Worth Loomis
Professor of Faith
and Public Life;
Development Director of the Macdonald Center for the Study of Islam
and Christian-Muslim Relations
In
1993 as I was finishing up as president of Hartford Graduate Center
(now Rensselaer at Hartford) Barbara Brown Zikmund asked if I would
join the Seminary to expand its reach in the corporate community and
to teach ethics. During the Fifties/Sixties I had been a
Production Manager in several factories in Ohio and had been heavily
engaged in the Industrial Mission movement (clergy interacting with
workers on the factory floor) in the US and the UK. So I was
pleased at the prospect of again being involved with the teachings of
the Church.
The
glue that makes a good society (and a happy workplace) is a strong mix
of justice, community, and integrity; all qualities common to the
three Abrahamic Religions – the People of the Book. Some of
these qualities can be inherited from the previous generation, but
like all good things they must also be taught. And, given that
most of the world’s catastrophic conflicts are religious in nature,
teaching interfaith relations is also something that must be
taught. Hartford Seminary is one of the world’s leading
interfaith institutions and anything that advances its mission is
exciting work. Try it, you’ll like it.
