Carter Heyward papers, 1967 -- 2017

Carter Heyward is an Episcopal priest known for her impassioned preaching. She is a pioneer in theological circles, specifically in the areas of feminist liberation theology and the theology of sexuality. She speaks on issues including religion, family values, addiction and recovery, and the quality of relationships we establish with each other. Heyward was born August 22, 1945 and raised in North Carolina. She graduated from Charlotte's East Mecklenburg High School in 1963. She received her undergraduate degree from Randolph-Macon Women's College in Lynchburg, Virginia in 1967. She then moved to New York City to begin a B.D. at Union theological seminary, but only stayed a year. Heyward moved back to Charlotte and worked in her home parish, St. Martin's Church, for the next year and a half as a lay assistant. She did all the duties except those reserved for priests while working there. In 1971 she returned to New York and earned a Master of Arts in the Comparative Study of Religion from Columbia University. In 1973 she earned her Master of Divinity at Union Theological Seminary. Heyward received a Ph.D. in systematic theology from Union in 1980. Heyward, called to the vocation of priesthood, was ordained priest on July 29, 1974 (the Feast day of Mary and Martha), along with ten other women. The ceremony violated church cannons and was not officially sanctioned by the church until 1976. In an emergency meeting held at Chicago's O'Hare airport on August 14, 1974, the House of Bishops voted immediately that the ordinations were not valid, calling them "irregular" and restricted the women from exercising their priestly functions. In January 1975, Heyward and fellow priest Suzanne Hiatt were hired as assistant professors at Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She received tenure as an Associate Professor in 1981. As a professor, Heyward's primary teaching concentrated on 19th century Anglican theology, feminist liberation theology and theology of sexuality. She proclaimed the possibilities for women to be priests, for lesbians to be theological and made way for new approaches to connecting the divine to the erotic, to justice, and to challenging boundaries. Her presence as a teacher, priest, activist, speaker and writer have pushed the edges of how feminists think about justice and has challenged the foundations on which 'community' is built.