Distinguished Alumni/ae Award
The Right Reverend Dr. Peter Selby ‘66
Visionary for Justice and Inclusion in Church and Society
In an article titled “Risk, Fear, and
Faith”—focused on Britain’s banking system— Peter Selby wrote: “There is no
human event, from falling in love to learning to swim, that does not involve at
some level the overcoming of fear... Therein lies the meaning of the most
repeated biblical injunction, ‘Fear not’: it is not that we are to avoid
noticing what are the forebodings and anxieties that threaten to make fear the
wellspring of action, and as a result to lead us into wrong decisions; rather
it is a call to a proper assessment of our fears and the harnessing of the
inner resources of love and faith to overcome them.”
This reflection has relevance beyond the
contexts and issues originally addressed. Fear is all around us—in the rapidly
changing institutions of theological education, in the wider community of the
church, and in societies concerned with their own safety and prosperity. Since
his graduation fifty years ago, Peter Selby’s ministry has focused on
encouraging and empowering the people of God to overcome fear by harnessing the
inner resources of love and faith.
Perhaps the first clue that his life and
ministry would be characterized by this confrontation of fear with faith was
his decision to leave Oxford and travel across the ocean to study in this
place. Here on Brattle Street he met professors and classmates—likewise following
the risky and faithful call of the gospel—who have challenged each other and
sustained profound friendships across time and across oceans. One of those
classmates, supporting and challenging, across time and space is Jonathan
Daniels.
Peter Selby’s ETS education led him to
answer an even riskier call to travel further west, to the other US coast,
where he pursued Clinical Pastoral Education at none other than San Quentin
Prison. It was a transformational experience that would lead to a life-long
concern for criminal justice and, in particular, for ministry with prisons.
Upon graduation, Peter worked as a curate
in an increasingly multicultural London parish, followed by educational
ministry for the laity, doctoral studies in New Testament, and a canonry in
Newcastle on Tyne. Along the way, he married Jan and raised three children. Jan
undertook a leading ministry of her own. With friends she founded NOW—the Newcastle
Ordination of Women group—meeting, lobbying, campaigning for the change
that is only now coming to full realization with the ordination of women to all
orders of ministry in the Church of England.
Peter Selby was appointed to the
episcopacy during Margaret Thatcher’s premiership, serving the Diocese of
Southwark in south-west London. It was a ministry that required the skill of a
faithful pastor at a time of social upheaval and divided visions for the
nation. After 8 years, he turned his attentions to academe with a fellowship at
Durham University. There he began pioneering work in thinking theologically on
the nature economic debt. His book Grace and Mortgage: the Language of Faith
and the Debt of the World has been cited as prescient of the financial
crisis of 2007.
He returned to church leadership with an
appointment as Bishop of Worcester in 1997, including membership in the House
of Lords—surely not a typical honor for an EDS alumnus. But he used that
position to advocate on criminal justice issues, leading to an appointment by
the Archbishops of Canterbury, York, and Wales as Bishop to Prisons. Notably,
he celebrated the Eucharist in a jail every Christmas Day, sharing the
incarnate love of God with those often forgotten by society. Upon retirement,
he assumed the presidency of the National Council for Independent Boards –monitoring
the treatment of those in custody – both in prison and immigration detention.
Subsequently he has worked with St Paul’s Institute, seeking to engage with the
financial sector of London. His most recent book is An Idol Unmasked: a
Faith Perspective on Money.
As bishop Peter Selby has consistently
combated the institutional fear evident in the Lambeth Conferences’ and the
Church of England’s sexuality-based restrictions on ordination. Instead he has
drawn upon the inner resources of love and faith to argue in favor of marriage
equality in church and society. And he has served as one of two Episcopal
Patrons of the international No Anglican Covenant Coalition, helping to defeat
it in England and across the Communion.
In his first book, Look for the Living:
the Corporate Nature of Resurrection Faith, published in 1976, Peter Selby
wrote: “I have been constantly aware of the debt which I owe to my teachers at
the Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and in particular
to Dr Harvey Guthrie and Dr Lloyd Patterson, whose course on ‘Biblical
Eschatology and the Church’ has continued to offer me a framework of
theological thinking which can move critically with change.”
Bishop Peter Selby, over his long and
extraordinary vocation in ministry, has confronted fear with faith, taken
risks, and stood steadfastly for the gospel, thinking theologically and moving
critically with change. In the process he has broken down barriers and shone
the love of God in the darkest corners of society. For his extraordinary vision
and commitment, for his lifetime of ministry embodying EDS’s historic and
current mission, and most importantly for his embrace of the call to confront
and overcome fear with faith, love, and risk, I am pleased to present Peter Selby
‘66 with the Episcopal Divinity School’s 2016 Distinguished Alumni/æ
Award.
Matthew P. Cadwell ‘99
Co-President
Alumni/ae Executive Committee
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