Leslie MacPherson Artinian, Departmental Administrator, Office of Ministry Studies

“I feel like there’s a kind of cold-bloodedness to the corporate world. Harvard is certainly not immune to that, but I feel like it’s not here. In my office, we have a lot of grace. You don’t have to be perfect. We work really hard, but there’s a kindness that we have, which is really lovely. It’s the kind of thing where there’s flexibility—an understanding and compassion.”

Background and Tradition

My path was a winding one that inevitably led me here. If I could have known myself this well 25 or 30 years ago, this is the place I would’ve wanted to be—even if I didn’t realize what I was going to do to get here.

I grew up in New Hampshire, and I’m also a fourth-generation Universalist—my tradition—which is rare. I went to the University of New Hampshire and got a degree in writing, and I wanted to go on with that, so then I came to Boston and went to Emerson and received an MFA in creative writing. I started getting more involved in one of the UU churches in Boston. I started thinking about going to divinity school myself, but wasn’t ready. So I said, “That’s okay; maybe I’ll do it when I’m 40.”

I ended up doing all different kinds of things, but mostly I worked in libraries and taught as an adjunct, because it’s hard to work full-time as a teacher and survive. I also met my husband through Emerson, and we ultimately settled in Boston. Here at Harvard, I worked at the Hilles Library, which was part of Radcliffe, for 10 years, and supervised the students who worked the library desk in the evenings. I really liked that job, and at the time, and I was able to come here to HDS and take a couple of classes.

I ended up coming here as department administrator. Right away it was like, “Oh my God, this is wonderful!” Kerry Maloney, Harry Huff, and I all started here at the end of August 2004. It has been a delight.

Most of the writing I do now is sermons. I am the chair of the Worship Committee of my church, which is First Parish in Milton. I get to lead worship, and I get to do some of the awesome things I’ve cared about my whole life. I never did get ordained, but I do a great deal of lay ministry in all kinds of different ways. I’ve been here for 12 years. Students come and they go. I’m always sad to see them go, but then other cool people come. What an amazing gift it is to know our students’ work, perspectives, ideas.

A Typical Day

People always ask, “You’re the department administrator. What do you do?” And I say that I’m the traffic cop and the bill-payer of our office. We have a bunch of ministers in the office, and we’re ministerial types. We’re a great group and a great community, and that anchors me.

My day really depends on what day it is, what week it is, how many things I’m managing. Right now, I’m working with Professor Dan McKanan on his conference, the Spirit of Agriculture Conference, which is going to be enormous. It is about sustainability as it relates to agriculture. Some alums are coming back for it. There are some really cool grads who got started on their passion here and then have gone on for advanced degrees. I am so proud of them. To me, if you want to choose an image for this work, the image is a web. It sounds corny, but this really is an interconnected web of my passions and I like to think my talents connect with what the school needs and wants. I’m pretty lucky.

The HDS Garden

The year that it started, the former head of facilities, Roy Lauridsen, who has since retired, came up to me one day in January and said, “The students in EcoDiv asked, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to have a garden on campus?’ ” This was when HDS was really cranking up our sustainability practices. We started doing compostables, carrying bottles of water, and recycling. That particular group of students was really active working with facilities to get that going. A lot of them wanted to have the garden, and he said, “I was wondering if you’d be interested in helping them do that.” I literally jumped up and down and was like, “Sign me up!” I was a little excited.

Our garden is really about food and direct service to people who need it. After many meetings, we decided to have a small vegetable garden with some flowers. It really took us at least three years to figure out what we were doing. We got a grant from the Harvard Office for Sustainability that the students wrote a proposal for, and we were able to purchase good infrastructure. We put in raised beds, a drip system, and trellises, and ever since then it’s been a learning process. Now, though, with the help and direction of a work-study student each summer, it really runs itself.

We have a connection to the Faith Kitchen, and they have a meal twice a month. For every meal, we give them greens and other stuff: greens and tomatoes, greens and beans, greens and a thousand peppers, as we had last year. Whatever is ready.

Grace and Theology

I feel like there’s a kind of cold-bloodedness to the corporate world. Harvard is certainly not immune to that, but I feel like it’s not here. In my office, we have a lot of grace. You don’t have to be perfect. We work really hard, but there’s a kindness that we have, which is really lovely. It’s the kind of thing where there’s flexibility—an understanding and compassion.

I would also say this is the ideal place to be UU, because we are a non-creedal denomination. This is my personal soapbox, but I’ll say that it’s not true that we don’t believe in “nothing and everything.” The thing that I draw on, and I think many others I know draw on, too, is the wisdom that is found in most world faiths. Even in non-faiths there’s a lot of wisdom and spirituality to be found. Here at HDS, which is pluralistic, a UU is like a kid in a candy store. Just coming to noon services over the course of a year, which every week is hosted by different group, I have learned so much.

Family Life

I have two boys, one who is 15 and the other who is 12. They’re just delightful and totally polar opposites. They’re both into theater, although the older one is much more so. They’re both creative types. Their dad and I are both kind of theater nerds, too. My husband teaches writing, screenwriting, and playwriting at Eastern Nazarene College in Quincy, Mass. We’re definitely theater geeks, and my older son is part of that. He’s in a production of Guys and Dolls now. I keep laughing, because I don’t remember teenage-hood being quite this dramatic, but when you have a kid doing drama, it’s all very dramatic.

My other little guy is very creative too, and he is very big into Dungeons & Dragons. He started a D&D club in seventh grade, and they meet on Mondays and play. He is writing a movie, a fantasy movie, which we’ll begin filming this summer with a group of his friends. We’re kind of “all creativity, all the time,” which is nice. I feel relieved, actually. If they were playing football, my husband and I wouldn’t know what to do. We would have no idea how to be football parents.

Photos: Laura Krueger, top; Rose Lincoln/Harvard Staff Photographer, bottom.