Dean Moore Addresses the BUSTH Community via Zoom
May 3, 2020 – Dean Mary Elizabeth Moore gives heartfelt words of thanks to the School of Theology community directly through Zoom video recording. The transcript is posted below for those needing to follow along.
Thank you!
Beloved community, I want to say a huge thank you for being such a remarkable community through this pandemic-filled semester. Some of you have been ill with the virus, even dangerously ill; some have lost loved ones whom you were not even able to see; some have continued your work with food pantries, shelters, and chaplaincy sites; some are caring for family members who are fragile; and some are teaching school with your children while also teaching and taking classes in the School of Theology. The demands on you are huge, and I wish I could lift them. I realize, however, that no matter what you and I do, the pressures and hurts will continue.
Just in the last three weeks, I have talked with students who had just passed the brink of death with the virus; students and faculty who are exhausted from their efforts to give their best to the current situation; and graduates who are greatly saddened by their delayed graduation and their loss of a whole festival of celebrations with their friends. We have tried to respond at every turn, and you have helpfully communicated what we could do better. You have also given your best in your varied roles and developed new healthy habits for this moment in time.
This is a time when gratitude is needed more than ever, both as a spiritual discipline and as a psychological path toward wellbeing. Psalm 139 sings it well to God:
7 Where can I go from your spirit?
Or where can I flee from your presence? …
13 For it was you who formed my inward parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works; that I know very well. (NRSV)
These are words for hard times. You ARE wonderfully made. Do you know it?
So, thanks to you wonderfully-made people! Thank you to our faculty who converted to remote teaching almost overnight, and to students who have brought their best to classes, even as all of us keep learning from our mistakes. Thank you to the STHSA that has given their program money to support students in need, and thanks to those administrators who have been responding to requests that have provided more than $16,000 in extra support thus far, not to mention extra job opportunities and stipends. Thank you to the STH Librarians who have provided extravagant library services, and to the Contextual Education office that has “made a way out of no way” so students could complete their contextual experiences remotely. Thanks to Admissions for creative and personal gatherings with prospective students, and to all of our leaders in communications, community life, academic life, finance, registration, and international student life. You have listened closely to the community and have responded again and again. Most of all, thanks to our students who have brought your best attitudes, along with honest words of concern and brilliant suggestions. You people are beloved community because you ARE beloved.
I thank God for you every day!