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.
Dr. Daisy Khan, Founder and Executive Director of Women’s Islamic Initiative in Spirituality & Equality (WISE), discusses how Muslim women’s lives can be improved by connecting them to beliefs that affirm human dignity and gender equality at the core of the Islamic faith. Please post your questions in the comments section on Facebook or YouTube, or email the Reverend Meredith Ward at
The Forum is on hiatus for Labor Day weekend. In its place, join the clergy for an in person conversation about summer vacations and the fall season ahead.
The Reverend Buddy Stallings reflects on the decade since he retired as Rector of St. Bart’s and the state of the world today.
Watch or listen to The Forum from previous weeks below.
In an age of information overload and political polarization, how do we discern what truly serves the common good? CUNY Law professor and St. Bart’s parishioner Ally Coll explores the promises and pitfalls of both evidence-based and...
Art, faith, and science converge in the landscape paintings of 19th-century American artists. The Reverend Meredith Ward explores how artists sought to educate and morally elevate their audience with their artistic skill, until, at a certain...
Reflection, Renewal, and New Year's Resolutions Dr. Patricia Tidwell, PhD, LCSW, a psychotherapist and St. Bart's parishioner, returns to The Forum to talk about healthy ways of approaching a New Year.
For over a thousand years, the song that a pregnant Mary sings while visiting her relative Elizabeth has played a central role in Christian liturgy. Knox Sutterfield, Director of the Florilegium Chamber Choir on the Upper West Side and the...
An Advent Reflection on the Logos Hymn The Logos Hymn in the Gospel of John professes Jesus to be the Divine Word who created the world and in time came into it as the light shines in the darkness. Why did the Divine Word become incarnate and...
Sunday, December 5, 2021 Exploring Dimensions of Spirituality and Dementia The Reverend Lynn Casteel Harper, the Minister of Older Adults at The Riverside Church and author of On Vanishing: Mortality, Dementia, and What It Means to...
The Reverend Canon Stephanie Spellers, Canon to the Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church and Assisting Priest at St. Bart’s, who wrote Radical Welcome: Embracing God, the Other, and the Spirit of Transformation fifteen years ago, takes...
Author Sophfronia Scott shares her deep dive into the private journals of the famous Trappist monk, and the connection she found in his pages that led to her book The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas...
Directly before a liturgical performance of Duruflé’s Requiem by St. Bartholomew’s Choir, Paul Machlin, Arnold Bernhard Professor of Arts and Humanities Emeritus at Colby College, examines the much beloved work, its connection...
Claudio Lomnitz, Professor of Anthropology at Columbia University and author of Death and The Idea of Mexico, provides an overview of the beloved Mexican tradition.
Christianity’s Complicated Origins: Implications for Christian-Jewish Relations Today Jesus himself was Jewish, as were his disciples and the earliest Christians, and yet Christians have often downplayed their Jewish origins. Mary C...
