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Today’s Buzz on Wall Street? An Ethical Economy

January 29, 2010

By Nicole Seiferth

An evening reception during the 2010 Trinity Institute conference was buzzing with conversation following the day’s presentations in a more energetic way than your average theological conference. Trinity Institute focused this year on Building an Ethical Economy: Theology and the Marketplace, a topic that sparked lively discussions about everything from capitalism to disease in third-world countries; from the state of the environment to the education of the next generation.

So what were people saying?

Julie Dever, a first time Trinity Institute participant, had a unique perspective on economics and the Church. She is a Trinity Wall Street parishioner and also works for the Federal Insurance Deposit Corporation, where for many years she was involved in closing failed financial institutions. “I consider myself a public servant,” Dever said. “The conference has helped me sort out how the church and theology can play important roles in framing the economic conversation in the future.”

Trinity Institute’s featured speakers were Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury; Kathryn Tanner, professor of theology at the University of Chicago Divinity School; and Sir Partha Dasgupta, professor of economics at the University of Cambridge.

“Money is a metaphor like other things;” Williams said in his opening presentation, “our money transactions, like our family connections…bring out features of our human condition that, rightly understood, tell us something of how we might see our relation to God.”

“The Archbishop set the stage for understanding economics as a human activity,” said Joe Gunby, a United Methodist seminarian from Emory University in Atlanta, GA.

“Each generation wrestles with questions given to us,” added Zachary Thompson, Gunby’s Episcopal classmate at Emory. “Those questions center around what is means to be a human being.”

The conference concluded on Friday, January 29 at Trinity Wall Street and at partner sites around the world. Conference presentations and panel discussions are all available on-demand via webcast on the right side of your screen.

Nicole Seiferth is assistant editor for website and parish publications.