Honorary Degrees Awarded at 2015 Convocation

November 12, 2015

Berkeley Divinity School conferred its 2015 honorary degrees on Tuesday, October 20th during the Convocation Evensong.  The three recipients were Carl T. Anderson, Chair Emeritus of the Berkeley Board of Trustees, the Rt. Rev. Audrey C. Scanlan ’03 M.Div, Bishop of the Diocese of Central Pennsylvania, and the Rt. Rev. Kenneth A. Kearon, Bishop of Limerick and Killaloe, a diocese in southwest Ireland.

Born in Dublin in 1953, Bishop Kearon attended Mountjoy School and Trinity College, Dublin, where he studied Philosophy. Following further study at Cambridge and in Dublin, he was ordained a priest in 1982 and served as curate in All Saints’ Raheny and St John’s Coolock before his appointment as Dean of Residence at Trinity College, Dublin. In 1991 he became Rector of Tullow before becoming Director of the Irish School of Ecumenics in 1999, and Secretary General of the Anglican Communion in 2005, the role that he performed until late last year.

Carl Anderson is a retired partner of the law firm Paul Hastings, LLP. He served as Chair of Berkeley’s Board of Trustees from 2007 to 2014 and was instrumental in leading the seminary during its search and transition to a new dean. His wife Betsy Anderson ’97 M.A.R. is a retired Episcopal priest and served most recently as the associate rector for pastoral ministries of St. Matthew’s Church in Pacific Palisades, California.  Mr. Anderson received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and his law degree from the University of Michigan.

Bishop Scanlan was installed as bishop in September. Prior to her election as bishop she served as Canon for Mission Collaboration and Congregational Life in the Episcopal Church in Connecticut.  In that role her responsibilities included financial counseling and strategic planning for congregations, and encouraging and facilitating missional experiments across a diocese of 168 parishes.

At the celebratory Evensong that commemorated Berkeley’s patron St Luke, Bishop Scanlan preached on the evangelists’, and our own, experiences of writing stories of good news. Earlier, Bishop Kearon had given the bi-annual Pitt Lecture on “The Anglican Communion: A Work in Progress.” Dean Andrew McGowan noted that the honorees represented two important aspects of Berkeley’s life, education and governance, in an alumna and a Board chair, and also embodied the global as well as the local realities of the Anglican Communion.

The full service of Evensong and conferring of awards is available here.