BRATTLEBORO — St. Michael's Episcopal Church begins a Tuesday series, Lives of Courage and Faith, where participants will learn about four very different and inspiring individuals and find how they respond (or have responded) to various world challenges with vision, imagination, and action.
Some of these individuals are still alive, others have died. Some of these individuals are well-known, others are not. The format of each session will involve a presentation and a discussion and will end with a brief time of worship and prayer in the form of compline, or evening prayers.
Each session will begin with a simple dinner in the Undercroft, from 5:15 to 6 p.m. The program will follow from 6 to 7 p.m., and conclude with the compline from 7 to 7:15 p.m.
The programs are as follows:
• Tuesday, Feb. 23, The Reverend Canon Edward Rodman. Presented by Craig Hammond. Rodman has been “a rare force, sometimes a hurricane, who has made a huge impact on both Craig's life and the work of the Episcopal Church over the past 50 years,” according to a news release. Classmates at the Episcopal Theological School in the mid-1960s, they split off from one another over black power in the civil rights movement and have come back together to share a lifetime of friendship.
• Tuesday, March 1, Joanna Macy. Presented by Jean Smith. Macy writes, “The most remarkable feature of this historical moment on Earth is not that we are on the way to destroying the world, we've actually been on the way for quite a while. It is that we are beginning to wake up, as from a millennia long sleep, to a whole new relationship to our world, to ourselves, and to each other.” Author, Buddhist scholar, and environmental activist, Macy's goal is to help us identify our curiosity, energy, and strength that together we may live out the active hope our world needs now.
• Tuesday, March 8, Greg Boyle. Presented by Mary Lindquist. A Jesuit priest famous for his gang intervention programs in Los Angeles, Father Greg Boyle makes winsome connections between service and delight, compassion and awe. He heads Homeboy Industries, which employs former gang members in a constellation of businesses.
• Tuesday, March 15, Albert Schweitzer. Presented by Karen Guthrie. By age 29, Schweitzer held doctorates in philosophy and religion and was an acclaimed organist, professor and pastor. But earlier he had decided that at age 30 he would undertake medical studies, become a doctor and devote the rest of his life to direct service in Africa. At the age of 37, Dr. Schweitzer and his wife, Hélène, opened a hospital in Lambaréné, Gabon, where he spent most of the rest of his life.