For more information, contact
Dr. Peter Gathje, Vice President for Academic Affairs/Dean
(901) 334-5844
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Memphis Theological Seminary to host the 10th Annual Dr. Barbara A. Holmes Lecture Series featuring Celebrated Civil Rights Veteran Rev. Dr. Bernard Lafayette February 27 – 28
Lafayette is a recipient of the Mahatma Gandhi International Award for Reconciliation and Peace
MEMPHIS, TN – Memphis Theological Seminary (MTS) “Nonviolent Social Change: Reflections 50 Years Later,” will be the topic for the 10th annual Dr. Barbara A. Holmes Lecture Series. The lecture and discussion will be led by celebrated veteran of the Civil Rights Movement, Dr. Bernard Lafayette, Jr. During this turbulent time in our nation’s history, he served as a Freedom Rider, leader of the Selma project of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and as an aid to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Today he remains an activist, minister, educator, lecturer, and an authority on strategy on nonviolent social change.
Dr. Lafayette was a founding member of SNCC in 1960, as well as a leader in the 1960 Nashville movement, trained by Rev. Dr. James Lawson. In June of 1961, he and other Freedom Riders were arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, and jailed at Parchman State Prison Farm. He directed SNCC’s Selma project from 1962 to 1963, and the Alabama Voter Registration Project, until Dr. King recruited and appointed him as National Program Administrator for the SCLC. He later served as National Coordinator of the 1968 Poor Peoples’ Campaign. Additionally, he served as Director of Peace and Justice in Latin America, Chairperson of the Consortium on Peace Research, Education and Development Director of PUSH Excel Institute, and minister of the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Tuskegee, AL. He is co-author of In Peace and Freedom: My Journey in Selma. Books will be available for purchase and signing.
A recipient of the Mahatma Gandhi International Award for Reconciliation and Peace, Dr. Lafayette served as a Senior Fellow at the University of Rhode Island (URI) and helped establish the Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies. The Center promotes nonviolence education with a curriculum based on the principles of Dr. King. In 2014, URI honored him with an honorary doctorate in recognition of his lifetime of nonviolence leadership for civil and human rights. He is Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence at the Candler School of Theology, at Emory University in Atlanta, and the Chair of the National Board of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Dr. Lafayette is also the 2018 Breeden Scholar-in-Residence at the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities at Auburn University.
Lectures will be presented on Tuesday, February 27, 7:30 p.m. at St. Paul Baptist Church, 2124 E. Holmes Rd and Wednesday February 28, 11:10 a.m. at Lindenwood Christian Church, 2400 Union Ave. Both lectures are sponsored by Memphis Theological Seminary and free and open to the public. The Lecture Series was established to honor Dr. Barbara A. Holmes, the first African American woman to serve as an Academic Dean at a U.S. Seminary (MTS).
Memphis Theological Seminary (MTS) is an ecumenical graduate school of theology that seeks to create a higher theological educational setting that is committed to scholarship, piety, and justice. MTS was founded in 1852 in McKenzie, Tennessee. In 1964, the seminary moved to Memphis, TN and educates men and women of all races and denominations.
www.MemphisSeminary.edu