Alison Cheek, one of the first female priests in the Episcopal Church and the first to publicly celebrate the Eucharist, died on September 1 at her home in Brevard, North Carolina, according to friends. She was 92.
Virginia Theological Seminary took what appears to be an unprecedented step by announcing that it has set aside $1.7 million for a slavery reparations fund—something considered but not yet enacted by other institutions of higher education that historically benefited from slave labor.
Enslaved African Americans worked on the Alexandria-based campus, which was founded in 1823, and at least one building was built with slave labor. Black students were excluded from attending the Episcopal seminary until the 1950s.