Interview with St. Stephen’s University

St. Stephen’s University is a theological graduate university based in New Brunswick, Canada, and our first Apartheid-Free University. It offers programs in Theology and Culture, Peace and Justice, and Reconciliation Studies, with a focus on community service, peacebuilding, and activism. We sat down with Steve Schallert, St. Stephen’s University’s director for marketing and recruitment, to discuss St. Stephen’s University’s faith identity and its commitments to partnerships with Palestinian institutions. 

Thanks so much for making the time to chat with us! Please introduce yourself briefly and tell us about your community, St. Stephen’s University (SSU).

Steve Schallert (SS): I’m the director for marketing and recruitment at SSU, and I’m based out of Cape Town, South Africa. I’m a community organizer and peacebuilding educator. SSU is a graduate school of theology, peace, and reconciliation based in New Brunswick, Canada. We function in a hybrid model, so we’re a global learning community of faculty and students spanning the entire world. Most of our programs are online, and then we have occasional residencies or study abroad programs that bring people together in person. At SSU we take seriously Martin Luther King, Jr.’s call to institutionalize nonviolence. We seek to help educate the movement, regardless of where people are. 

How and why did SSU decide to become an Apartheid-Free Community? 

SS: Here in South Africa, we know a thing or two about apartheid. Apartheid in all its forms is antithetical to our foundational values as an institution. Our core values are justice, beauty, and compassion, and we seek to operate in that framework at every level, including our pedagogical approach. Apartheid is not just or beautiful or compassionate. It’s unjust, violent, and dehumanizing. The Apartheid-Free pledge really resonated with us, and it echoes some of SSU’s foundational values and stated mission, so it was kind of a no-brainer.  

In terms of actually signing on, we’re a small university that functions as a community and a family. From our board of governors all the way through our staff body, it’s a very conversational and communal space. I think the pledge came to me first, and then I passed it around to our faculty and everyone said, “Yeah, of course.” It was as simple as that.

How have different constituencies on campus, like students, faculty, and staff, responded to or contributed to SSU signing the Apartheid-Free pledge?

SS: Since SSU is already committed to solidarity with the Palestinian cause and we already partner with Palestinian institutions, I don’t think anybody really blinked an eye. We were just happy to be in community with other groups who care about Palestinian liberation. 

How has SSU taken action in solidarity with Palestine? What does that solidarity look like at the institutional level?

SS: A close mentor of mine used to say, “Know where you stand and then go stand there.” Institutional solidarity (which is quite different from individual solidarity) is really important for the fight for justice, especially around Palestine. Institutions in every sector can engage in the movement at a level beyond just the individual, so there’s a fundamental mandate for institutions to get involved. For SSU, the most obvious point of solidarity is our long-standing partnership with the Bethlehem Institute for Peace and Justice at Bethlehem Bible College. We don’t just run courses about Palestine (as meaningful and important as that is), but we want to run courses with Palestinian institutions, and forge meaningful partnerships there. We want to create opportunities for students to learn from Palestinian educators, theologians, and peacemakers. It’s so important that those voices keep educating the movement. One of the most fundamental ways that we do that is through a Master of Peace and Justice degree track that focuses on peacebuilding in the Palestinian context, in direct partnership with the Bethlehem Institute for Peace and Justice. 

Can you describe SSU’s faith commitments and values as a theological institution, and how that identity has impacted SSU’s dedication to the Apartheid-Free pledge?

SS: We’re chartered as a private Christian university in Canada, but the expressions of faith itself within SSU are beautifully unique. Rather than denominational categories, our faculty, staff, and students make a commitment to inclusion and generosity. SSU feels like a melting pot where people can “faith,” or not, in whatever capacity they feel called to, and that looks different in each of our three major schools. The first is our school of Theology and Culture, which is a diverse theological conversation that also studies race, gender, and other major social issues of our day. The second school is the Jim Forest Institute for Religion, Peace, and Justice, which has some theological grounding, but also just as much praxis-based education. For example, I teach a community organizing class within that framework. The third school is our Center for Peace and Reconciliation Studies, which focuses on reconciliation work between settler communities in Canada and their Indigenous neighbors. In that school, faith functions as an affirmation of Indigenous spirituality. Every professor in each school has a completely different theological background. It’s one of the things that keeps me interested in faith, because there’s such a deep mosaic of spiritualities present in our community.

We try to challenge colonial and exclusionary boundaries of Christendom, and to set a deep, open table of welcome to anyone who wants to learn at SSU. We’re also aware of how destructive Christian Zionism and Christian nationalism are for Palestinians. Because of that, SSU tries to take a very active role in challenging Christian Zionism, both theologically and politically. That challenge is deeply rooted within our community’s faith identity.

What are the biggest challenges SSU has faced since the genocide in Gaza began in October 2023, and how have you overcome them?

SS: When you stand in solidarity with any community experiencing violence, those who are pointing the gun at an oppressed community will eventually turn it towards you. Of course those who stand against our commitments to solidarity with Palestinians have pointed in our direction occasionally. But that’s insignificant compared to the grief we’ve dealt with since the beginning of the genocide in Gaza. The grief of watching our friends suffer. For all of us at SSU, the ongoing genocide and the expanding settler-colonial project of apartheid in the West Bank are tied to communities, friendships, institutions, and individuals that we love. That’s especially true for our students in the Palestinian peacebuilding track who have long-standing relationships in Palestine. We’re constantly wrestling with questions like, “What more can we do? What programs or learning opportunities might be helpful right now?” We’ve been trying to deal with that grief as we walk alongside close friends who are facing fundamental suffering.

What else would you like to share with the Apartheid-Free Communities network?

SS: One of the primary questions we receive a lot from people, especially in the past couple years of genocide in Gaza, is simply “What can we do?” And beyond personal commitments like attending protests or participating in BDS, we want people to know that SSU is available to anyone who’s wishing to deepen their capacity to respond to violence and injustice. Our programs are designed not to be disruptive to people’s lives or their ongoing activism. We have options from people who just want to improve their peacebuilding toolkit, to fully pursuing a Master of Peace and Justice. In response to that question, “What can I do?” I also often ask people, “With whom?” These days, more than ever, we need one another. One of the things I love about the Apartheid-Free network is the connections it creates to help draw people together. These fights are long and hard and emotionally taxing. I studied at SSU for graduate school, and it helped me answer that question, “With whom?” One of the great byproducts of a place like SSU is making new friends and comrades around the world who care about so many of these interconnected issues. For those who are interested in taking on the violence of their neighborhood, or the whole world, and need more friends to do it with, SSU is a good place to find some.