An Evening to Remember

December 7, 2018
Weinstein-Rosenthal Forum on Faith a Dynamic Success

The Office of the Chaplaincy hosted the 32nd annual Weinstein-Rosenthal Forum on Faith, Ethics, and Global Society on Monday, October 8th in the Alice Jepson Theatre of the Modlin Center for the Arts at the University of Richmond.  Some 600 students, faculty, staff, and wider community members were treated to an extraordinary evening of music, poetry, and prose by Carrie Newcomer, Parker Palmer, and Gary Walters. The theme: “What We Need is Here: Hope, Hard Times, and the Human Possibility.” 

Carrie Newcomer is an award winning folk singer.  Gary Walters is an acclaimed pianist.  And Parker Palmer is recognized as a national thought leader in higher education who connects leadership insights and spiritual values to living a life of meaning and purpose.  The evening had three movements: Hidden in Plain Sight, Broken into Wholeness, and How Then Shall We Live

Within each movement Parker Palmer offered spoken reflections on the theme, with Carrie Newcomer and Gary Walters offering musical responses.  At one point, Parker asked the audience to turn to a neighbor and share for five minutes about the sacred experiences that sustain and give us hope, such as friendship, meaningful work to do, causes that we care about, poetry, art, religious communities, and so forth. 

The event concluded with a rousing audience sing-along, followed by an extraordinary reception and book-signing. 

We are so grateful to the Weinstein and Rosenthal families for the gift of this annual forum, and for the hundreds of people who take part each year.  Our community is better because of it. 

Save the date for the 2019 Forum.  Monday, September 23, 2019, “Radical Compassion: An Evening with Andrew Solomon.”  Details can be found here: https://chaplaincy.richmond.edu/programs/weinstein-rosenthal/index.html.