“As women, we have to look at ourselves from all directions, from all mirrors, not from a broken mirror,” said Judge Al-Faqih. “If we look at ourselves, as women, from a complete mirror, we will see a complete human being with full rights.”

The panel discussion was the first of a series of talks and presentations about the boundaries and divisions of religion and social justice, all sponsored by Susan as part of a recent gift from her Susan Shallcross Swartz Endowment for Christian Studies.

Susan attended the panel and was both moved and inspired to further action by the speakers. “Our hope and vision is that these conversations will invigorate our understanding of Christian studies by exploring ethics and cross-cultural understanding,” she explained.

Read the Harvard Crimson article.

Which is why she is especially excited to announce a joint venture between the Christian Center of Park City, Jewish Family Services, The People’s Health Clinic, and Intermountain to host a talk with bestselling author and international speaker, Dr. Mark Hyman. Susan hopes that you will join her on Wednesday, March 6, starting at 7:00pm at Temple Har Shalom in Park City for Dr. Hyman’s talk entitled Expand Your Brain, Shrink Your Belly: The Secrets to Boosting Your Brain Power and Losing Fat and Staying Healthy For Life.

Dr. Hyman is the pioneer of an advancing field called functional medicine which views the human body as an integrated system and looks to identify and address the root causes of disease—not just treat the symptoms. This family physician and four-time New York Times bestseller will focus his upcoming talk on chronic disease prevention through nutrition, diet and exercise.

The Details

Who: Dr. Mark Hyman

Where: Temple Har Shalom, 3700 N. Brookside Court, Park City, UT 84060

When: Wednesday, March 6, 2013 at 7:00 pm

How: RSVP via Facebook here

Sundance is especially meaningful to Susan, because of her intimate involvement as a producer in several films about pressing social issues. Both Susan and her husband Jim are founding members of Impact Partners, an organization that pairs independent filmmakers and investors. Over the past years, Impact Partners has produced many Sundance premieres. And 2013 was no exception.

Susan and Jim were thrilled to support a total of six films in the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, which concluded earlier this week. This year’s films included the compelling sports documentary The Crash Reel, and the boundary-pushing Afternoon Delight, who’s director Jill Soloway nabbed the Sundance Directing Award. What’s more, American Promise, about what it means to be a minority at an exclusive school, won a Special Jury Prize, and the immigration murder mystery, Who Is Dayani Cristal? received the Cinematography Award.

But perhaps the film Susan is most proud of is Pandora’s Promise, which Jim produced. The feature-length documentary explores how and why mankind’s most feared and controversial technological discovery—nuclear power—is now passionately embraced by many of those who once led the charge against it. “It is so powerful to see a documentary that fundamentally changes the way you think about an issue,” marvels Susan.

Read more and view the complete selection of Susan’s paintings.

Water Study 001

As women step into global leadership roles in government and business, they have also become driving forces in addressing humanitarian issues, particularly those pertaining to women and children around the world.

Park City resident Jacki Zehner is one of those women whose philanthropic efforts are focused on gender equality. Her organization, Women Moving Millions, challenges other professional women to each pledge $1 million or more to causes related to “the advancement of women and girls.”

But raising funds is just a part of the challenge, she said. Choosing which organizations to support is also difficult, which is why she became involved with the Global Fund For Women.

“I think, how can I pick the change agents in Rwanda or South Africa or Chile. I don’t have that expertise, and to me the Global Fund For Women is that, it is my global philanthropic portfolio manager.”

Last week, Zehner and fellow Parkite Susan Swartz, who is a founder of the Christian Center of Park City, hosted a luncheon highlighting one of the oldest and most successful international organizations devoted to women-led humanitarian efforts, The Global Fund for Women, which will celebrate its 25th anniversary in 2013, and they invited the fund’s Chief Executive Officer, Musimbi Kanyoro, to be the event’s keynote speaker.

Kanyoro, who was born in Kenya, is a former Secretary General of the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) and has participated in numerous United Nations conferences on issues related to women and families.

Kanyoro is quick to emphasize that the Global Women’s Fund is not purely dedicated to a feminist agenda. Helping women to become healthier and more educated, she said, helps everyone in their communities.

She used a Ghanian proverb to illustrate the philosophy that efforts to empower women also benefit their children, their families and their communities. “A bird does not fly with one wing. We African women are never going to fly without men. Our joint work will make more of a difference together,” she said.

Kanyoro singled out the Christian Center of Park City for praise saying she had heard of its work in the community, which includes maintaining a local food pantry.

“I come from Africa and I know what it means not to have food, or to have so little you don’t know if you will have enough for tomorrow,” she said.

While women are making great strides, Kanyoro said, there are still women in dire circumstances in places like Africa, Asia, the Pacific and in Latin America.

“This is the reality of the world in which we work. Somewhere on this planet today, some women will wrap their newborns in brown bags and newspaper and dump them in a latrine or dust bin. Some will try to take care of them but will not have enough to feed them,” she said.

According to Kanyoro, the Global Fund looks for women-led groups that are working on local solutions. “That is what gives the Global Fund its edge,” she said, describing efforts to expose and reduce human trafficking, to stop the practice of genital mutilation, and to ensure women and girls have the opportunity to go to school.

“We might have some people working at the top level making it possible for the international work to be known, but we also have strong leaders who are doing the work in their cities and villages,” she said.

Kanyoro said The Global Fund was one of the first international organizations to take action when the Taliban decided to forbid women from going to school. They managed to channel resources into the hands of women who set up small schools in homes.

Read the entire article at ParkRecord.com.

Susan Swartz’s connection to the transcendent would be apparent even if the acclaimed landscape artist and HDS Dean’s Council member didn’t sign all her paintings with her name, followed by the letters “GTG” (“Glory to God”). That’s because Swartz’s work explores nature as a place where the worldly and the spiritual intersect. The subject may be a forest, a mountain range, or a pond at dusk, but what appears on the canvas is the essence behind the form.

 “Artists are often likened to prophets,” former HDS Dean William A. Graham wrote in a 2011 review of Swartz’s paintings. “When we contemplate Swartz’s abstract visions… ‘revelatory’ does not seem an out-ofplace attribute—whether you find the revelation to be of God’s hand or simply, with [evolutionary biologist] E. O. Wilson, nature’s ‘deeply fulfilling beneficence.’”

 Given the role that faith plays in her work, it’s no surprise that Swartz’s relationship with HDS began with her art. Preston N. Williams, Houghton Research Professor of Theology and Contemporary Change, saw some of her paintings at an opening on Martha’s Vineyard in 2005. The encounter left a deep impression and led to a week on campus for Swartz as artist-in-residence. She says that the more she and her husband, Jim, AB ’64, learned about the Divinity School, the more they felt connected to its work, its mission, and its role in the world.

“Understanding the role faith has had in shaping our nation, as well as the cultures and histories of our world, has been a lifelong pursuit for me and my husband,” she says. “Moreover, business leaders, political leaders,young men and women are all looking for leadership on ethical issues of the day. I believe that the teachings of the major religions of the world are the best place to begin when developing ethics curriculums. These studies are best conceived in a setting as grounded and tolerant as I have found HDS to be.”

Today, Swartz is one of the Divinity School’s most ardent supporters. She says that, as a member of the Dean’s Council, she works with other volunteers dedicated to “keeping the oldest divinity school in the country a relevant and vibrant place of scholarship and reflection.” Swartz says that she’s gotten as much back from her service as she has given, thanks largely to her relationship with former Dean Graham.

“The leadership of Bill Graham was the first indication that this would be a place I could learn and grow, as well as give back,” she says. “Over time, the students and their passion to engage and to serve society have been a source of both pride and hope for me.”

In May 2012, Swartz decided to extend and deepen her commitment to HDS. She and her husband established the Susan Shallcross Swartz Endowment with a $10 million gift that will significantly extend the School’s capacity in Christian studies. Dean David N. Hempton says that HDS will use the funds in the years ahead for faculty and fellowship support, as well as for new programming, such as conferences, interschool seminars, and student field and service experiences.

“Susan’s remarkable gift will enhance teaching and research in Christianity, one of our core strengths, for many years to come,” he says. “The Swartz Endowment will enable HDS to continue to bring to campus the leading scholars and thinkers in this field, as well as the talented students that they attract. HDS is very fortunate to have such a devoted and thoughtful friend, and we are deeply grateful for her support.”

 Swartz says that her reason for giving to HDS was simple: She felt that the School was the place where she could have the greatest impact on a world that seems to become more polarized every day.

“This country and the world are more fractured places, more wrought with extreme interpretations of patriotism, nationalism, and faith,” she says. “I felt that a gift that honored Harvard’s and this country’s founding fathers belonged at the Divinity School. We hope that this gift will inspire scholarship and reinvigorate debate, service, and teaching for generations to come.”

Faced with their own mortality an improbable group of young people, many of them HIV-positive young men, broke the mold as radical warriors taking on Washington and the medical establishment. How to Survive a Plague is the story of two coalitions—ACT UP and TAG (Treatment Action Group)—whose activism and innovation turned AIDS from a death sentence into a manageable condition. Despite having no scientific training, these self-made activists infiltrated the pharmaceutical industry and helped identify promising new drugs, moving them from experimental trials to patients in record time. With unfettered access to a treasure trove of never-before-seen archival footage from the 1980s and ’90s, filmmaker David France puts the viewer smack in the middle of the controversial actions, the heated meetings, the heartbreaking failures, and the exultant breakthroughs of heroes in the making.

Watch the trailer for How to Survive a Plague.

Watch PBS Newshour’s interview with the director David France.

Click here to join Google + Hangout on Monday, December 3 at 8pm EST for World Aids Day.

See other films Susan has supported.

For the past ten years the Christian Center has provided the largest food pantry in the Park City community. Last year, they distributed food to over 34,000 people from Summit, Wasatch, and Salt Lake Counties with food. During the winter months they see the largest need, particularly due to the hundreds of seasonal workers (many who are international) who come to work at the ski resorts.

In addition to this special food drive partnership with The Canyons, the CCPC’s Food Pantry currently receives food daily from eight area supermarkets including two Smith’s, two Fresh Markets, Whole Foods, and two WalMarts. CCPC also receives donations from Windy Ridge Bakery, Deer Valley Bakery, and Talisker just to name a few. The Pantry also received regular donations from area food drives including the following organizations: Utah Food Bank; Community Action of Provo; Park City Boy Scouts; The Wellness Center; Frontier Bank; Park City Academy; Promontory Kids Club; Talisker Employees; RMS Enterprises; Park City REALTORS and Deb Hartley; each of the public schools in Park City; most area churches; and from many committed private family donors.

Food donations maybe left at many locales at the Canyons resort or at the CCPC between 10 am and 4 pm, 1283 Deer Valley Drive, Park City, Utah 84060.

For Susan’s national and international friends, please support a food pantry in your town this holiday season. Blessings are best shared!

One of the environmental organizations Susan admires and supports is the Voss Foundation, which works to provide access to clean water to communities in Sub-Saharan Africa and to raise awareness about ongoing need in the region. The Voss Foundation was founded by the former CEO of VOSS of Norway, the producer of one of the purest bottled waters in the world. “It’s encouraging to see a company make such a powerful commitment to clean water issues,” says Susan. “I hope to see other corporate foundations follow the lead of VOSS.”

What are some of your favorite water-focused charities? Which environmental organizations do you think are making the biggest difference?