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Harm & Healing: The Complex Legacy of Christianities in Upholding and Resisting Eugenic Violence

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With a liberatory lens, this talk will address the inseparability of US eugenics from Christianity.  Reverend Jennifer Bailey, of the Faith Matters Network, will explore the unholy alliance between white supremacy and white Christianity to uphold eugenic practices while also revealing the Black folk religion in Christian traditions that has been a site of resistance of these legacies. 

Presenters

  • Reverend Jennifer Bailey

    Named one of 15 Faith Leaders to Watch by the Center for American Progress, Rev. Jen Bailey (she/her) is an ordained minister, public theologian, and national leader in the multi-faith movement for justice. She is the Founder and Executive Director of the Faith Matters Network, a Womanist-led organization equipping community organizers, faith leaders, and activists with resources for connection, spiritual sustainability, and accompaniment. Jen comes to this work with nearly a decade of experience at nonprofits combating intergenerational poverty. Rev. Bailey is an ordained itinerant elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and serves locally on the staff of Greater Bethel A.ME. Church in Nashville, Tennessee. An Ashoka Fellow, Nathan Cummings Foundation Fellow, Aspen Ideas Scholar, On Being Fellow and Truman Scholar, Jennifer earned degrees from Tufts University and Vanderbilt University Divinity School where she was awarded the Wilbur F. Tillett Prize for accomplishments in the study of theology. Her work has been featured on OnBeing with Krista Tippett, CBS This Morning, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and dozens of other publications. Her new book, To My Beloveds: Letters on Faith, Race, Loss and Radical Hope will be published by Chalice Press in October 2021. Rev. Bailey serves on the boards of the Fetzer Institute, the Jessie Ball duPont Fund, and the Healing Trust. She enjoys good food, dancing like no one is watching, and road trip adventures with her husband, psychotherapist and religious studies scholar Ira Helderman and baby Max.