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HDS Admissions: Student Blog

Tag Archives: Events

HDS On the Road

13 Thursday Jun 2019

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Applying

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Advice, Events, Recruitment

Post by: Mikaela Allen, Master of Theological Studies ’19, HDS Office of Admissions Graduate Assistant

Fall is peak recruitment season for Admissions teams everywhere, HDS included. While our full schedule will not become available until later this fall, our office is getting a head start in the Pacific Northwest in late June. If you in the area and want to connect, click here for more details and to register.  

Preparing materials for recruitment. Photo by Mikaela Allen. 
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DivEx: A Year Later

31 Wednesday Oct 2018

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Considering HDS

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DivEx, Events, TED

Post by: Natalie Solis, MTS 2021 

Read on to learn about HDS’ Diversity and Explorations Program as well as Theological Education Day from DivEx alum and current student, Natalie Solis. Please see the bottom of this post for more information about DivEx and TED. 

Solis DivEx photo 2

Natalie Solis, author, in front of Andover Hall, DivEx 2017

Whether you have dreamt about going to HDS for years or are still discerning whether Divinity School is the right path for you, the Diversity and Explorations program is an extremely helpful introduction to HDS. Just one year ago, I was getting ready for DivEx. Now, I am pursuing my MTS with a concentration in Religions of the Americas and working as a Graduate Assistant at the HDS Office of Admissions. DivEx was a crucial part of my journey to HDS. As a first-generation college student and religion major at the University of Southern California, I learned about HDS early in my undergraduate career from professors who attended HDS. Since I am planning to pursue a career in academia, I sought out faculty advice when I was applying to graduate school last year. In speaking with HDS alum and USC Dean of Religious Life, Varun Soni, he encouraged me to apply to DivEx.   Continue reading →

Student Organizations at HDS: Pushing the Boundaries at WomenCircle

19 Thursday Apr 2018

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in Student Life

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Events, Friends, Growth, Spirituality, WomenCircle

Hi everyone! I’m K.C. McConnell, a current MTS student as well as a Graduate Assistant in the Office of Admissions here at HDS. Coming to graduate school, I never imagined that I would be able to participate in student-run clubs and organizations. I thought that most students in graduate school woke up, went to class, went home, and did not interact with their fellow classmates outside of informal gatherings. At HDS, I was pleasantly surprised. Not only does our school have dozens of student organizations, but many of our organizations are extremely active in life around campus.

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Catching Up on HDS Happenings

17 Friday Nov 2017

Posted by HDS Admissions Blog in What's It Like at HDS?

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AAR, DivEx, Events, TED

Hey everyone! Sorry for the break in posts! We’ve had a few amazing events on campus that have kept us pretty tied up here at HDS Admissions. Continue reading →

Inhabiting the Questions of Religion: Seasons of Light at Harvard Divinity School

14 Monday Dec 2015

Posted by David Waters in Student Life

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Classmates, Community, Diversity, Events, Friends, Harvard, Religious Pluralism, Student Life

What does it mean to pursue the study of religion at a place that isn’t aligned with a particular religious tradition? What does it look like when you engage in this study with students from six continents and more than 35 different religious traditions—plus some who have no particular religious affiliation at all? Seasons of Light, our annual multireligious celebration, is part of the answer. The order of celebration for Seasons of Light situates the celebration in the context of our community:

As the nights lengthen and the darkness grows in the Northern Hemisphere, the Great Wheel of the calendar turns once again, catching us up in its low descent. Together we inhabit the promise of holy darkness and anticipate the light’s return. Many religious traditions honor this sacred interplay of day and night in their respective holy days and seasons; most also observe periods of fasting and feasting, often coinciding with a region’s agricultural rhythms of seedtime and harvest. Tonight, we gather to honor the mystery of the swelling darkness around us by kindling the flames of several traditions represented in the HDS community.

Here, I’ve been able to join that concern for literature with an exploration of religion and culture in an attempt to reach for the divine: that ineffable extraordinary which has sparked our imaginations and given shape to our aspirations from the very beginning.

I’d been looking forward to this celebration for weeks. One of my favorite parts of studying at HDS has been the infusion of that study with a sense of sacred purpose. I came to HDS from a small school in southern Maryland where I was awakened to some of the deeper questions that we attempt to answer with the study of literature. Here, I’ve been able to join that concern for literature with an exploration of religion and culture in an attempt to reach for the divine: that ineffable extraordinary which has sparked our imaginations and given shape to our aspirations from the very beginning.

Doing all this in a space that’s at once deeply concerned with religion and religious practice, yet not itself religious, means asking a whole series of fascinating questions—questions that echo throughout the field of religious studies. Can we study religion from within a religious practice or identity? Must we attempt to get “outside” of religion to view it objectively? Is that objectivity even possible? If we feel passionately about religion, how do we express that passion?

Walking into Andover Chapel last week provided some of those answers. Students, staff, and faculty had been gathered in Rockefeller Café before the ceremony for our last Community Tea. Mixing and mingling around tables filled with all kinds of delectable treats, we took a moment from the hustle and bustle of the end of the semester to simply be with each other. To catch up, trade stories, commiserate over the interminable stream of papers, and to share in that measure of comfort that comes from knowing that we’re in it together.

It’s one thing to read about different traditions, but it’s another to have them made tangible: here was a symbol of faith, being illuminated by my classmate whom I’d spent the semester learning and talking and eating with.

Afterward, in the Chapel, the warmth we felt in the Café was manifest in the candles flickering at the entrance. In the middle of the chapel stood a simple altar with the symbols of the many faith traditions represented here at HDS: a seated Buddha, a hanukkiya, the Ikh Omkar of the Sikh tradition, Unitarian Universalism’s flaming chalice, an Advent wreath, and many more. As we gathered, students from each of these traditions made their way to the table to light the candles of their respective faiths. As I watched my fellow students light their candles, I turned to my order of celebration to read about the signs and symbols that I didn’t recognize. It’s one thing to read about different traditions, but it’s another to have them made tangible: here was a symbol of faith, being illuminated by my classmate whom I’d spent the semester learning and talking and eating with. In this moment, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and the Johrei tradition were not abstractions or exotic “others,” but the embodied faiths of people with whom I share a common community. There was the Advent wreath of my Christian faith alongside the Yule Log of Paganism, the Villakku/Diya of Hinduism, and the Arabic Plaque of Islam.

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As the evening proceeded, we sang songs, listened to readings from different traditions, and students and faculty from different traditions performed anthems, chants, and music from their respective faiths. Singing the Hebrew of “Hineh mah tov” in the round brought tears to my eyes: “Hineh mah tov umah nayim, shevet achim gam yachad!” Behold what a good and joyful thing it is, when people live together in unity.

We approach this study of the sacred each from our own various locations and identities, sometimes shaped by a religious conviction of our own, sometimes not.

Here’s the thing about HDS, the study of religion, and our nonsectarian space: One of the things we understand here is that there’s no “outside” space from which we can observe and report on religion “objectively.” We approach this study of the sacred each from our own various locations and identities, sometimes shaped by a religious conviction of our own, sometimes not. In her address “Where We Do Stand,” Janet Gyatso, our Hershey Professor of Buddhist Studies, invites us to consider “Wilfred Cantwell Smith’s insistence that we must be friends with the people whose religions we study, we must come to know, as he says, ‘those qualities of the believer’s life that can only be known in that personal two-way relationship known as friendship.’” This leads us toward the “ability to abide with other people’s religion—not just to study it but also to inculcate ourselves in a common space so as to inhabit the questions of religion together.”

This is what we do here at HDS. This is the beauty and the magic of Seasons of Light: that it allows us to inhabit the questions of religion together, as friends.

10 Tips for Muslim Prospective Students

29 Friday Aug 2014

Posted by Usra Ghazi in Considering HDS

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Diversity, Events, Faculty, Lectures, Muslim, Noon Service, Open House, Prayer, Prospective Students, RSL, Staff, Student Life

Harvard Divinity School students come from an array of different ages, ethnicities, and religious and secular backgrounds. When I first visited HDS on Admitted Students Day, I was delighted to find a diverse student body and especially excited to find a Muslim community here, to call my spiritual home.

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Balancing Your Personal and Professional Life

25 Friday Apr 2014

Posted by Usra Ghazi in Transitioning to HDS

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Community, CSWR, Events, Family, Lectures, Pluralism Project, Work

When I found out that I had been admitted to HDS, I was about to head into an all-staff meeting at work. Upon receiving the news, I could barely contain my joy. I immediately informed some of my colleagues (a couple of them, HDS alumni) who had supported me in the application process. I called my parents, my siblings, and my husband. I thanked God. Then, I headed right back to work. Continue reading →

A Hyper-Stimulating Environment

03 Monday Mar 2014

Posted by Chris Alburger in Student Life

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Classmates, CSWR, Events, FOMO, HBS, HGSE, HKS, HLS, Interfaith, Libraries, Opportunities, Public Health, Research, Resources, Student Life, Theological Education Day, Tours, Work-Study

A bulletin board in the Rock. Photo by Chris Alburger

A bulletin board in the Rock. Photo by Chris Alburger

It’s hyper-stimulating. That’s what I thought, when I visited Harvard Divinity School for Theological Education Day. With all the panel discussions for prospective students, classes to visit, faculty and denominational counselors to meet, and library and campus tours, in addition to the regular events that take place throughout the year, like Community Tea, Noon Service, and events and lectures, there was far more going on than I could possibly do in my 2-day visit. As a student at Harvard for two years now, that feeling hasn’t gone away. I’ve found there’s far more going on here than I can even keep track of, let alone do, in any given week.

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