Smith, R. Drew 1956-

PERSONAL:

Born 1956; married Angelique Walker (a minister); children: Asha (daughter). Education: Indiana University, B.S.; Yale University, M.Div., M.A., Ph.D.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Leadership Center, Morehouse College, 830 Westview Dr. S.W., Atlanta, GA 30314; fax: 404-614-8569. E-mail—rsmith@morehouse.edu.

CAREER:

Baptist minister; pastor of parish and prison congregations; Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA, scholar in residence at Leadership Center. University of Pretoria, Fulbright professor, 2005; Case Western Reserve University, fellow and faculty member in residence, 2007; also taught at Indiana University, Butler University, and New York Theological Seminary. Operation Crossroads Africa, member of executive staff, 1980s; U.S. Department of State, member of Speakers Bureau and lecturer in Brazil, Cameroon, Ghana, Israel, and Turkey; member of advisory board, Pew Partnership for Civic Change, Institute for Church Administration and Management, Calvin College Institute for the Study of Christianity and Politics, and Notre Dame University Center for the Study of Latino Religion.

WRITINGS:

(Editor) New Day Begun: African American Churches and Civic Culture in Post-Civil Rights America, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 2003.

(Editor) Long March Ahead: African American Churches and Public Policy in Post-Civil Rights America, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 2004.

(Editor, with Fredrick C. Harris) Black Churches and Local Politics: Clergy Influence, Organizational Partnerships, and Civic Empowerment, Rowman & Littlefield (Lanham, MD), 2005.

(Editor) Freedom's Distant Shores: American Protestants and Post-Colonial Alliances with Africa, Baylor University Press (Waco, TX), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

R. Drew Smith told CA: "I have approached my writing as an opportunity to contribute to existing knowledge on a matter of considerable urgency within contemporary society: the relationship between religion and social life and, particularly, between religion and public affairs. I have been active in the church for most of my life, first as the son of a minister, and for the last thirty years as a minister myself. Throughout, I have been concerned with how churches connect and, too often, misconnect with the larger world, and I have sought to contribute to linkages between churches and the broader society that facilitate the best instincts of both. Writing is a way to reach across time and space as a voice on these issues."