{"id":12122,"date":"2021-09-10T16:27:00","date_gmt":"2021-09-10T20:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/?p=12122"},"modified":"2025-07-18T10:39:36","modified_gmt":"2025-07-18T14:39:36","slug":"las-multiples-pandemias-estan-destapando-lo-que-hay-que-destapar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/resources\/news\/multiple-pandemics-are-uncovering-what-needs-to-be-uncovered\/","title":{"rendered":"Las m\u00faltiples pandemias destapan lo que hay que destapar"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Rev. Dr. Katharine Rhodes Henderson has already announced her plan to transition as president of Auburn Seminary<\/a> in New York City. So when she was asked this week during Leading Theologically<\/a> about the work her soul must have, a famous question posed by the Rev. Dr. Katie Geneva Cannon<\/a>, Henderson was ready.<\/p>\n

It turns out Cannon was Henderson\u2019s preaching tutor in seminary during the late 1970s, helping her to outline the first sermon she ever gave. \u201cKatie and I go a long way back,\u201d Henderson told the Rev. Dr. Lee Hinson-Hasty of the Presbyterian Foundation, who hosts Leading Theologically every two weeks and is Senior Director for Theological Education Funds Development for the Committee on Theological Education of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). \u201cAs I transition from the presidency of Auburn Seminary, I am listening for the prompting of the Spirit as to what work my soul must have \u2026 Ministry has always come to me, often unbidden. I\u2019m not too anxious about the form it\u2019s going to take.\u201d<\/p>\n

Henderson said she got a call last month from another \u201cdear friend,\u201d the Rev. Dr. James Forbes Jr.<\/a>, who asked her, \u201cKatharine, why can\u2019t God just keep a secret a little moment longer?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"

The Rev. Dr. Katharine Rhodes Henderson<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

Hinson-Hasty marveled at the company Henderson keeps \u2014 Cannon and Forbes are two of the top preachers in Presbyterian Church history \u2014 and asked her, \u201cDo you have a superpower I don\u2019t know about?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we all have superpowers,\u201d Henderson responded. Those powers \u201ccome to us naturally\u201d at Auburn Seminary through a group of senior fellows including the Rev. Dr. William Barber II, Rabbi Sharon Brous<\/a>, Sister Simone Campbell<\/a> and others.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think one my [my superpowers], and it\u2019s related to the Spirit, is to see patterns and connections\u201d that may not be so apparent to others, Henderson said. \u201cWe are a national institution now, connecting groups around the country who are working on issues of justice and creating a world where we all belong. One of my superpowers is figuring out who is in that network. Who needs to be called in and for what purpose?\u201d<\/p>\n

Those are tools theological students use in their discernment, Hinson-Hasty said. \u201cWhat is it I have to offer in this moment? What does the world need? You call them \u2018ethical spectacles,\u201d he told Henderson, glasses that \u201cAuburn has helped to create.\u201d<\/p>\n

Auburn Seminary was founded in Auburn, New York, in 1818, three decades before the Seneca Falls Convention<\/a>, the nation\u2019s first women\u2019s rights gathering, was held about 15 miles to the west. While the seminary was heavily involved in the abolitionist movement, it was also founded on land stolen from the Iroquois people, Henderson said, and originally constructed by local prisoners \u201cwho labored, of course, without pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the positive side, we trained women and people of color early on,\u201d she said. Harriet Tubman lived down the street, and a faculty home was used by the Underground Railroad. \u201cContradictory forces, both theological and cultural, have always been at play,\u201d Henderson said.<\/p>\n

When the discussion turned toward transparency, she said she\u2019s been thinking recently about \u201cwhat lies beneath and what needs to be uncovered,\u201d especially as she and her husband discovered \u201ca squirrel issue\u201d behind the walls during a recent kitchen renovation. They also discovered that \u201csnakes are fond of this area as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Adrienne Maree Brown<\/a>, who wrote \u201cEmergent Strategy,\u201d pointed out, \u201cthings are not getting worse \u2014 they are being uncovered, and we must hold each other tight as we pull back that veil,\u201d Henderson said. \u201cIt\u2019s like our renovation: You don\u2019t know what lies beneath until you do the demolition.\u201d As the multiple pandemics have shown, \u201cwhat\u2019s true in our kitchen is also true in our culture. Once you start uncovering things, you can\u2019t go back. There\u2019s not what some people imagine as normal. It\u2019s a time of great turning\u201d for many people, according to Henderson. \u201cIt\u2019s a time full of great possibility and also precarity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those voices we ought to listen to, Hinson-Hasty said, may not be people we know.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhose voices are you missing? It is the voices on the margins that are unheard,\u201d Henderson said. \u201cThe prophetic voice is not necessarily in the pulpit or at the front of the room. It\u2019s the voices on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n

Henderson said her mother, who died five years ago in her 90s and grew up in the midst of racial segregation, couldn\u2019t understand even in her 90s \u201cwhy we aren\u2019t out marching in the streets,\u201d Henderson said.<\/p>\n

Reading thoughtful books on how the uncovering is occurring or ought to occur isn\u2019t enough, she said. It\u2019s also important to act, by organizing, marching or giving money to a favorite cause.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have an untapped potential, a network of congregations,\u201d she said, \u201cpeople we can connect with who are trying to build this world where we all belong.\u201d<\/p>\n

For her benediction, Henderson read the poet Rumi\u2019s \u201cThe Guest House.\u201d It says in part: \u201cThis being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! \u2026 The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

El presidente del Seminario de Auburn dice que debemos \"abrazarnos fuerte\" mientras descorremos el velo de lo que ha estado oculto durante mucho tiempo<\/p>","protected":false},"author":78,"featured_media":12124,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[117],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/78"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}