Graduate Profile: Amelia (Mel) Shenstone, MDiv '23

How I've Changed  

As someone who enjoys academics but gets frustrated if it doesn't have a practical application, I feel like I've swung like a pendulum between academics and ministry practice. At first it felt like one or the other. Over time, they've become closer together, as I learn to integrate rigorous scholarship with day-to-day ministry in a congregation. I bet my congregants would say my sermons make more sense now! 

Favorite Class or Professor 

I've had many wonderful instructors at HDS: not just faculty, but adjuncts, teaching fellows, visiting instructors (leaders in fields as diverse as reparations activism, neurology of spirituality, and lifespan faith development), and even fellow students in a reading and research course. Among them, Dan McKanan stands out. As an advisor, I couldn't ask for someone more attentive, supportive, and knowledgeable about both HDS and the UU ministerial formation process. As an instructor, I admire his thorough knowledge of his subjects, but even more, the way he continually updates course designs to be flexible to suit varying interests and learning styles. He asks great questions that highlight what is most important about the matter at hand, and why it matters. His eco-theology class was a highlight.

Future Plans

Throughout my time at HDS, I've been on a journey of ministerial formation in the Unitarian Universalist tradition, serving a local congregation as its intern minister. The next step on that path is a hospital chaplain residency here in Boston.