For more information on giving to the Berkeley Center renewal project and participating in a generous 1:1 match from a current Berkeley trustee, please contact Director of Advancement Jonathan Taylor at jonathan.taylor@yale.edu.
The renewed Berkeley Center is a sign of hope for theological education in the 21st century
The entrance to the Berkeley Center.
On the evening of October 9, 2024, during Yale Divinity School’s Convocation, the Berkeley Center will swing its doors wide open to celebrate its re-opening after a renewal project costing just over $6 million. Supporters across the country, including Berkeley graduates and friends, current and former trustees, dioceses including Texas and New York, and parishes including Trinity Church, New York, have partnered with Berkeley Divinity School to make this vision a reality.
The renovation of the Berkeley Center, Berkeley’s home since the 1970s, is a symbol of Berkeley’s investment in and commitment to the future of the Episcopal Church and to the residential model of formation. Among the smaller number of seminaries working in that mode, Berkeley is the only one working in partnership with one of the world’s great universities.
The Berkeley Center is unique within the landscape of Yale University. The 1910 Mediterranean Revival home is located on historic Saint Ronan Street close to the Yale Divinity School campus. It is home to the deanery and St. Luke’s Chapel as well as to a set of rooms used in the past for student accommodation and other programs. Thanks to the generosity of Berkeley’s supporters, it will now be much more.
The Berkeley Center has long been a significant aspect of life as a Berkeley seminarian. Alumnus Randy Hollerith reflected:
When I was in seminary, the Berkeley Center was “the place”—our home…It was a place to find solace, be with one another, and of course worship and pray. The renewed Berkeley Center renews Berkeley’s commitment to place-based theological education, which has been under threat in our communion. I am grateful for Berkeley’s leadership in our church, and I look forward to a future stay at the restored Berkeley Center.
The Very Rev’d Randy Hollerith ’90 MDiv, Dean of Washington National Cathedral
Worship in St. Luke’s Chapel.
Berkeley will host visiting scholars, bishops, and other leaders in a self-contained visitor’s apartment and three newly remodeled ensuite rooms. While visitors benefit from a space for sabbaticals and other forms of visit to the Yale and Berkeley community, the student population will benefit from their presence. The renewed Berkeley Center has become a place of hospitality for current Berkeley students as well as the wider Yale Divinity School community and anyone seeking continuing education opportunities. What used to be an inaccessible basement is now a bustling garden level with three offices, a student lounge, a study room, a small prayer chapel to complement the larger St. Luke’s, and a 2,400-square-foot patio. Two old kitchens have been transformed into a gorgeous and fitting workspace for hospitality ministers, students who regularly cook Berkeley meals following the Wednesday Community Eucharist and who prepare daily coffee hours following Morning Prayer.
The Berkeley Center will now be a community hub for the Episcopal seminarians at Yale. The Annand Program for Spiritual Formation, which increasingly serves the wider Yale Divinity School community also, will host its programming here. So too the Transforming Leaders initiative, which offers programming to support leaders further along in their vocations, including The Leader’s Way fellowship program, online courses and workshops, and The Leader’s Way Podcast.
Alumnus Michael Curry ’78 MDiv expressed his enthusiasm for the renewal:
The Berkeley Center was such an important space for my own formation. Daily Morning Prayer instilled in me the discipline of a practice; Wednesday community meals imparted the importance of service and fellowship; it was a place where I felt my call to serve God and the church most deeply. I look forward to returning to the restored Berkeley Center and give thanks to God for the next generation of leaders in our church.
The Most Rev’d Michael Curry ’78 MDiv, Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church