Lisa Thompson has been named the seventeenth president of Union Theological Seminary in New York City. She will begin her presidency on July 1.
Union Theological Seminary is a graduate institution enrolling about 250 students, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Department of Education. Black students represent one quarter of the student population.
Dr. Thompson’s appointment marks a return to Union Theological Seminary, where she previously taught for three years. Most recently, she was the Cornelius Vanderbilt Chair of Black Homiletics & Liturgics at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. Dr. Thompson has also taught at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania.
Grounded in womanist and Black feminist epistemologies, Dr. Thompson’s scholarship explores lived religions, hermeneutical ethics, and the social consequences of religious meaning-making. She is the author of Preaching the Headlines: Pitfalls and Possibilities (Fortress Press, 2021) and Ingenuity: Preaching as an Outsider (Abingdon Press, 2018).
“I am honored to serve as the next president of Union Theological Seminary, an institution with a distinguished history of scholarship and progressive theology,” said Dr. Thompson. “Stepping into this role energizes what most inspires me: contributing to a creation enlivened by just, democratic, and generative ways of being together. I am committed to Union’s future, and the risky-yet-worthy work ahead of us. Together, with the faculty, students and staff, we will be discerning, dreaming, and building, not only for the world we can create today, but for the world we are making possible in the next 200 years.”
Dr. Thompson earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology and communication studies with a minor in religious studies from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and her master of divinity degree from Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. She received a second master’s degree and a Ph.D. in religion from Vanderbilt University.
Why does it appear that the sum total of Dr. Lisa Thompson is steeped in White religiosity from her degrees to even the places she has worked. In lieu of the places where she’s worked previously then she attempts to pontificate about Black American women in the church all the while in deeply embedded White spaces. In my view, it sounds like Dr. Thompson has an acute case of cognitive dissonance of the highest order similar to many so-called Black Academics. I would even venture in saying Dr. Thompson is following in the footpath of the pseudo-Black academic of Michael Dyson by jumping from one Historically White University and College (HWCU) every few years. Further, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that how is it possible to write a book titled “Ingenuity: Preaching as an Outsider” and don’t cite Dr. James H. Cone? Are you freaking kidding me. Then again, maybe Dr. Thompson was not exposed to the Great Teachings of Dr. James H. Cone at those places that were the embodiment of White monoculture. Last, I do find it interesting this article failed to mention that Dr. Thompson’s appointment makes her the first Black American to lead this institution.