Vocation [in] Disruption
Even broken, we are called. Amidst disruption, there is still vocation. Yet vocation looks different in disruption — and for some of us, our vocation has been or has become disruptive, calling out systemic injustice and widespread harm.
This issue is devoted to all who are living and working amidst disruptions of various kinds, searching for anchors of meaning and purpose in shifting circumstances. It includes a study guide for So That All May Flourish, a new book on Lutheran higher education, and several invited pieces on reproductive rights in the post-Dobbs era.
Articles in this Issue
-
Editorial
From the Publisher: Introduction and Invitation
Lamont Anthony Wells
Wells introduces himself as the new Executive Director of NECU, succeeding Rev. Dr. Mark Wilhelm, and frames this Spring issue as a passionate response to the crises facing higher education amid threats to academic freedom and the well-being of educators.
-
Editorial
From the Editor: Vocation [in] Disruption
Colleen Windham-Hughes
Windham-Hughes introduces the issue’s theme — vocation amidst disruption — previews new features including contributor contact information, a study guide for So That All May Flourish, and invited pieces on reproductive rights, and shares results from the Fall survey of readers.
-
Institutional Focus
So That All May Flourish Study Guide
A chapter-by-chapter study guide to So That All May Flourish (Fortress Press 2023), a new volume by NECU authors that develops the central tenet of “Rooted and Open” and offers discussion questions for use in orientation programs, classes, workshops, task forces, and professional development settings.
-
Reflection
“Miracles are no longer required”—Life Writing as a Healing Tool
Barbara Reul
A music historian and cancer survivor chronicles how a uterine cancer diagnosis in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted her vocation as a university professor, and how writing two open-access memoirs became an unexpected tool for healing body, mind, and soul.
-
Article
The Power of Ritual Action and George Floyd Square
Mary Clare Tiede Hottinger
A California Lutheran University senior examines how George Floyd Square in Minneapolis has been transformed into sacred space through ritual action, and considers what this site of remembrance, mourning, and ongoing struggle for justice can teach us about the power of ritual to unify and sustain community.
-
Reflection
Be Like Jesus: Flip Some Tables
Jessica Easter
Easter argues that the example of Jesus overturning the moneychangers’ tables in Matthew 21 calls Christians not to work within unjust systems but to disrupt them — and that this table-flipping must be done in community with others who share the vision of a world where all are seen, heard, and valued.
-
Article
Necessary Disruptions: Centering Vocation in the Common Good
Erin VanLaningham
VanLaningham previews the forthcoming NetVUE volume Called Beyond Our Selves: Vocation and the Common Good, arguing that vocation, common, and good all need to be disrupted and expanded so that students might arrive at a wider sense of individual purpose and collective well-being.
-
Article
Where Disruption and Vocation Meet: One Path Toward Teaching Reproductive Justice in Challenging Times
Lena R. Hann
Hann recounts how a missed math class in her first college term led her into volunteer work at a feminist abortion clinic and ultimately a career in public health, and describes how she designed and taught a Reproductive Justice immersive term course at Augustana College through the disruptions of COVID-19, George Floyd’s murder, and the Dobbs decision.
-
Article
The Duty to Teach and Restore Bodily Autonomy: Reflections from the Classroom
Cynthia Richards
Richards reflects on a Narrative Medicine course she taught at Wittenberg University in the wake of the Dobbs decision, in which students examined cultural “first recognitions” of the reproductive body and discovered that almost none had ever had a way of talking openly about their reproductive selves — an alienation she calls educators to address.
-
Article
Turning to a Reproductive Justice Framework for Inclusive Dialogue across Differences
Jenny M. James
James makes the case that a reproductive justice framework, rooted in the work of black feminist scholars and activists, gives educators tools to overhaul polarized pro-choice/pro-life conversations and to host inclusive dialogues across differences of race, sexuality, gender identity, and faith.
-
Article
A Reconsideration of the Political Approach to Abortion
Sophia Cruz Ponce
Cruz Ponce argues that the pro-life versus pro-choice binary distracts from the underlying social factors that lead to unwanted pregnancies, and proposes a reframed political approach focused on mandated sex education, free contraception, and crisis pregnancy centers that address the social, political, and economic barriers women face.
-
Article
Take Heart: Is Neutrality Really What We Need Right Now?
Abbylynn Helgevold
Helgevold, an ethicist at Wartburg College, argues that calls for faculty neutrality on abortion in the post-Roe classroom stifle the courageous conversations Lutheran higher education is uniquely positioned to host — conversations grounded in “Rooted and Open” and the ELCA’s 1991 Social Statement on Abortion.
-
Article
Views on Flourishing After the Age of Roe
Caryn Riswold, Mary J. Streufert
Riswold and Streufert reflect on the Radcliffe Institute’s January 2023 conference “The Age of Roe” and argue that the ELCA’s 1991 Social Statement on Abortion and its 2019 statement Faith, Sexism, and Justice offer Lutheran higher education a third way to approach reproductive justice grounded in serving the neighbor so that all may flourish.