The Westminster Seminars offer a dynamic schedule of topics to help us live more fully as thoughtful Christians in today’s world. Everyone is always welcome. Come when you can – no preparation or homework.
The Zoom option makes it easy to catch a seminar if you aren’t at church. For most seminars, you can watch or listen later on the Westminster web page at: Westminster Seminars.
Join Zoom Meeting
The Zoom meeting opens at 9:30.
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86753114914?pwd=UmxkMWF0RUdCT1FoV3AxUlZ4REhtZz09
Meeting ID: 867 5311 4914
Passcode: 209681
March 29; April 12, 19, 26 (The seminar will not meet on Easter Sunday.)
Presented by Richard Norris III, our 2024-25 seminary intern.
Founded by Richard Allen in 1816 in Philadelphia, the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church is the oldest independent Black denomination in America. For more than 200 years, the AME Church has been at the vanguard of the fight for justice and equity in the United States. Congressman James Clyburn once said, “Richard Allen was not looking for religion when he founded the AME Church. He had already found religion. What he and others did in founding the AME Church was, in fact, precipitating a movement. So I always refer to the AME Church as the AME Movement.” In this series, Richard Norris III will endeavor to tell the story of the AME Movement in America and beyond.
The Reverend Richard Norris III is a fourth-generation minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and graduating senior in the Master of Divinity program at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
May 3, 10, 17, 24
Presented by Rev. Dr. Rafael Rodríguez, Professor of New Testament, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
In one of the most beloved scenes of the New Testament, a pious man asks Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” (Luke 10:29). Jesus’ response – as shocking to its original hearers as it is familiar to us – inverts our expectations and shifts our gaze from the potential recipients of our hospitality to ourselves as reluctant hosts. The scandal of the Good Samaritan is not the recipient of neighborly compassion but its condemnable hero. Divine hospitality, it turns out, can come from anywhere, even those we deem unfit for our care or concern. The pious man’s question becomes all the more pathetic in light of the Samaritan’s compassion.
In “Won’t I Be Your Neighbor,” we will explore this inversion of neighborliness across the New Testament canon. From its biblical roots in the Old Testament, through its appearance in the stories of Jesus and his earliest followers, to its place in the ethical admonitions in Paul’s letters, “love of neighbor” emerges as a key indicator of “love of God.” In other words, we will find in hospitality and neighborliness an expression of the love of God. And we will find ourselves encouraged to imitate a God who is love, whose love for us provokes, enables, and invigorates our own scandalous expressions of neighborly love.
Rafael Rodríguez has taught the New Testament for two decades, first among undergraduate students at Johnson University (Knoxville, TN) and then among graduate students at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary (since 2024). His areas of expertise include social memory theory, performance and media criticism of the Gospels, the historical Jesus, and the life and letters of Paul. In August, he and his wife Andrea will have been married for 25 years; they have two daughters: Janelle (a sophomore at Lipscomb University, Nashville, TN) and Josie (a sophomore at City Charter High School, Pittsburgh). They also have two little Shih Tzus who are inordinately, even unreasonably spoiled.
On May 31, Lou Mitchell will return to conclude his series on C.S. Lewis that was interrupted by a January snowstorm.