Commencement/Convocation

Susan Shallcross Swartz Professor of the Practice of Christian Studies Stephanie Paulsell was the faculty speaker during the Multireligious Commencement Service on May 24, 2017. Below are her remarks: Professor Walton, Dean Hempton, dear colleagues...

Margaux Fitoussi’s world has changed before her eyes more than once. Born in France, she lived in Paris until she was 7, when her parents—she an American dancer and he a doctor of Tunisian origin—divorced. Next was a home on the edge of the ocean in Long...

Seriously and joyfully, HDS began the academic year, and celebration of its bicentennial year, with images and words that looked back with candor and respect and simultaneously propagated enthusiasm for the school’s colorfully bannered mission to...

A panel of HDS faculty launches the bicentennial of HDS by discussing the outcome of the 200-year history of the School: a multireligious divinity school. Audio

On August 30, former HDS Dean George Rupp delivered the 2016 Convocation address in which he encouraged HDS to focus on three areas of strength as it enters its third century. Harvard University President Drew Faust offered welcoming remarks. Audio...

After reflecting on the formation of Harvard Divinity School in 1816, Harvard President Drew Faust looked out to the crowd of HDS faculty, students, staff, and friends gathered on the Campus Green and told them that their community not only embodies the...

On August 30, George Rupp, former Dean of Harvard Divinity School, will deliver the keynote address during the School’s Convocation. The event, during which Harvard President Drew Faust will offer an introduction, also marks the kickoff to HDS’s...

Graduating HDS students, their families, faculty, and staff participated in the 2016 Multireligious Commencement Service on May 25, 2016. Kimberley C. Patton, Professor of the Comparative and Historical Study of Religion, gave the faculty address. Listen...

Professor Francis X. Clooney, S.J., director of the Center for the Study of World Religions, writes about John O'Malley, S.J., who was awarded a Centennial Medal by the Harvard Alumni Association.

Reverent and self-deprecating —but always eclectic—Harvard Divinity School's Multireligious Commencement Service might well have been the loftiest, and yet the least pompous, celebration on the University's calendar.