Reflections Fall 2004; The Mighty and the Almighty: Foreign Policy and God

8/13/2019 Reflections Fall 2004; The Mighty and the Almighty: Foreign Policy and God

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Reflections


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From the Dean’s Desk


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Contents


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The Mighty and the Almighty:

United States Foreign Policy and God

I have very much been looking forward to this event. As you know, I have

chosen to address the most controversial topic I could think of not involving Mel

Gibson—the Mighty and the Almighty: United States Foreign Policy and God.

To begin, I thought I would honor the tradition of priests I have known who

choose to begin their sermons with a little story or anecdote.


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Anxious About Empire:

A Conversation

with Professor Wesley Avram

Since the fall of , Wesley Avram has served as the Clement-Muehl Assistant

Professor of Communication Arts at Yale Divinity School. He is the contributing

editor of the newly published book Anxious About Empire (Brazos Press, ).

Tyler Stevenson ’ recently sat with Professor Avram to discuss the origination

of this very timely publication and the essays contained in it.


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Partnership in Hope:

Gender, Faith, and Responses

to HIV/AIDS in Africa

Over the past three years I have experienced a new journey, one that is both

marvelous and terrible. It is marvelous because of the companionship, the part-

nerships, along the way. It is terrible because it is a journey into the heart of

the HIV/AIDS pandemic that for now is concentrated predominantly in the

Southern Hemisphere of our world.


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Politics and Salt

Madeleine Albright, Secretary of State in the previous administration, came to

Yale Divinity School on 30 March, 2004, and talked to us on the topic “The

MightyandtheAlmighty:UnitedStatesFor

focus on one part of what she said. She quoted from Vice President Cheney’s

Christmas greeting card, which bore the inscription, “If a sparrow cannot fall to

the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without

His aid?”


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Letters to a Young Doubter

As most Reflections readers already know, Bill Coffin, former Yale Chaplin and

mentor to so many of us over the years, is not well. His body has been weakened

by a stroke and terminal heart disease, but his mind, wit, and spirit still soar.

Credo, a compendium of fifty years of his sermons, speeches and writings, was

published to great acclaim in the winter A major biography by Warren

Goldstein titled William Sloane Coffin Jr.: A Holy Impatience came out

in the spring . But leave it to Bill to have the last word!


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James A. Forbes

When America Can Say,

“I’m Back!”

Today’s sermon is addressed to our nation. What better day to bring a message

to America than on this day when we celebrate the founding of the spirit of our

nation in the profound sentiments reflected in the Declaration of Independence,

July , ? How fortunate for me, the preacher, that the gospel reading is from

one of the most familiar stories in the Bible, the parable of the Prodigal son, from

Luke, chapter .


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The Third World

is Just Around the Corner


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William Lacy Swing received his Bachelor of Divinity degree from Yale Divinity

School in . A career member of the Senior Foreign Service of the State De-

partment, his diplomatic career has spanned more than forty years including five

postings as Ambassador to African countries—South Africa, Nigeria, Liberia, the

Democratic Republic of the Congo (ex-Zaire), and the former People’s Republic

of the Congo (Congo Brazzaville). From – , he was also Ambassador

to Haiti. In October , United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan ap-

pointed Ambassador Swing to be his Special Representative for Western Sahara

with Residence at Laayoune, Western Sahara, a post he held until June .

In May of , Mr. Annan then appointed him as his Special Representative

for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), with the rank of Under-Sec-

retary-General. Recently, John Lindner, Director of Development and External

Relations at YDS, and Jamie Manson ’, editor of Reflections, interviewed

Ambassador Swing at the United Nations building in New York City.

“Ministry” with Societies in

Transition: An Interview with William

Lacy Swing ’


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On Mammon and Manna

In the heat of mid-summer , delegates to the th General Council of the

World Alliance of Reformed Churches met in Accra, Ghana. Several hundred

of us visited the slave castles of the Ghana coast, which for centuries served as

a hub for the traffic of human souls to the Americas. At Elmina Castle, we wit-

nessed a profound spiritual condemnation written in the stone and wood of the

fortress’s architecture: the Dutch Governor, merchants, and soldiers lived on the

upper level, while the people regarded only as merchandise lay in chains in the

dungeons below.


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*

The Last Word: What Does Madeleine

Albright’s Address Say About

the Character of ContemporaryChristianity?

At Duke’s Commencement of , Dr. Madeleine Albright was the commence-

ment speaker and received an honorary doctorate. I always go to commencement

even though Duke cleverly begins the service at on Sunday morning, therebyensuring that students from the Divinity School will not be able to be there. I go

to the mass at Holy Family Episcopal so I can split the difference.


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*


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From the Editor


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Documents

Reflections Fall 2004; The Mighty and the Almighty: Foreign Policy and God