Warren installed as its first president.
Robert draws a direct connection between those 19th-century Methodists who founded BU and the concept of the “beloved community” and another famous denizen of the School of Theology, Martin Luther King, Jr. (GRS’55, Hon.’59).
Three BUSTH Community Members Featured in UMFNE’s Inaugural Stewardship Preaching Institute
The United Methodist Foundation of New England begins it Stewardship Preaching Institute on Wednesday, April 20. The series of webinars runs through July, and includes speakers known for their excellence in preaching. Among them are BUSTH Distinguished Alumnus 2020 Bishop LaTrelle Easterling (STH'04), Dean of Marsh Chapel at Boston University and School of Theology Professor of New Testament Pastoral Theology Robert Allan Hill, and BUSTH PhD student and alumnus Nikki Young (STH'19).
During each webinar, preachers will share their tools to creating their message, preach their message, and answer questions from attendees.
For further information and to register online, please visit the UMFNE website.
Assistant Registrar & International Student Advisor, Full-Time, Higher Ed: Boston, MA
Assistant Registrar & International Student Advisor in Boston, MA ($46-50K annually)
Overview
Gordon-Conwell is a multidenominational Protestant graduate school, unique with its broad array of over 2,100 students and 200 faculty and staff from 98 denominations and 64 countries. We offer a residential model of education at South Hamilton, MA; an urban context model offering classes in Boston, MA; adult educational models in both our Charlotte, NC campus and our offerings in Jacksonville, FL; in addition to online and cohort models involving students from around the world.
Our mission is to prepare men and women for ministry at home and abroad. Rooted in the gospel and God’s Word, the seminary seeks to develop Christian leaders who are thoughtful, globally aware, spiritually mature, and ready for a broad array of ministries. While being historically orthodox and evangelical, we seek to address the issues of our times with both relevance to the culture and faithfulness to Christ and God’s truthful Word.
Position Summary
Under the supervision of the Registrar, the Assistant Registrar assists in leading the daily management of the registration office, assisting students with registration concerns, providing counsel regarding curriculum requirements, and serving as the International Student Advisor.
Key Responsibilities
1. Student Petitions and Academic Issues: Receives and acts on student petitions within seminary policies and communicates decisions to students; reviews students for academic probation and notifies individuals of actions taken; provides counsel to students regarding curriculum requirements as needed; refers special problems to the Registrar, Campus Dean, or appropriate committee for counsel and direction. (25%)
2. Graduation verification & Certificate Completion: Certifies the credentials for Boston graduation; reviews graduation applications and communicates important information to pending graduates; assists in planning the graduation banquet and commencement exercises as assigned. Confirms program completion for diploma and certificate students, assists with completion ceremony. (20%)
3. International Student Advisor: Serves as the Designated School Official (DSO) for the Boston campus, maintaining the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS). Organizes SEVIS data processing under the guidelines provided by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS. Advises students with immigration petitions and applications to include processing for new F-1 visas, work permits, reinstatement, and reduced course load authorizations, change of status, medical leave, and economic hardship employment authorization. Supports international students experiencing cross-cultural, family, personal or economic crisis, which may impact academic performance in partnership with Student Life. Helps students to access appropriate community services/resources in partnership with Student Life. Assists international students with processing applications for work permits, reinstatements, extensions of stay and other immigration related matters. (25%)
4. Data Entry and Transcript Production: provides leadership to the Boston Registration Team to ensure that forms and petitions related to data entry such as paper registration forms, pass/fail petitions, immunization records, biographical data, address changes, final grades, and others are processed in a timely manner... (10%)
5. Generates Reports and Data: provides data reports for the Boston Registration Office and other constituencies (e.g. Dean’s office, Admissions, faculty advisors, etc...). This includes but is not limited to enrollment reports, inactive student reports, course registration totals, etc… (10%)
6. Orientation and Other Communication: Coordinates new international student orientation and assists with multiple components of orientation each fall and spring. Communicates with prospective students regarding academic and international student questions when referred by other teams (Admissions, Student Life, Financial Aid); communicates with other constituencies as needed. (5%)
7. Other duties as assigned by the Registrar to ensure the smooth operation of the CUME Registration Office. (5%)
Required Competencies
• Technical Knowledge: Competent in using Outlook, Word, Excel. Ability and willingness to learn to perform at an intermediate level in the CAMS database system. Experience with website content maintenance is helpful but not required.
• Customer Service: Strong customer service skills with ability to display empathy with all constituents. Commitment to a high level of confidentiality and attention to detail is required.
• Communication and Interpersonal Effectiveness: Must have excellent listening, writing, and verbal communication skills. Must demonstrate capable and consistent decision-making skills and problem-solving ability. Must collaborate and serve in a team environment that requires collegiality and collaboration with other seminary offices.
• Organization and Adaptability: Able to manage time well in order to accurately perform detailed work while also serving students in their varied academic concerns.
• Familiarity with Academic standards: familiarity with the policies and degree programs of the seminary is strongly preferred.
Education and Experience
• Master’s degree or commensurate experience.
• 3+ years’ experience working in an academic or similar administrative setting.
• 3+ years’ experience in a customer service and problem-solving environment is strongly preferred.
• Knowledge of current immigration rules and regulations.
• Knowledge of community resources for appropriate referrals.
• Experience working in a multi-ethnic environment with cultural sensitivity.
Application Process
Please apply through Gordon-Conwell’s Career Center available here: https://www.gordonconwell.edu/employment/
Please include these documents in either Microsoft Word or PDF formats:
• A cover letter addressed to Natalie Crowson, Institutional Registrar, explaining your interest in the position.
• A formal CV that includes the names of at least three references.
No hard copy materials, please. Opportunities to interview will be made available at the search committee’s initiative. Applications will be accepted until the position is filled.
Dean G. Sujin Pak’s Message for Holy Saturday and Easter 2022
Easter has a long tradition of being the height of the Christian liturgical season, particularly in the calendar of western churches. It can be a beautiful celebration of hope and resurrection, offering the promises of new creation and restoration after a season of repentant preparation (Lent) and after a profound event of violence, loss, and grief (Christ’s crucifixion). The yearning for such Easter hope is palpable in a world wracked with trauma and loss of life from the crises of war, racism, climate change, a health pandemic, and a myriad of injustices and inequities.
Yet, as our own theologian Dr. Shelly Rambo points out, we are at risk of completely overlooking a crucial aspect of the Easter story when we move too quickly from Good Friday to Easter Sunday. Dr. Rambo names the need for mindful attention to Holy Saturday. She warns of Christian theology’s tendency toward a too-quick movement to a triumphant resurrection, often at the risk of glorifying suffering, evading violent realities, and glossing over trauma and loss. In Spirit and Trauma: A Theology of Remaining, she wisely suggests, “Perhaps the divine story is neither a tragic one nor a triumphant one but, in fact, a story of divine remaining, the story of love that survives. It is a cry arising from the abyss. The question is: can we witness it?” (172).
Can you imagine that first Holy Saturday? The disciples’ worlds were turned upside down. All that they had been certain about—all in which they had placed their hope—was devastated. Traumatized by violence and loss, they huddled together in disorientation, grief, and shock. The way forward was not only uncertain; it seemed unimaginable.
For many in these COVID years, uncertainty has become a constant companion.
These feelings are not so unfamiliar. Certainly, they are not unfamiliar to persons whose worlds have been disrupted and destroyed by disease, war, racism, ecological devastation, and repeated, traumatic injustices. For many in these COVID years, uncertainty has become a constant companion. Indeed, beyond COVID, uncertainty and trauma have been too-long a companion of too many.
What might it mean to linger on Holy Saturday? For one, we find that the disciples and their families gathered in a room together. They must have mourned and grieved together. They must have held each other’s trauma and uncertainty. They must have had to find a way to accept the silence, the lack of answers. All the while, they remained with one another. They abided with one another. They sought and found solidarity and strength in and with one another. As Dr. Rambo suggests, they found love in the remaining.
Holy Saturday is a call to a profound hunger for peace and justice that cannot and will not be satisfied with shallow, illusory ‘triumphs’.
Christianity’s triumphalist temptations have had dire consequences, particularly in the season of Easter, as any historian of Christian-Jewish relations will know. Christians would do well to pause long and intentionally within and upon Holy Saturday. Holy Saturday is a call to a profound hunger for peace and justice that cannot and will not be satisfied with shallow, illusory ‘triumphs’. Holy Saturday is the vocation of remaining, with honest recognition and acknowledgment of our own and others’ pain. Holy Saturday is an invitation to transformative love and life-giving solidarity, that we might begin to become, embody, and enact the life abundant that is Easter.
- G. Sujin Pak, dean