Rev. Dr. Angela Parker to Present the Gustafson Lectureship at United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities

Catching God’s Breath
in the Age of #BlackLivesMatter

angela-parker-268x300-1 Dr. Angela Parker
Assistant Professor of New Testament and Greek
at Mercer University's McAfee School of Theology

Monday, October 24, 7:30–9:00 PM CT
On Campus and via Livestream

Come join us for United's Gustafson Lectureship in New Testament Studies, delivered by Dr. Angela N. Parker, assistant professor of New Testament and Greek at McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University. She received her BA in religion and philosophy from Shaw University (2008), her MTS from Duke Divinity School (2008–2010) and her PhD in Bible, culture, and hermeneutics (New Testament focus) from Chicago Theological Seminary (2015). In her research, Dr. Parker merges Womanist thought and postcolonial theory while reading biblical texts. Dr. Parker will speak on the subject of her recently published book, If God Still Breathes, Why Can't I? Black Lives Matter and Biblical Authority.

The Gustafson Lectureship was established to honor Henry A. Gustafson, Emeritus Professor of New Testament Theology at United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities.

Please RSVP. Registration is free.

Please note: Persons on campus need to be fully vaccinated. While masks are not required, visitors should wear a mask in accordance with health risks and seminary policy available here.

Questions? Contact MJ Luna at mluna@unitedseminary.edu.

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Dr. Angela N. Parker

Dr. Angela N. Parker received her BA in religion and philosophy from Shaw University, her MTS from Duke Divinity School, and her PhD in Bible, culture, and hermeneutics (New Testament focus) from Chicago Theological Seminary. At McAfee School of Theology, she teaches courses in New Testament, Greek Exegesis, the Gospel of Mark, the Corinthians Correspondence, the Gospel of John, and Womanist and Feminist Hermeneutics unto preaching.

In her research, Dr. Parker merges Womanist thought and postcolonial theory while reading biblical texts. In If God Still Breathes, Why Can’t I: Black Lives Matter and Biblical Authority, Dr. Parker draws from her experience as a Womanist New Testament scholar to deconstruct one of white Christianity’s most pernicious lies: the conflation of biblical authority with the doctrines of inerrancy and infallibility.

As Dr. Parker shows, these doctrines are less about the text of the Bible itself and more about the arbiters of its interpretation—historically, white males in positions of power who have used Scripture to justify control over marginalized groups. This oppressive use of the Bible has been suffocating. To learn to breathe again, Dr. Parker says, we must “let God breathe in us.” We must read the Bible as authoritative, but not authoritarian. We must become conscious of the particularity of our identities, as we also become conscious of the particular identities of the biblical authors from whom we draw inspiration. And we must trust and believe that as long as God still breathes, Black lives indeed matter.

In addition to her teaching and research, Dr. Parker serves as co-chair for the Paul and Politics Seminar of the Society of Biblical Literature and is a committee member of American Academy of Religion’s Status of Racial and Ethnic Minorities Committee.