Convocation presented by State Department’s Shaun Casey

Former head of the State Department’s Office of Religion and Global Affairs Shaun Casey will present Carleton College’s weekly convocation on Friday, January 18 from 10:50 to 11:50 a.m. in the Skinner Memorial Chapel. In his presentation, Casey will examine ethics, international politics, and diplomacy in order to answer the question, “Can Government and Religion Build Peace Together?”

Carleton convocations are free and open to the public. They are recorded and archived for online viewing here.

During the Obama administration, Casey became the inaugural director of the State Department’s Office of Religion and Global Affairs. Reporting directly to then-Secretary of State John Kerry, he supervised a staff of 30 experts working at the intersection of religion and American diplomacy.

Conventionally, U.S. Foreign Service officers are well-versed in the language, politics, economics and history, but are often times vulnerable in the field of religion. Casey worked to increase the capacity of the State Department around the world to sense religious dynamics, and revolutionized the way Foreign Service officers approached religion in the field.

Currently, Casey is the director of the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs at Georgetown University, an academic research center that promotes peace by training a new generation of leaders to understand and address global issues such as peace, poverty, climate change, and human rights. 

Prior to his role in the State Department, Casey served as a professor at the Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. He has written on the ethics of the war in Iraq, as well as the role of religion in American presidential elections.

Casey holds an undergraduate degree from Abilene Christian University, a MA in public administration from the Harvard Kennedy School, and a Master of Divinity and Th.D. in theology from the Harvard Divinity School.

This event is sponsored by Carleton College Convocations. For more information, including disability accommodations, call (507) 222-4308. The Skinner Memorial Chapel is located at First and College Streets in Northfield.