July Summer Series: Fissures of Hope

July Summer Series at The Riverside Church
Fissures of Hope

Sundays | July 13, 20, 27 | 9:30 AM
In Room 10T & Online via Livestream

Join us for a powerful three-part summer series exploring how hope persists and emerges in the cracks of despair, injustice, and political uncertainty. Fissures of Hope brings together theological reflection and literary insight to help us imagine new possibilities in troubled times.

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Session 1 – July 13
Valley of Dry Bones: The Possibility of Hope in Impossible Times
With Andrea C. White & Ayana Mathis

Session 2 – July 20
Hope Against Hope: Resurrection Hope and Divine Promise
With Andrea C. White

Session 3 – July 27
The World’s Fast Burn: Hope in the Face of Political Upheaval with James Baldwin
With Ayana Mathis

About the Presenters

Rev. Dr. Andrea C. White is Associate Professor of Theology and Culture at Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York, an ordained American Baptist minister, and Theologian-in-Residence at The Riverside Church. Her teaching and research fashion a nexus between womanist theology, Black critical theory, and phenomenology. A sought-after preacher, scholar, and speaker, Dr. White has lectured internationally and across the U.S. on religion and race. She has taught and preached many times at Riverside. She and her husband, Rev. Richard Landers are members, along with their children, Mara and Chloe Landers, who have shared their gifts as violinists and liturgists in worship.

Ayana Mathis is the author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie and most recently, The Unsettled (available in our Riverside Bookstore), which was the inaugural winner of McSweeney’s Gabe Hudson Prize and a finalist for the Hurston/Wright Foundation’s Legacy Award. The book was named a New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book of 2023 and included in year-end best lists from The New Yorker, Publisher’s Weekly, Oprah Daily, and Kirkus Reviews. Mathis received her MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and went on to become the first African-American woman to serve as an Assistant Professor in that program. She currently teaches in the MFA Program at Hunter College. Deeply invested in the intersections of theology and literature, Mathis is a candidate for the Master of Arts in Religion with a concentration in Theology at Union Theological Seminary. Her current work reflects a growing focus on theology of the literary imagination, exploring how spiritual narratives are shaped—and reshaped—through storytelling and lived experience.