Brevard College is honored to welcome The Right Reverend Michael Curry – the 11th Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina and an advocate for social justice – to the Porter Center for Performing Arts Friday, April 24 at 7 p.m.
Bishop Michael Curry’s lecture is titled, “Let Justice Roll Down Like Waters!” The College is co-sponsoring the event with the Transylvania County chapter of the NAACP. A panel of speakers representing the NAACP and Brevard College will immediately follow the lecture. The event is free and open to the public.
“I knew he was destined for great things,” said Brevard College President David Joyce, a friend and classmate of Curry’s while the two studied at Yale University. “I’m excited that the state of North Carolina was able to attract him.”
Curry is the first African-American bishop to lead a southern diocese of the Episcopal Church. In his three parish ministries, he was active in the founding of ecumenical summer day camps for children, the creation of networks of family day care providers and educational centers, and the brokering of millions of dollars of investment in inner city neighborhoods.
During his time as Bishop of the Diocese of North Carolina, Curry refocused the Diocese on The Episcopal Church’s Millennium Development Goals through a $400,000 campaign to buy malaria nets that saved over 100,000 lives. Throughout his ministry, Curry has also been active in issues of social justice, speaking out on immigration policy and marriage equality.
Born in Chicago, Illinois, on March 13, 1953, Curry attended public schools in Buffalo, New York, and graduated with high honors from Hobart College in Geneva, New York, in 1975. He received a Master of Divinity degree in 1978 from Yale University Divinity School.
“Bishop Curry’s address is an opportunity for the people of Brevard to come together to hear one of the great prophetic voices of our time,” said Carter Heyward, an Episcopal priest and retired theological professor and vice president of the local NAACP. “His passion for justice reflects our shared commitments to creating justice and compassion for all people in this county and elsewhere.”