About the Series

The world is changing. U.S. church membership has been dwindling for decades — and the pandemic supercharged the decline. The world is experiencing extreme weather events like never before. What is a person of faiths role in this ever changing world. Many of us wonder: What is the future of faith?

This year at the Church on the Hill, the Boston Society of the New Jerusalem is hosting a series of conversations in which veteran Boston journalist Christopher Lydon will explore the future of life and faith in Massachusetts and beyond with great leaders and thinkers of our time.

Event Information

Lydon and McKibben will discuss life and environmentalism on Monday, November 21, 2022 at at 7:30 pm. Participants can join either in person or online via our YouTube channel. We are asking that people register for free tickets as our church has limited space.

Directions to our church

CLICK HERE for location and directions via, car, public transportation, or foot.

Virtually

Join us virtually Online, please click this box to visit our live YouTube event.

Host for the Series

Host: Christopher Lydon

Christopher Lydon hosts the WBUR program Open Source, and has for decades been a presence on Boston public radio and television. He has been a reporter for The New York Times, the host of The Ten O’Clock News on WGBH TV, and the co-founder and host of The Connection on WBUR. Photo: Asia Society via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Guests for the Series

November 21: Bill McKibben

Bill McKibben is a former staff writer for the New Yorker, and writes frequently for a wide variety of publications around the world, including the New York Review of Books, National Geographic, and Rolling Stone. Bill McKibben is an author and environmentalist who in 2014 was awarded the Right Livelihood Prize, sometimes called the ‘alternative Nobel.’ His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change. The Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, he was the 2013 winner of the Gandhi Prize and the Thomas Merton Prize, and holds honorary degrees from 18 colleges and universities. Foreign Policy named him to their inaugural list of the world’s 100 most important global thinkers, and the Boston Globe said he was “probably America’s most important environmentalist.”

October 27: Elaine Zecher

Rabbi Elaine Zecher leads the largest congregation in New England as the senior rabbi at Temple Israel of Boston. She is outspoken on matters of justice and liberty, a tireless worker in interfaith partnerships, and an advocate of progressive legislation and policy. She has also served as vice president for leadership of the Central Conference of American Rabbis.

October 13: The Birth of TenPoint: How Boston was Changed

In response to a wave of violence in Boston in 1992, religious and community leaders organized around a ten-point plan to redirect the lives of Black and Latino youth at risk of violence and drug abuse. Three decades later, the founders of the Boston TenPoint coalition join Church on the Hill and veteran journalist Christopher Lydon to discuss the movement’s impact and its future.

March 17: Rev. Nancy Taylor

Rev. Nancy Taylor has been the senior minister and chief executive officer at Old South Church in Copley Square since 2005. Prior to that, she served for five years as minister and president of the Massachusetts Conference of the UCC. As the head of a church that has continued to grow and thrive in recent years, she’ll offer her perspective on the future of mainline Protestantism. Photo: Courtesy of Old South Church

April 7: Andrea Campbell

Andrea Campbell served for six years on the Boston City Council, representing parts of Dorchester, Mattapan, Jamaica Plain and Roslindale. She received the Boston Globe’s endorsement in her 2021 campaign for mayor, and is now a candidate for Massachusetts attorney general. She brings insight into how shifting political and demographic tides will shape life in Massachusetts in the years to come. Photo: Andrea Campbell via Facebook

April 28: Rev. Emmett G. Price III

Rev. Emmett G. Price III is the Dean of Africana Studies at Berklee College of Music and the founding pastor of Community of Love Christian Fellowship in Allston. He hosts on the WGBH weekly radio segment and podcast “All Rev’d Up,” and joins us to discuss the future of faith in America’s Black communities. Photo: Bearwalk Cinema via emmetprice.com

May 12: Fr. John Unni

Fr. John Unni has been the pastor of Saint Cecilia Parish (Roman Catholic) for 17 years, where he has expanded the church’s focus on the health and spiritual growth of Boston’s most marginalized. When not presiding at Mass, he serves the community on the boards of Pine Street Inn and St. Boniface Haiti Foundation. Photo: Courtesy of Saint Cecilia Parish