2004 Conference Speakers

Peter Adriance has served as NGO Liaison for the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá'ís of the U.S. since 1990. He is a member of the steering committee of the U.S. Coalition for the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014). He helped found and was active in the leadership of the U.S. NGO networks for three UN conferences on human settlements, social development, and the environment and development. For 10 years, he took part in domestic and international consultations that resulted in the launching of the Earth Charter. Adriance was a member of the National Planning Committee for the 1999 National Town Meeting for a Sustainable America.

He also helped found, and since 1998 has served on, the governing board of the International Environment Forum. He is a past chair of the United Nations Association Council of Organizations and has worked with other organizations to advocate U.S. support for a strong and effective United Nations; payment of U.S. dues and arrears to the UN; and constructive UN reform. He served on the national planning committee for the National Forum on the UN (2003). Mr. Adriance received an MBA from the University of Massachusetts in 1972 and a BA from Alfred University in 1970.

Salam Al-Marayati is the Director and one of the founders of the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), a public service, non-profit, non-partisan agency that disseminates accurate information about Islam and Muslims to the media and to our elected officials. For thirteen years, Mr. Al-Marayati has worked tirelessly to promote harmony between Muslims and their fellow Americans through interfaith dialogue and working in concert with local and national officials. Al-Marayati has made countless appearances in major national media outlets to discuss issues pertinent to Americans and American Muslims.

Mr. Al-Marayati has been published in The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, Christian Science Monitor, L.A. Daily News, The Chicago Tribune, The San Francisco Chronicle, and U.S.A. Today. Al-Marayati has explicated issues of importance to Americans on television news programs including CNN, PBS, MSNBC, Fox News, CNBC and all major national networks. Mr. Al-Marayati also interviews frequently with the international press.

Heather Boushey joined the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) as a Research  Economist in 2003. Her work focuses on the U.S. labor market, social policy, and work and family issues. Dr. Boushey's work ranges from examining the recent recession and recovery's effects on the labor market and how families balance work and child care needs to how young people have fared in today's economy. She has testified before Congress and authored numerous reports and commentaries on issues affecting working families, including the implications of the 1996 welfare reform. She is a co-author of The State of Working America 2002-03 and Hardships in America:  The Real American Story of Working Families. Previously, she was at the Economic Policy Institute and is now also a Research Affiliate with the National Poverty Center at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy. She received her Ph.D. in Economics from the New School for Social Research and her B.A. from Hampshire College.

Taylor Branch is an author and national authority on America's civil rights movement. He is winner of numerous book awards including the 1989 Pulitzer Prize for Parting the Waters. Branch spent more than 15 years researching and writing Parting the Waters and Pillar of Fire, the first two volumes in his trilogy on the history of America during the life of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. He is currently working on the third and final installment of the King Trilogy, At Canaan's Edge.

Branch has also written for the New York Times Magazine, Sport, The New Republic, and Texas Monthly. He has written and co-written several additional books and has served on the staffs of The Washington Monthly, Esquire, and Harper's magazines. Branch served as Lecturer in Politics and History at Goucher College from 1998-2000. He received a five-year MacArthur Foundation Fellowship in 1991 and the National Humanities Medal in 1999. Branch earned a bachelor's degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1968 and an MPA from Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs in 1970.

Carol Browner served as head of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, a $7 billion, 18,000-employee agency responsible for protecting the air, water and health of our communities. She served as a member of the President's Cabinet for eight years. Ms. Browner, an attorney, is widely recognized for her innovative partnerships with the business community and non-governmental organizations, forging common sense, cost-effective solutions to public health and environmental challenges. Accomplishments during her tenure as Administrator included enacting the strongest-ever national air pollution standards, creating innovative and flexible alternatives to traditional regulatory programs, and leveraging more than $1 billion in public and private funds to cleanup brownfields. Ms. Browner also serves on the Board of Directors for the Center for American Progress.

Fr. Charles Currie, SJ has been the President of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities since August 1997. He began his academic career teaching and doing research in chemistry at Georgetown University in 1966. He subsequently served as President of Wheeling College (now Wheeling Jesuit University) and Xavier University, before returning to Georgetown to direct the University's Bicentennial celebration. In 1989, when six Jesuits and two co-workers were killed in El Salvador, Father Currie began a long involvement with that country which continues today.

Immediately prior to coming to the AJCU, he was rector of the Jesuit Community at St. Joseph's University in Philadelphia, where he also taught a course in Theology and Science. His experience as faculty member, administrator and president at a number of different schools serves him well in a position dedicated to effective communication and outreach, and strong partnerships.

Dr. Bob Edgar is General Secretary of the National Council of Churches USA. An ordained elder in the United Methodist Church, he has been a pastor to United Methodist congregations, a campus minister, and a community organizer. Dr. Edgar came to the Council from Claremont Theological School where he was president from 1990 - 2000. Dr. Edgar is well known for his service as a six-term member of the U.S. House of Representatives, from 1975 to 1987, where he was the first Democrat in more than 120 years to be elected from the heavily Republican Seventh District of Pennsylvania.

An active volunteer, Dr. Edgar serves on several boards including the Independent Sector and the National Coalition on Health Care. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment and the Board of Directors of the Environmental and Energy Study Institute. Dr. Edgar received a Bachelor of Arts from Lycoming College, and a Master of Divinity from the Theological School of Drew University. He holds four honorary doctoral degrees.

Dr. David Elcott is the U.S. Interreligious Affairs Director of the American Jewish Committee. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Psychology and Middle East Studies from Columbia University and is the former Vice-President of the National Center for Learning and Leadership. He is an author, lecturer and organizational consultant, and has worked with numerous communities to create Leadership Institutes grounded in a passion for Tikkun Olam and a commitment to communal change. Dr. Elcott is author of A Sacred Journey: The Jewish Quest for a Perfect World and numerous articles and monographs.

Dr. Elcott has spoken across North America to Christian and Muslim audiences about Israel and to Jewish audiences about Islam and the Arab world. His work with the Abraham Fund produced a curriculum and national program on co-existence. He has worked with German clergy on Jewish-German relations and is presently organizing a visit by German Protestant theology students at Tuebingen to study Judaism in the United States. He is trained in Islamics, is a student of contemporary Christian liberation theology, and has spent years studying Buddhism.

Sister Maureen Fiedler, SL is Host of Interfaith Voices, an hour-long radio magazine show. Its programs offer insightful dialogue on the religious issues that arise through our lives, shape our culture, and influence our public policy. Fiedler has been involved in interfaith activities for a quarter of a century. She has been an active participant in many inter-religious coalitions working for social justice, racial or gender equality, and peace. Her special interests lie at the intersection of theology and public policy.

She has served for 26 years as a co-director of the Quixote Center, a national faith-based justice center located in Brentwood, MD. She is an editor of Rome Has Spoken: A Guide to Forgotten Papal Statements, and How They Have Changed Through the Centuries. Fiedler has been a commentator on National Public Radio and is often invited to discuss church issues on national television talk shows. She is also a frequent public speaker on issues of justice, women's issues and religious reform. She is a Sister of Loretto, and holds a Ph.D. in government from Georgetown University.

Rev. Dr. James Forbes serves as the fifth Senior Minister of the Riverside Church in New York City. Forbes is the first African-American to serve as Senior Minister of one of the largest multicultural congregations in the nation. He is an ordained minister in the American Baptist Churches and the Original United Holy Church of America. Before being called to Riverside's pulpit, Dr. Forbes served from 1976-1989 as Professor of Preaching at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Dr. Forbes is known as "the preacher's preacher" because of his extensive preaching career and his charismatic style. In 1995, Newsweek recognized him as one of the 12 most effective preachers in the English-speaking world.

Dr. Forbes has delivered major lectures at such places as Harvard, Yale, the White House, and the World Pentecostal Fellowship. He earned a Doctor of Ministry Degree from Colgate-Rochester Divinity School in 1975, a Master of Divinity Degree from Union Theological Seminary in 1962, and a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from Howard University in 1957. He earned his Clinical Pastoral Education Certificate from the Medical College of Virginia in 1968 and has been awarded many honorary degrees.

Rev. Brenda Girton-Mitchell is Associate General Secretary for Public Policy of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA (NCC). Prior to joining NCC she was Director of Diversity Relations at Mitsubishi Motors America, Inc. She also served as Associate Executive Officer of the National Council of Negro Women, Inc., and as Associate Executive Director and Director of Government Relations at the American Counseling Association. Earlier positions include service as Legislative Counsel for Sears, Roebuck and Company, Legislative Assistant to Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana, and President of the Indianapolis Education Association.

Ms. Girton-Mitchell is a deacon trustee at Washington, D.C.'s historic Metropolitan Baptist Church. An active volunteer, she has held many national positions, including President of the Women's Lawyers Division of the National Bar Association, President of Women in Government Relations, national Vice President of the National Council of Negro Women and Treasurer of the National Bar Institute. Ms. Girton-Mitchell graduated from Chicago Kent College of Law and has been admitted to the bar in Illinois, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Supreme Court. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education from Ball State University and a Master of Science from Indiana University/Purdue University. Currently, she is pursuing a Master of Divinity at Wesley Theological Seminary. 

Rev. Dr. C. Welton Gaddy is the President of The Interfaith Alliance and The Interfaith Alliance Foundation, and serves as the Pastor for Preaching and Worship at Northminster (Baptist) Church in Monroe, Louisiana. Gaddy is author of more than 20 books and regularly provides commentary to the national media on issues relating to religion and politics. He is the immediate past-president of the Alliance of Baptists and is a twenty-year member of the Commission of Christian Ethics of the Baptist World Alliance. Among his many leadership roles, he has served as a member of the General Council of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, President of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and Chair of the Pastoral Leadership Commission of the Baptist World Alliance.

Dr. Gaddy also served in many leadership roles in the Southern Baptist Church including membership on the convention's Executive Committee from 1980-1984 and Director of Christian Citizenship Development of the Christian Life Commission from 1973-1977. Dr. Gaddy received his undergraduate degree from Union University in Tennessee and his doctoral degree and divinity training from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. 

Father J. Bryan Hehir is the Parker Gilbert Professor of the Practice of Religion and Public Life at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He is also the Secretary for Social Services and the President of Catholic Charities in the Archdiocese of Boston. Fr. Hehir is the author of several publications including "The Moral Measurement of War: A Tradition of Continuity and Change"; "Military Intervention and National Sovereignty"; "Catholicism and Democracy"; "Social Values and Public Policy: A Contribution from a Religious Tradition"; and "The Moral Dimension in the Use of Force".

Prior to assuming these positions Father Hehir served as President and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, the national network of Charities in the United States, from 2001 through 2003. From 1973-1992 he served on the staff of the U.S. Catholic Conference of Bishops, addressing issues of both foreign and domestic policy for the church in the United States. From 1984-1992, he served on the faculty at Georgetown University in the School of Foreign Service and the Kennedy Institute of Ethics. In 1993, he joined the faculty of the Harvard Divinity School as Professor of the Practice in Religion and Society. From 1998-2001 he served as Interim Dean and Dean of the Divinity School.

Imam Yahya Hendi is the Muslim chaplain at Georgetown University, the first American University to hire a full-time Muslim chaplain. Hendi is also the Imam of the Islamic Society of Frederick, and is the Muslim Chaplain at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, MD. He serves as a member and the spokesperson of the Islamic Jurisprudence Council of North America and is an adjunct faculty member at McDaniel College in Westminster, MD.

Mr. Hendi holds a Master's degree in Comparative Religions from Hartford Seminary and is currently working on his Ph.D. in Comparative Religion.  He has written numerous publications on many topics, including women in Islam, women and gender relations in Islam, the coming of the Messiah, and religion and Islam in the United States.  Imam Hendi often visits and lectures at churches and synagogues, has appeared on many national and international television and radio shows as an expert on Islam, and serves on the national and the international interfaith councils. In 2002, he was chosen by Hartford Seminary to receive its annual "James Gettemy Significant Ministry Award" for his dedication to his Ministry and for his work to promote peace building between people of different religions.

Dr. Susannah Heschel holds the Eli Black Chair in Jewish Studies and serves as Associate Professor in the Department of Religion at Dartmouth College. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and taught at Southern Methodist University and Case Western Reserve University before joining the faculty at Dartmouth in the fall of 1998. She is the author of Abraham Geiger and the Jewish Jesus and Insider/Outsider: Jews and Multiculturalism, co-edited with David Biale and Michael Galchinsky.

She has served as the Martin Buber Visiting Professor of Jewish Religious Philosophy at the University of Frankfurt in1992-93, and has lectured frequently in Germany on topics related to Jewish-Christian relations, and on feminism and religion. She is the editor of a classic collection of essays, On Being a Jewish Feminist. Together with Robert Ericksen, she has edited a volume of essays entitled, Betrayal: German Churches and the Nazis. Professor Heschel has spoken on Judaism and the environment at the UN Earth Summit, and on Judaism and population ethics at the UN Conference on Population and Development. She spent the 1997-98 academic year as a fellow at the National Humanities Center, where she was writing a book.

Stephanie Kaza is Associate Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Vermont where she teaches religion and ecology, Buddhism and ecology, environmental justice, ecofeminism, and unlearning consumerism. She also serves as the faculty Co-chair of the UVM Environmental Council. Kaza is a recipient of the 2002 Kroeps-Maurisch teaching award for excellence at the University of Vermont and a $10,000 Religion and Science course award from the Templeton Foundation. A long-time practitioner of Soto Zen Buddhism, Dr. Kaza is Vice-President of the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies and a member of the International Buddhist-Christian Theological Encounter group. She has served on the boards of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship and the Center for Respect for Life and the Environment.

Kaza holds a Ph.D. in Biology from U.C. Santa Cruz, an MA in Education from Stanford, a BA in Biology from Oberlin College, and a Master of Divinity from Starr King School for the Ministry. She is the author of The Attentive Heart: Conversations with Trees, meditative essays on deep ecological relations with trees, and co-editor (with Kenneth Kraft) of Dharma Rain: Sources of Buddhist Environmentalism. Her newest book, Hooked! Buddhist Writings on Greed, Desire, and the Urge to Consume, will be published in early 2005.

Rev. Dr. Bernard LaFayette, Jr. has been a civil rights movement activist, minister, educator, lecturer, and is an authority on the strategy of nonviolent social change. An ordained minister, Dr. LaFayette earned his BA from the American Baptist Theological Seminary and his Ed.M. and Ed.D from Harvard University. He has served on the faculties of Columbia Theological Seminary in Atlanta and Alabama State University in Montgomery, where he was Dean of the Graduate School; he also was Principal of Tuskegee Institute High School in Tuskegee, Alabama and a teaching Fellow at Harvard University.

Dr. LaFayette is a former President of the American Baptist College of ABT Seminary; Scholar in Residence at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change; and Pastor emeritus of the Progressive Baptist Church. He is currently a Distinguished-Scholar-in-Residence and Director of the Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies at the University of Rhode Island. Dr. LaFayette is the Chairperson for the International Nonviolence Executive Planning Board and has been re-appointed by Rhode Island Governor Donald Carcieri as the Chairman for the Rhode Island Select Commission on Race and Police-Community Relations.

John D. Podesta is the President of the Center for American Progress and Visiting Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center. Podesta served as Chief of Staff to President William J. Clinton from October 1998 until January 2001 and was a Principal on the National Security Council. He also served as Assistant to the President, Deputy Chief of Staff, Staff Secretary and senior policy adviser on government information, privacy, telecommunications security and regulatory policy. He has held a number of positions on Capitol Hill including: Counselor to Senator Thomas A. Daschle; Chief Counsel for the Senate Agriculture Committee; Chief Minority Counsel for the Senate Judiciary Subcommittees on Patents, Copyrights, and Trademarks, Security and Terrorism, and Regulatory Reform; and Counsel on the Majority Staff of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

In addition, he founded Podesta Associates, Inc. with his brother Tony in 1988. Podesta worked in the Department of Justice's Honors Program in the Land and Natural Resources Division and as a Special Assistant to the Director of ACTION. He has also served as a member of the Council of the Administrative Conference of the United States and the United States Commission on Protecting and Reducing Government Secrecy. Podesta is a graduate of Georgetown University Law Center and Knox College.

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is Founder and CEO of ASMA Society (American Sufi Muslim Association) and Imam of Masjid Al-Farah, a mosque in New York City. By establishing ASMA in 1997, he created the first American organization committed to bringing Muslims and non-Muslims together through programs in interfaith, culture, arts, academia and current affairs. As Imam of Masjid Al-Farah, he preaches a message of peace and understanding between people and is one of the most sought-after Muslim scholars in the country.

Imam Feisal is the architect of the Cordoba Initiative, an interreligious blueprint for improving relations between America and the Muslim world, while pursuing Middle East peace. As a tireless advocate for an ecumenical solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he served as member of the National Interreligious Initiative For Peace in Washington, DC. He is a member of the World Economic Forum's Council of 100 Leaders and the Board of Trustees of the Islamic Center of New York. He is also an advisor to the Interfaith Center of New York. His published writings include Islam: A Search for Meaning; Islam: A Sacred Law; and his latest book, What's Right With Islam: A New Vision for Muslims and the West.

Rev. Dr. Cherly J. Sanders has been Senior Pastor of the Third Street Church of God in Washington, D.C. since 1997, and Professor of Christian Ethics at the Howard University School of Divinity since 1984. She is the author of over 50 articles and several books, including Ministry at the Margins; Saints in Exile: The Holiness-Pentecostal Experience in African-American Religion and Culture; Empowerment Ethics for a Liberated People; and is the editor of Living the Intersection. She is a graduate of the Sidwell Friends School, holds a BA in Mathematics from Swarthmore College, and a Master of Divinity (cum laude) and Doctor of Theology (in the field of Applied Theology) from Harvard Divinity School. In 2002, she was awarded an honorary Doctor of Divinity by Asbury College in Wilmore, Kentucky.

Rabbi David Saperstein is the Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. During his 30 year tenure as Director of the Center, Rabbi Saperstein has headed several national religious coalitions. He currently co-chairs the Coalition to Preserve Religious Liberty and serves on the boards of numerous national organizations including the NAACP and People For the American Way. In 1999, Rabbi Saperstein was elected as the first Chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom created by a unanimous vote of Congress. Also an attorney, Rabbi Saperstein teaches seminars in both First Amendment Church-State Law and in Jewish Law at Georgetown University Law Center.

A prolific writer and speaker, Rabbi Saperstein has appeared on a number of television news and talk shows including Nightline, Oprah, The Newshour with Jim Lehrer and ABC's Sunday Morning. His articles have appeared in the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Harvard Law Review. His latest book is Jewish Dimensions of Social Justice: Tough Moral Choices of Our Time.

Rev. Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, Ph.D. is the 11th President of Chicago Theological Seminary. She has been a Professor of Theology at CTS for 20 years and was Director of the Ph.D. Center for five years. An ordained minister of the United Church of Christ since 1974, she is the author or editor of eleven books and translator for two different translations of the Bible. Thistlethwaite works in the area of contextual theologies of liberation, specializing in issues of violence and violation. Her works include Casting Stones: Prostitution and Liberation in Asia and the United States with Dr. Rita Nakashima Brock and The New Testament and Psalms: An Inclusive Translation. Her newest work is Adam, Eve and the Genome: Theology in Dialogue with the Human Genome Project.

Rev. Thistlethwaite serves on several boards and committees including Theology Today Editorial Board; Lilly Endowment Advisory Committee; Association of Theological Schools Leadership Advisory Committee; and the Medill Center for Religion and the News Media at Northwestern University. Rev. Thistlethwaite has a Ph.D. from Duke University, a Master of Divinity (summa cum laude) from Duke Divinity School and a BA from Smith College.

Jim Wallis is a speaker, author, activist, and international commentator on ethics and public life. Wallis was a founder of Sojourners - Christians for justice and peace - more than 30 years ago and continues to serve as the editor of Sojourners magazine, covering faith, politics and culture. In 1995, Wallis was instrumental in forming Call to Renewal, a national federation of churches, denominations, and faith-based organizations.

Wallis speaks at more than 200 events a year, offers regular commentary and analysis for radio and television, and teaches a course at Harvard University on "Faith, Politics, and Society."  In the last several years, Wallis has led more than 250 town meetings, bringing together pastors, civic and business leaders, and elected officials in the cause of social justice and moral politics. In 1979, Time magazine named Wallis one of the "50 Faces for America's Future." His books include Faith Works; The Soul of Politics: A Practical and Prophetic Vision for Change; Who Speaks for God? A New Politics of Compassion, Community, and Civility; and Call to Conversion.

Prof. Elizabeth Warren joined the faculty of Harvard Law School in 1992 as the Robert Braucher Visiting Professor of Commercial Law and became the Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law in 1995. She is the co-author of The Two-Income Trap:  Why Middle Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke. Her earlier books include As We Forgive Our Debtors:  Bankruptcy and Consumer Law in America (which won the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award), The Fragile Middle Class, Business Bankruptcy and three leading casebooks.

Prof. Warren is the Vice-President of the American Law Institute and serves on the Executive Committee of the National Bankruptcy Conference where she directed the National Bankruptcy Review Commission's study of federal bankruptcy laws and drafted its report to Congress. The National Law Journal named her one of the Fifty Most Influential Women Lawyers in America. Harvard students voted her the Sacks and Freund Award for teaching excellence. Prior to teaching at Harvard, Professor Warren was the William A. Schnader Professor of Commercial Law at University of Pennsylvania School of Law and also taught at the University of Texas School of Law, University of Houston Law Center, University of Michigan, and Rutgers Law School.