[Church Divinity School of the Pacific] The Rev. Ruth Meyers, Ph.D., will be the new Dean of Academic Affairs at Church Divinity School of the Pacific beginning in the 2012-13 academic year, CDSP President and Dean the Very Rev.W. Mark Richardson, Ph.D., announced Jan. 17.

Meyers, the Hodges-Haynes Professor of Liturgics at CDSP since 2009, on July 1 will succeed the Rev. Linda Clader, Ph.D., who has been Dean of Academic Affairs, the top academic position at the Episcopal seminary, since 2002. Clader is retiring from herdean position, but will continue her CDSP teaching duties as Professor of Homiletics.

Meyers is a New Jersey native who has served as a parish priest in North Carolina and Michigan. She earned her M.A. and Ph.D. in liturgical studies from the University of Notre Dame and her M.Div. from Seabury-Western Theological Seminary.

Meyers currently chairs the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music for the Episcopal Church. She is a former Academic Dean at Seabury-Western, where she taught for 14 years. She also is on the core doctoral faculty of the Graduate Theological Union, of which CDSP was a founding member.

“Ruth will bring to this position not only this past experience as a dean, but also her wide knowledge and background of leadership in the Episcopal Church, and her extensive experience in theological education as a Professor of Liturgy,” said Richardson, in announcing her appointment. “I am confident that she will make a significant contribution during this important time in the life of CDSP.”

Meyers’ most recent publication was a book in the Canterbury Studies in Anglicanism series (Canterbury Press, 2010) that she co-edited with Paul Gibson, Worship-Shaped Life: Liturgical Formation and the People of God.

Richardson praised Clader, a CDSP alumna, for her decade of leadership as Dean of Academic Affairs. As dean, she successfully managed two accreditation reviews, and grew institutional and academic connections with the Graduate Theological Union and its member schools and centers.

“Linda understood how the contributions of our faculty to the GTU and its additional academic resources add value for our students and CDSP courses,” said Richardson. “She has carefully cultivated the development of our GTU relationships among faculty and the institutions.”

Clader is a Chicago-area native who studied classical languages at Carleton College and Harvard University, where she earned a Ph.D. in Classical Philology. After teaching classical languages at Carleton, she received her M.Div. from CDSP in 1988 and was ordained priest in 1989. She has been teaching at CDSP since 1991.

About Church Divinity School of the Pacific (CDSP)

Church Divinity School of the Pacific (CDSP) is a seminary of the Episcopal Church and founding member of the Graduate Theological Union. Women and men come to its Berkeley, California, campus to prepare theologically and spiritually for innovative leadership in the Church and the world.

Founded in 1893, CDSP offers post-graduate courses and graduate degree programs forstudents pursuing a variety of lay and ordained careers and is committed toacademic excellence in an active worshiping community.

CDSP is located at 2451 Ridge Rd., Berkeley, Calif., just north of the University of California, Berkeley. For more information, visit www.cdsp.edu, or call 510-204-0700.