Carpenter Foundation Awards $80,000 Grant for LGBTQ+ Peacemakers

The E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation has awarded Hartford Seminary an $80,000 grant to support LGBTQ+ students in the International Peacemaking Program (IPP).

Among the foundation’s areas of interest are programs offering “support to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender persons of faith, or endeavoring to insure faith communities’ understanding, affirmation, and inclusion of such persons.”

The foundation has supported LGBTQ+ students in the past who have completed the IPP. This new gift will allow for future students to participate in the program, which brings emerging leaders with undergraduate degrees from the United States and other countries where there is interreligious tension or conflict to Hartford Seminary for an academic year. With long-established expertise in interfaith dialogue, Islamic studies, and Christian-Muslim relations, Hartford Seminary is at the forefront of training leaders for peacemaking between religions.

Fellows in the International Peacemaking Program study interfaith dialogue, conflict transformation, and leadership skills. They live in intentionally interfaith housing on campus, spend time in local faith communities, and receive practical skill-building training to enhance their capacity as peacemakers.

Past recipients of Carpenter Foundation scholarships include:

• The Rev. Louis Laurens Botha Gaum, ’18, of South Africa, one of a group of Dutch Reformed Church clergy and members who won a high-profile case against the church’s policy on same-sex marriages.
• Megan Strauss, ’19, of Connecticut, who recently completed the Seminary’s Cooperative Master of Divinity program and is now studying at Yale Divinity School.
• Jason Fredlund, ’20, of Connecticut, a Racial Justice Educator and Equity Consultant at Re-Center: Race and Equity in Education in Hartford.