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Dramatic performances, open forums, a film screening, scripture studies and other events will be part of the inaugural Religious Awareness Week that starts Sunday, Feb. 27, and lasts through the following Sunday.
“It is a week that can raise the profile within the Lafayette community of the rich diversity of religious traditions and beliefs that are present on our campus, and of how integral religious life is to the goal of educating the whole person,” says John Colatch, college chaplain and director of religious life.
Highlights will include a presentation by Craig Osborne, who runs About Faith, a program that helps ex-offenders reintegrate successfully into society by providing mentors, guidance with resume preparation, job counseling, assistance in obtaining housing, and counseling with family issues. The program also features an After Care Center, a structured living environment that employs resources to help those struggling with crime order their lives through Biblical discipleship and instruction. The program is sponsored by the Bethlehem Christian Training Center.
There will be two presentations of the one-person Holocaust drama Dreadfully Sorry, Guys, written and performed by Claudia Stevens. A reaction to the 1999 California murder of Stevens’ friend Gary Matson and his partner, the performance offers a “reflection on lost culture and diversity.” Stevens has performed at many colleges, theaters, synagogues, and museums, including the Houston Holocaust Museum and the Virginia Holocaust Museum in Richmond.
She has held academic, conducting, and performing arts positions at Williams College, the University of Richmond, and the College of William and Mary. As a pianist and composer Stevens has performed at Carnegie Recital Hall and the National Gallery, served as featured artist on several “Performance Today” National Public Radio broadcasts, and recorded for and published compositions in Perspectives of New Music.
Stevens is a recognized scholar of Robert Schumann, as well as 20th century American music. Manuscripts and documents relating to her career as pianist and new music advocate are in the collections of the Aaron Copland House, New York, and Special Collections at Swem Library, College of William and Mary. She has received multiple grants from the International Theatre Institute as well as the Virginia Commission for the Arts and a special NEA “New Forms” grant, among others. Several of her original works for the stage have been published in the journal Exquisite Corpse.
The schedule of events: