{"id":48222,"date":"2025-05-21T09:57:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-21T13:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/?p=48222"},"modified":"2025-06-04T13:46:40","modified_gmt":"2025-06-04T17:46:40","slug":"la-reverenda-emma-jordan-simpson-del-seminario-de-auburn-comparte-su-sabiduria-en-el-podcast-leading-theologically","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/resources\/news\/rev-dr-emma-jordan-simpson-of-auburn-seminary-shares-her-wisdom-during-the-leading-theologically-podcast\/","title":{"rendered":"La Rev. Dra. Emma Jordan-Simpson, del Seminario de Auburn, comparte su sabidur\u00eda durante el podcast \"Leading Theologically\"."},"content":{"rendered":"

When the president of Auburn Theological Seminary<\/a>, the Rev. Dr. Emma Jordan-Simpson<\/a>, imagines a world that\u2019s healing, she hears the sound of children laughing.<\/p>\n

\u201cI say that because as a parent, a pastor, an organization leader and a member of the community, I know that when children are laughing, something\u2019s going right,\u201d she told the Rev. Bill Davis during the most recent edition of \u201cLeading Theologically,\u201d which can be heard here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you are pursuing the sound of children laughing, it changes the way you are engaging the world,\u201d Jordan-Simpson said. When she heard her oldest child laugh for the first time, \u201cit changed the way I engaged the world, because that\u2019s the sound I want to hear, and I want to do everything to elevate that sound.\u201d<\/p>\n

During recent editions of the podcast, Davis, the Senior Director for Theological Education Funds Development<\/a> at the Presbyterian Foundation<\/a>, has engaged in conversations on repair, reconciliation and reparations with a number of faith leaders.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the most powerful aspects of the difference that Jesus made was the vision that we could be reconciled with each other and with God, with humanity and with nature \u2014 that it was actually possible for us to do that,\u201d Jordan-Simpson told Davis. As a pastor who has worked with leaders in other faith traditions, it \u201chas been affirmed for me that spirit of reconciliation, that belief in reconciliation, is common to us,\u201d she said. \u201cWe may use different words, but the basic tenets of forgiveness, the ability to address resentment and offer pardon, the atonement, making amends for wrongdoing and damage \u2014 the work of seeking peace \u2014 is indeed work. \u2026 Peacemaking doesn\u2019t just happen. It needs to be pursued and it has to be lived every day.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEven after great harms, it is possible for us to be healed,\u201d she said, \u201cand to remember and learn from the past so that we can work together to create a different future. That is the work of it all \u2014 the work of remembering, of telling ourselves the truth about history, about our past, learning from that not just so we have that as objective information, but because it forms the world we are called to build together.\u201d<\/p>\n

She called that approach to reconciliation \u201ccommon in faith traditions. It\u2019s not unique to Christianity. Sometimes people are put off by the word \u2018reconciliation,\u2019 particularly when your experience has been that you live among those who don\u2019t want to reconcile or who demand reconciliation without accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n

Davis asked: What are those early steps in accountability?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe peace that we settle for is the peace that\u2019s about quiet,\u201d Jordan-Simpson responded. \u201cIt\u2019s about silence and about not acknowledging. It\u2019s about keeping a stiff upper lip and going on. That\u2019s a very fragile peace, because we\u2019re human beings and we\u2019re complex.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rather than a linear process, reconciliation is \u201ca way of life,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s the complexity of our lives that has us at any moment seeking peace or reckoning with our past,\u201d which is true \u201cfor people who have been historic harmers and those who have been historically harmed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reconciliation \u201cis not for the faint of heart,\u201d she said. The first step, a step Auburn Seminary has taken,\u00a0is to \u201cinvest in people\u2019s ability to imagine\u00a0\u2014 to imagine a world where we are reconciled.\u201d At the memorial service for longtime Auburn Seminary President Barbara Wheeler, mourners heard a sermon from Zechariah 8:4-6<\/a>, the prophetic vision of old men and women with staffs in their hands, sitting along the streets of Jerusalem while boys and girls play in those same streets. The vision ends with these words from the Lord of hosts: \u201cEven though it seems impossible to the remnant of this people in these days, should it also seem impossible to me?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s the imagination for a reconciled world,\u201d she told Davis, but \u201chow do we help people to imagine that when we have conditioned people to believe that\u2019s really not possible? It is possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Citing 1 John 3:14<\/a>, Jordan-Simpson said we know we\u2019ve passed from death to life when we have love for our siblings.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo me, that means that reconciliation is not a project for heaven,\u201d she said. Eternal life \u201cbegins now with our love for each other. If we say these words are true, then it absolutely is possible. We have to not just preach that \u2014 we have to live it and understand that it is a way of life, and not just an end goal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"

The Rev. Bill Davis<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

Religious leaders, including preachers, \u201chave to understand that you don\u2019t just preach a sermon. You don\u2019t just tell a story and then you go home. Something happens when people listen to your stories \u2014 to the sermons that you preach and in seminary classrooms where you teach. People do things with those stories and with those theologies. They shape the way in which we create policies, set up communities, and, ultimately, [determine] who gets to be a human being. There\u2019s incredible import on those stories.\u201d<\/p>\n

What may institutions struggle with is \u201cwe want this one magical big blast of a thing that immediately absolves us,\u201d she said. \u201cWe can set aside some money, we can do these things and it will be over and we\u2019ll be done with it.\u201d The truth is, \u201cthe legacies of those past harms are telling us something about the world we have created, and we can\u2019t pay our way out of that.\u201d But \u201cwe can change how we engage this world, and that change creates a new world.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s \u201cnothing we are contending with now that was caused last week. These are the great grandchildren of old wounds, but what we can do is listen deeply to somebody\u2019s story, somebody who\u2019s been ignored,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s not the magic in that story \u2014 it\u2019s the posture.\u201d We ought to be asking ourselves, \u201cWhat am I now responsible for after hearing this?\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked to name one of the best things she\u2019s heard, Jordan-Simpson went back to her experience helping a mutual aid organization deliver groceries in New York City to people who need food. On her initial effort, she was accompanied by the program director, and it started to snow. At one stop, the two carried bags loaded with food to the house of a woman obviously happy to see them. On the way, \u201cI said to him, \u2018Why are you delivering food in the snow?\u2019\u201d Jordan-Simpson said. \u201cHe said, \u2018because people are hungry.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe didn\u2019t say, \u2018that\u2019s my job\u2019 or \u2018they filled out an application,\u2019\u201d she told Davis. \u201cHe said, \u2018because people are hungry.\u2019\u201d With little fanfare or acknowledgement, neighbors were working to get food in the homes of people who needed it \u201cbecause people are hungry, because people are lonely \u2014 not because it\u2019s their obligation,\u201d she said. \u201cThat, to me, is the sign that God is working.\u201d<\/p>\n

The final guest in the \u201cLeading Theologically\u201d series on reconciliation, repair and reparations is the <\/em>Rev. Dr. Bruce Grady<\/em><\/a>, executive presbyter of the <\/em>Presbytery of New Hope<\/em><\/a>. That podcast will drop June 4.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When the president of Auburn Theological Seminary, the Rev. Dr. Emma Jordan-Simpson, imagines a world that\u2019s healing, she hears the sound of children laughing. \u201cI say that because as a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":48223,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[117],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48222","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\/48222","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\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.presbyterianfoundation.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}