Harvard Divinity School

Meaning Makers of HDS is a podcast by the Harvard Divinity School Office of Communications that explores the many dimensions of human meaning making. In interviews with HDS alumni, faculty, and others, this podcast showcases how members of the HDS community create meaningful lives—through religion, spirituality, faith, and beyond. Each episode features conversations that highlight the deeply personal and diverse ways people wrestle with life’s biggest questions.

In the second episode of Meaning Makers of HDS, airing in Earth Month, we spoke with Aliyah Collins, MDiv '23, an environmental activist and founder of the Eco-Healing Project. Throughout the conversation, Collins shared how her time at HDS inspired her to develop the Eco-Healing Project, how she finds meaning in her pursuit of climate justice, and how she helps HBCUs and their communities find hopeful paths forward after extreme weather events.

Transcript: https://www.hds.harvard.edu/news/2026/04/29/meaning-makers-hds-inspiring-hopeful-climate-action.

Intro and outro music: "Running On Home" by Joel Stewart, courtesy of Universal Production Music.

In episodes 21 and 22 of the Pop Apocalypse, host Matt Dillon welcomes musician and mathematician Robert Schneider. Schneider is the lead singer of the psychedelic pop band The Apples in Stereo, a producer for bands including Neutral Milk Hotel and Olivia Tremor Control, and currently serves as an Assistant Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Michigan Technological University.

In part one, we discuss Robert’s religious upbringing in the American South before exploring the mystical dimensions of The Elephant 6 Recording Co. We touch on the Church of the Subgenius, meditative practices, Krishna Consciousness, church camps, Surrealism, and Sun Ra’s Arkestra, then take a deep dive into how the Beach Boys served as the spiritual and artistic north star for Elephant 6.

Robert Schneider bio

Robert Schneider is a musician, producer, and mathematician. He co-founded The Elephant 6 Recording Co. in the early 1990s, a collective of independent musicians and artists. Schneider is the lead singer and songwriter for The Apples in Stereo, a psychedelic pop band that has recorded seven studio albums. As a producer, Robert recorded and mixed some of the most celebrated albums of the 1990s, including Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane Over the Sea and Olivia Tremor Control’s Dusk at Cubist Castle. He completed his PhD in Mathematics at Emory University in 2018, specializing in number theory and combinatorics. Robert is now Assistant Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Michigan Technological University, where he helps run the Mathematics and Music Lab.

What does it mean to live out faith in a moment when human dignity feels under pressure? In this episode of the Harvard Religion Beat, host Jonathan Beasley speaks with the Rev. Kelly Brown Douglas—Episcopal priest, author, and professor at Harvard Divinity School—about moral imagination, sacred dignity, and the role of faith in public life. Drawing on her scholarship and ministry, Douglas reflects on justice, hope, and why she believes "hope is not a noun—it’s a verb."

Full transcript: https://www.hds.harvard.edu/news/2026/03/18/role-faith-social-movements-kelly-brown-douglas

This week we sat down with MRPL candidate Amy Brenneman to talk about her coming back to Harvard, writing the unknowns in a creative life, and hope in action.

This week we spoke with MDiv candidate Leah Gawel about the intersections of the arts, religious trauma, and the healing and empowering transformations we can bear witness to.

For Pop Apocalypse Episode 20, Host Matthew Dillon welcomes actress, writer, producer, and activist Amy Brenneman. After earning her BA in the Comparative Study of Religion at Harvard, Amy went on to a successful acting career, with star turns in the film Heat and in television shows including The Leftovers, The Old Man, and Judging Amy (which she also wrote and produced). In this wide-ranging conversation, Amy and Matthew explore how the craft of acting, the study of religion, the practice of Jungian dreamwork, and decades of practicing active imagination have enriched one another throughout her career. They discuss the similarities between ritual and acting and how a background in comparative religion helped Amy write, build, and inhabit characters. Amy also shares what helped bring a mythic and numinous dimension to roles like Laurie Garvey in The Leftovers. They conclude by discussing Amy’s current experience as a master’s student at Harvard Divinity School and her research into the politics and possibilities of the Trickster.

BIO:

Amy Brenneman is an American actress, producer, writer, and political activist. She is known for multiple award-winning television roles, including Judging Amy (which she wrote and produced), NYPD Blue, Frasier, Heartbeat (executive producer), VEEP, and The Leftovers, as well as movie roles in Heat, Casper, Friends and Neighbors, and The Jane Austen Book Club. She was a founding member of the social justice-focused Cornerstone Theater Company and has performed in many notable theaters around the country. She starred in the world premieres of the Pulitzer Prize-nominated Rapture Blister Burn and Fake It Until You Make It, and starred in The Sound Inside, which the Los Angeles Times named one of the year’s best performances. Amy has been honored by multiple activist organizations and currently serves on the Creative Council for the Center for Reproductive Rights. Amy earned a BA in the Comparative Study of Religion at Harvard University and is currently pursuing an MDiv at Harvard, researching the role of the Trickster archetype in ritual and activism.

This week we're joined by Jamie Feinberg, MDiv candidate, for a conversation about surrendering to the pursuit of our passions, finding systems of faith that work for and challenge us, and the continual process of becoming our most authentic selves.

This week we sat down with fellow second year MDiv candidate Julia Jackson to talk about the ways hope and mortality are tied together, about the power of reading, and about the promise of otherwise.

In this long read from Harvard Divinity Bulletin, author and educator Sarabinh Levy-Brightman starts treating sleep as worthy of attention and cultivation as any other soulful domain. As a result, she experiences shifting energies and curious moments of insight.

This special audio version of "Sacred Sleep of the Wandering Fool" is narrated by Sarabinh Levy-Brightman and appears in the Autumn/Winter 2025 issue of Harvard Divinity Bulletin.

Read or follow along on the Harvard Divinity Bulletin website: https://bulletin.hds.harvard.edu/sacred-sleep-of-the-wandering-fool/

Meaning Makers of HDS is a new podcast by the Harvard Divinity School Office of Communications that explores the many dimensions of human meaning making. In interviews with HDS alumni, faculty, and others, this podcast showcases how members of the HDS community create meaningful lives—through religion, spirituality, faith, and beyond. Each episode features conversations that highlight the deeply personal and diverse ways people wrestle with life’s biggest questions. 

In the first episode of Meaning Makers of HDS, we spoke with two HDS alumni serving their communities as chaplains: Maytal Saltiel, MDiv '12, and Ailya Vajid, MTS '11. Throughout the conversation, Saltiel and Vajid discussed their respective understandings of the chaplain's role, how through the chaplain's sacred work of presence they help others find meaning across the spectrum of life experiences, and how they personally make meaning in their own lives.

Full transcript: https://www.hds.harvard.edu/news/2026/01/27/meaning-makers-hds-sacred-work-presence

Intro and outro music: "Morning in the Mountains," by Michael William Murray, courtesy of Extreme Production Music USA