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CDSP Holds 119th Commencement

Church Divinity School of the Pacific, a seminary of the Episcopal Church and a member of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, will hold its 119th commencement on Friday, May 24. Sister Simone Campbell will give the commencement address and receive a Doctor of Divinity honoris causa. The ceremony is open by invitation only and will be streamed live over the Internet at www.cdsp.edu beginning at 10:30 am Pacific.

Campbell is the executive director of NETWORK, a Catholic social justice lobby, an attorney and a poet. Last summer, Campbell led a group of sisters, known as the Nuns on the Bus, on a nine-state trip to call attention to proposed federal financial cuts to programs that serve the poor.

“At CDSP, ecumenical collaboration is our lifeblood,” said Dean and President Mark Richardson. “Our entire community is eager to welcome Sr. Simone and learn from her extraordinary witness for justice and wisdom about the church’s social justice teaching.”

The Rt. Rev. Mark Hollingsworth, Episcopal bishop of Ohio, and Bonnie Anderson, a former president of the Episcopal Church’s House of Deputies, will also receive honorary Doctor of Divinity degrees.

Hollingsworth, a 1981 alumnus of CDSP, is the 11th bishop of Ohio. In California, Kentucky and Massachusetts, Bishop Hollingsworth has served a variety of congregations and church organizations including the Cathedral School for Boys in San Francisco. He was founder of Epiphany at Sea, a program taking inner-city middle school students to sea on traditional fishing schooners. He currently serves as a trustee of the Episcopal Preaching Foundation, the Ocean Classroom Foundation, and Kenyon College. He is a former trustee of CDSP.

Anderson was the president of the Episcopal Church’s legislative body called the House of Deputies from 2006-2012. She is known as a champion for the ministry of the laity, an advocate for marginalized people, and a skilled community organizer. She has been awarded honorary doctoral degrees from the Episcopal Divinity School and Sewanee, the University of the South, Sewanee. She received honorary Doctor of Canon Law degrees from Seabury Western Theological Seminary and General Theological Seminary.

On Thursday, May 23 from 2-4 pm Pacific, CDSP will present “The Church and the Moral and Spiritual Future of America,” a panel discussion with Campbell, Hollingsworth and Anderson. CDSP President Mark Richardson will moderate the panel.

The event, which is free and open to the public, will take place in the St. Margaret’s Courtyard on the CDSP Campus, 2451 Ridge Rd. in Berkeley. It will also be streamed live over the Internet at www.cdsp.edu.

Church Divinity School of the Pacific, a seminary of the Episcopal Church and a member of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, educates students in an ecumenical and interreligious context to develop leaders who can proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ to the world through traditional and emerging ministries. Learn more at www.cdsp.edu.