Leadership

Amy L. Dalton, Executive Director

Amy L. Dalton is a faith-rooted scholar-activist who has been deeply involved in peace and justice organizing since age 13 when she served on the Reconciling Committee at Claremont United Methodist Church. Her professional experience spans nonprofit development, publishing and communications, and community organizing. Amy holds a Master of Divinity...

Cathy Burrafato, Library Associate

Cathy brings decades of experience in supporting faith-based and justice-oriented organizations including as the Resource Center Coordinator for the Newton Presbytery Regional Office, the live-in Caretaker of Stony Point Center’s Gilmor Sloan House, and the Administrative Secretary for First Memorial Presbyterian Church. Cathy also has worked as a spiritual director...

Warren Cooper, Video Editor and Media Consultant

Executive Producer, Music Media Ministry

A jazz musician and artistic entrepreneur from Philadelphia, Warren works with CLBSJ on audio visual production and media strategy development. He is the Executive Producer of Music Media Ministry, a multi-media production company focused on the manufacturing and trafficking of positive art that nurtures the movement for justice and peace,...

Sister Sharifa Vernice Meytung, Contemplative Traditions Advisor

Sr. Sharifa V. Meytung is a Catholic-Buddhist lay contemplative practitioner; teacher of young children; haijin (writer of haiku poetry) and an abstract painter. Her spiritual practice is also deeply informed by her ancestral animist indigeneity. She has studied in many community and academic settings, including Catholic Theology at the University...

Matthew J. M. Coomber, Book Series Editor

Associate Professor of Biblical Studies, St. Ambrose University

Matthew J.M. Coomber is a professor of biblical studies and an Episcopal priest. He has served as an activist in various roles, including faith leader, educator, street medic, and as an organizer/director of international conferences on Bible and social justice. His primary focus of research is on how biblical texts...

Hillel Arnold, Website Manager

Associate Director of Archives and Chief Digital Strategies Officer, Rockefeller Archive Center

Hillel Arnold is the Associate Director of Archives and Chief Digital Strategies Officer at the Rockefeller Archive Center. He holds an MA in History from NYU and a MLIS from Long Island University’s Palmer School, as well as a BA in English from Hunter College. Previously, he worked as Digital...

Nicholas A. Johnson, President

Pastor, Raritan Valley Baptist Church

The Reverend Nicholas A. Johnson is a proud native of Newark, New Jersey. An ordained Baptist minister, Nicholas is affiliated with the American Baptist Churches, USA and the National Baptist Convention, USA. Since 2014, he has served as pastor at Raritan Valley Baptist Church in Edison, NJ. Nicholas is a...

Cass Shaw, Treasurer

CEO, The Council of Churches of Greater Bridgeport

Cass Shaw is an honorably retired Minister of Word and Sacrament in the PCUSA. Her most recent call was as CEO of The Council of Churches of Greater Bridgeport, in Bridgeport, CT, where she still lives. After ordination in 1980, Cass served as Pastor of a church in Cape May,...

Dong Hyeon Jeong, Co-Secretary

Assistant Professor of New Testament Interpretation, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary

Rev. Dr. Dong Hyeon Jeong is a United Methodist Pastor and an Assistant Professor of New Testament Interpretation at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, where he utilizes such critical interpretive lenses such as postcolonialism, gender and sexuality, socio-economic, race and ethnicity, ableism, and posthumanism/eco-justice. His book With the Wild Beasts, Learning from...

Elisabeth "Betsy" Simpson, Co-Secretary

Rev. Betsy Simpson is a retired Presbyterian Pastor, having served at the First Presbyterian Church of Glen Cove, Long Island for 17 years until 2016. During her years of active ministry, she led her congregation to become “Open and Affirming” including ordaining a gay parishioner as a ruling elder and...

Laura Gottwald

Laura Gottwald was born into a privileged white family in Georgia, where she was raised in a fundamentalist Baptist church. Her education includes a B.A in English from Georgia State University, a Masters of Religious Education from New York University, and a Masters of Divinity from New York Theological Seminary,...

Ludwig Beethoven J. Noya

Lecturer in Humanities and Theology, Christ College at Valparaiso University

Ludwig Beethoven J. Noya is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Lilly Network of Church-Related Colleges & Universities, and a Lecturer in Humanities and Theology at Christ College, Valparaiso University. Born and raised in Southeast Asia (Indonesia), Noya completed a Ph.D. in Religion (Hebrew Bible) in the Southeastern U.S. (Vanderbilt University,...

Eric A. Thomas

Assistant Professor of Bible, General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church

Eric A. Thomas is an Assistant Professor of Bible at the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church. His research interests include Queer biblical interpretation, Diasporic Studies and Homiletics. Eric is a graduate of Drew University where he completed the Ph.D. in New Testament with concentrations in Africana, and Women...

Gale A. Yee

Nancy W. King Professor of Biblical Studies emerita, Episcopal Divinity School

Dr. Gale Yee is a Hebrew Bible Scholar who has opened pathways for the interpretation of the Bible from feminist, postcolonial and Asian American perspectives. In 2019, she served as the first Asian American and first woman of color president of the Society of Biblical Literature. She currently lives at...

R. Douglas Bendall

Founder and President, The Newark School of Theology

R. Douglas Bendall is the founder and president of The Newark School of Theology, Newark, New Jersey. The school offers high quality theological education to lay persons and inner city ministers in Newark and surrounding cities. It promotes social justice and the development of congregations by providing educational opportunities to...

Thomas E. Boomershine

President, GoTell Communications

Thomas E. Boomershine (PhD, Union Theological Seminary) is an emeritus professor of New Testament and a United Methodist elder. He has been an activist as a biblical storyteller, educator (New York and United Theological Seminaries), author, and community organizer of the Network of Biblical Storytellers, International, and the Bible in...

Laurel Dykstra

Reverend, Salal + Cedar Watershed Discipleship Community

Laurel Dykstra (no pronouns/they/them) is an Anglican priest, environmental activist, and amateur naturalist who lives in the lower Fraser watershed on Coast Salish territory near Vancouver British Columbia. Laurel leads Salal + Cedar Watershed Discipleship Community, a tiny church that worships outdoors and builds skills for climate justice. They have...

Jennifer Henry

Executive Director, KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives

Jennifer Henry is an activist, preacher, and feminist leader. She has served the Canadian churches for close to three decades in national ecumenical social justice and is currently advising the United Church of Canada on the development of their strategic plan. From 2012 to 2020, she held the role of...

Ched Myers

Bartimaeus Cooperative Ministries

Ched Myers is an activist theologian who has worked in social change movements for 40 years. He holds a degree in New Testament Studies, and has authored and co-authored over 100 articles and a half-dozen books, including Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus (1988),...

Hugh R. Page

Associate Professor of Theology and Africana Studies, University of Notre Dame

Hugh R. Page, Jr. is Professor of Theology and Africana Studies as well as Vice President for Institutional Transformation and Advisor to the President at the University of Notre Dame. He holds a PhD in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University.  His research interests include early Hebrew poetry;...

Rick Ufford-Chase

Institutional Advancement Officer, Johnson C. Smith Theological Seminary

Rick Ufford-Chase is a faith-rooted activist and author with a long history of developing popular education tools. He currently serves as the Institutional Advancement Officer for Johnson C Smith Theological Seminary based on Atlanta, GA, and volunteers with the Grassroots Reparations Campaign and Proyecto Faro (an immigrant led advocacy organization...

John H. Elliott

Professor Emeritus, University of San Francisco

John H. Elliott (Dr. Theol., Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität, Münster, Germany) was known internationally for his research on 1 Peter and as a leading proponent of the social-scientific study of the Bible. He taught and wrote extensively on Jesus and the early Church in their historical and cultural contexts during tenures at...

Norman Gottwald

Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies, New York Theological Seminary

Norman K. Gottwald (1926 - 2022) was Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies at New York Theological Seminary and taught previously at the Graduate Theological Union and Andover Newton Theological School. His most influential book is _The Tribes of Yahweh: A Sociology of the Religion of Liberated Israel, 1250-1050 B.C.E._ (1979),...

Mark C. Johnson

Mark C. Johnson served as the first Executive Director of CLBSJ. Previously, he served as the national executive director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation USA (2007 -2013). Prior to that he had a 37 year career with the YMCA, concluding with service on the National Staff of the YMCA of...