March 7, 2016
Bexley Seabury, one of 10 accredited seminaries of the Episcopal Church, today announced that Therese DeLisio, PhD, will join its faculty in July as Associate Professor of Theology and Liturgy and Academic Dean. DeLisio is currently Associate Dean of 
Academic Affairs at her alma mater, Union Theological Seminary, New York City. She is a systematic theologian, liturgical scholar, theological educator and an attorney. For seven years, beginning in 2006, DeLisio taught theology, worship, and interreligious women’s studies at Chicago-area seminaries and universities. That period included teaching at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, with which Bexley Hall federated as Bexley Seabury in 2013. DeLisio will assume her new responsibilities at Bexley Seabury as it consolidates from two sites, in Chicago and Columbus, to one campus at 1407 East 60th Street, Chicago, Ill., 60637. Until DeLisio arrives in July, Bexley Seabury’s Associate Professor of Anglican Theology Jason Fout will serve as acting dean.
“All of us at Bexley Seabury are delighted that Therese DeLisio will soon be on board to help us move more deeply into our mission as a single-campus community dedicated to making theological education more accessible, more flexible and more ecumenically diverse,” said Bexley Seabury President Roger Ferlo. “Dr. DeLisio’s scholarship, teaching, ministry in the community, and her imaginative approach to learning technologies and formats are all well-aligned with Bexley Seabury’s values and our path going forward,” Ferlo said.
“I am thrilled,” DeLisio said, “to be rejoining Bexley Seabury in this new position as the seminary begins a promising new chapter in its long history at its new home in Hyde Park. I am excited about the new partnerships, innovations in academic programming, and expanded learning opportunities that this move will help to make possible. I look forward to collaborating with my colleagues, both old and new, to help imagine and to implement new and fruitful approaches to theological education, ministerial formation, and lifelong learning.”
Born in Brooklyn, New York, DeLisio earned degrees at three nearby institutions: M.Div. and Ph.D. in Systematic Theology and Worship degrees at Union Theological Seminary; a J.D. at St. John’s University School of Law in Jamaica, New York; and a B.A. in Psychology at Brooklyn’s St. Francis College. Her scholarly research and writing examine the theological, ethical, and liturgical implications of the contemporary “turn to the cosmos” for sacramental theology, liturgical practice, and creation care from an eco-feminist perspective. She is the author of “Stretching the Sacramental Imagination: A Trinitarian Proposal for a Cosmologically Conscious Age” (Fortress Press, forthcoming) and has written articles and reviews published in Anglican Theological Review, Union Seminary Quarterly Review and other journals.