Yale Divinity School Simpson-Hewett Lecture presents
Patrick Gonzales-Rogers, former director and current consultant for the Bears Ears Coalition:
“Honor and Accountability on the Road to Emmaus: Contemporary Native American Communities, Historic Christian Institutions, and Restorative Justice.”
Andover Newton Seminary’s Simpson-Hewett Lecture offers constituents – students, faculty, staff, and friends of ANS – new thinking about historic matters important to congregational churches. Patrick Gonzales-Rogers will offer this year’s lecture, entitled “Honor and Accountability on the Road to Emmaus: Contemporary Native American Communities, Historic Christian Institutions, and Restorative Justice.”
Gonzales-Rogers hails from Hawaii and will incorporate concepts from Hawaiian spirituality into his lecture. A former director and current consultant for the Bears Ears Coalition, Gonzales-Rogers has brought his deep experience on the topic of land conservation to the Yale School of the Environment, Yale Law School, Yale Divinity School, and Andover Newton Seminary as a distinguished visiting lecturer this year. This spring he is teaching a tribal resources and sovereignty clinic hosted by the Yale Center for Environmental Justice.
Gonzales-Rogers, who previously served as senior policy advisor and regional chief of congressional and legislative affairs for the Department of the Interior and assistant general counsel for the U.S. Senate Indian Affairs Committee, was recently named to the America the Beautiful steering committee, which is overseeing $91 million in grants to support landscape-scale conservation projects. At least 14 tribal nations have received grants thus far.
Gonzales-Rogers has devoted his career to understanding and overcoming historic challenges tribal nations face in managing land. Now he is turning his attention to educating students and the wider public about conservation. His lecture will be of great use to any religious leaders and persons of faith considering how to act and speak rightly when acknowledging their community’s history vis-à-vis Native American communities. The hope is that acknowledging and honoring the past will prepare communities to plot a new path of justice for the future.