Our guest on this episode of Crossings Conversations is the Rt. Rev.  Kirk Smith, Church Divinity School of the Pacific's interim Dean and President, and former Bishop of the Diocese of Arizona. Bishop Smith spoke with us about about deepening the churches understanding of its history while adapting to the need of a changing world to spread the Gospel in the 21st century. He also shared about his own call and his hopes for serving the CDSP community.

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Guest Bio:  Bishop Kirk Smith is the interim Dean and President of Church Divinity School of the Pacific.  He formerly served as bishop of the Diocese of Arizona from 2004 to 2019. Before and after his retirement in 2019, he taught church history courses at the Episcopal Theological School at Claremont, General Theological Seminary, Berkeley Divinity School at Yale, and Virginia Theological Seminary. He served as Bishop in Residence at Berkeley Divinity School at Yale for the Spring term 2021.

Prior to serving as bishop for the Diocese of Arizona from 2004-2019, Bishop Smith led parishes in Connecticut and California, including St James’, Wilshire Boulevard, a large urban multi-cultural and multi-racial congregation which also operates a day school, nursery school, senior housing project and food program. He received his bachelor’s degree from Lewis and Clark College, MDiv from the Berkeley Divinity School at Yale, and PhD from Cornell University.

About the Show: Crossings Conversations is a co-production of Church Divinity School of the Pacific and Trinity Church Wall Street. If you enjoyed the show, please rate and review it on Apple Podcasts or share it with a colleague. You can learn more about the only Episcopal seminary on the West Coast and subscribe to Crossings magazine at cdsp.edu.