Each week, guest speakers from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines join the Reverend Peter Thompson and other St. Bart's clergy for deep and insightful conversations about topics that matter to our lives as responsible citizens and people of faith. Speakers in recent years have included winners of the Tony Award, the Emmy Award, the MacArthur Fellowship, and the Pulitzer Prize, professors from prominent universities like Yale, Harvard, Princeton, and Columbia, and journalists from New York, The New Yorker, and The Atlantic.
Sunday, August 2, 2026 Building Bridges Through Dialogue
Emre Celik, Executive Director of Peace Islands Institute, discusses his work promoting interfaith and intercultural dialogue across New York City and beyond.
Upcoming at The Forum
Sunday, August 9 Shapers of The Hymnal 1982
Marty Wheeler Burnett, D.Min., Associate Professor of Church Music at Virginia Theological Seminary, looks back at the process of assembling the current hymnal for The Episcopal Church.
Watch or listen to The Forum from previous weeks below.
Dr. Charlotte Healy, St. Bart’s parishioner and co-curator of the exhibition Willem de Kooning Drawing (currently on view at the Art Institute of Chicago), gives an overview of the exhibition and explores de Kooning’s provocative...
Patrick Bergquist, Chief Program Officer of Episcopal Charities and former staff member of St. Bart’s, returns to talk with The Reverend Zack Nyein about the ways in which the Episcopal Diocese of New York is currently supporting those in...
Wellville: The Long-Term Quest to Achieve Sustainable Equity and Wellbeing
Philanthropist and investor Esther Dyson, reflects on her work as founder/volunteer for Wellville, a 10-year, non-profit project that is helping five small US...
The Reverned Natosha Reid Rice joins in conversation about how we can foster prophetic imagination amidst a city that never sleeps. An ordained minister and lawyer who currently serves as Minister for Public Life at All Saints' Atlanta; and...
St. Bart’s parishioner and accessibility consultant Janina Sajka reflects on how the Church can become a more welcoming place for people with disabilities.
Hospital chaplain Zachary Fletcher shares new and liberative ways of understanding autism and neurodiversity, including through the lens of Christian spirituality. Please post your questions for our speaker in the comments section...
New York magazine senior writer Sarah Jones chronicles the transition some conservative Christians make from pro-life to pro-choice.
Jones has recently authored several relevant articles about moral approaches to abortion:
Anti-Abortion...
As we celebrate our country on this Independence Day weekend, Stephen Lean, Director of The American Family Immigration History Center on Ellis Island, discusses the ways in which immigration has enhanced the nation’s life.
Join us in...
Beloved actress Jane Lynch, currently starring in the Broadway revival of Funny Girl, visits St. Bart’s to reflect on her life as an openly lesbian public figure and share stories from her long and acclaimed career.
In 2021, Juneteenth became America’s 11th national holiday, a day to commemorate slavery and emancipation. Emily Blanck, Associate Professor of History at Rowan University, an overview of the process through which Juneteenth...