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Perspective Magazine Perspective Magazine Summer 2020

Art of Resilience

Two-day event celebrated sustaining forces  in the Latinx community

More than 200 theologians, artists, musicians, scholars and community members gathered for a two-day conference, “The Art of Resilience – Latinx Public Witness in Troubled Times” in September. The sold-out event took place at Perkins School of Theology and Meadows School of the Arts on the campus of SMU. Participants enjoyed an opportunity to interact with outstanding Latinx scholars, local artists and religious and community leaders to reflect deeply on race, gender and immigration as matters of moral and faith concerns, according to Isabel Docampo, director of The Center for the Study of Latino/a Christianity and Religions at Perkins, which presented the program.

The program included an art exhibit hosted by Meadows School of the Arts, a performance by New York Latina playwright Jessica Carmona of her original work, “Elvira: The Immigration Play,” and special music performed by Ars lubilorum, a Latin-American collective of composers, including Marcell Silva Steuernagel, director of Perkins’ Master of Sacred Music program. Speakers included Dr. Fernando Segovia, Oberlin Graduate Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at Vanderbilt Divinity School; Dr. Daisy Machado, Professor of Church History at Union Theological Seminary in New York City; and Dr. Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, James B. Duke Professor of Sociology at Duke University. The event concluded with a worship celebration, with Bishop Minerva Carcaño preaching.