Date: September 8, 2021
September marks two years since the Seminary announced the creation of an endowment dedicated to the payment of reparations, and the intent to research, uncover, and recognize Black people who labored on campus during slavery, Reconstruction, and segregation under Jim Crow laws. The Office of Multicultural Ministries has created a TEDTalk-style video explaining the work and research behind the initiative.
In that time, the Reparations Initiative has issued 17 payments to members of seven different families, awarded our first reparations grant to a historically Black Episcopal church, and uncovered hundreds of records that shed light on the Seminary’s history and connections to the larger institution of slavery in Alexandria and Episcopal Diocese of Virginia. Yet what we are most humbled by is the opportunity to build relationships with the program’s descendant families.
In July, the Office hosted its inaugural descendant gathering – a luncheon at 1823 for the program’s shareholders and their families. This luncheon, though quite informal, embodied the intangible priorities of our program that focus on community relations and truth-telling. It is my hope that, through the work of this program, our shareholders — the descendants of African Americans whose labor built and sustained this institution — may reclaim a piece of that which was stolen from their ancestors.
Ebonee Davis
Associate for Programming & Historical Research for Reparations
Office of Multicultural Ministries