When Tara Stevens of The Woodlands, Texas, began exploring theological education, Candler School of Theology wasn’t her first choice. It wasn’t even on her list.
“I knew that I wanted to pursue a master of divinity degree,” she says. “But I was struggling with finding a school in Texas that really aligned with my heart for God, my heart for people, and my personal beliefs.”
She was also looking for a program that was flexible and wouldn’t require her to relocate. She visited a few schools in Texas, but none of them felt right. When she decided to expand her search, she stumbled across a hybrid program at another institution.
She signed up for an informational webinar they were offering. Representatives from several theology schools — including Duke, Yale, Harvard and Candler — participated in the webinar, sharing what their institutions had to offer.
Stevens says that something happened when Tayler Johnson, associate director of financial aid and admissions, began speaking about Candler. It was almost as if a switch flipped for her.
“The Holy Spirit was truly on this man representing this school I’d never heard of,” she recalls. “I heard his heart for the Lord and knew that Candler was where I wanted to pursue this life-changing program.”
Stevens enrolled in the inaugural cohort of students in Candler’s hybrid master of divinity program and is now in its first graduating class. Launched in fall 2023, the hybrid MDiv is designed specifically for students who desire a theological education but are not able to be in Atlanta full-time or to take most of their classes on campus — students like Stevens.
She needed to stay in Texas. Her son and daughter were experiencing life-changing moments of their own and she wanted to be fully present in their lives. Plus, she was fully committed to Outreachands, a small prison ministry organization in Spring, Texas.
“God has called me to serve incarcerated women and their families,” she says. “I knew I wasn’t being called to leave Texas. When I found the hybrid program at Candler, it fit exactly everything I was looking for.”
Assistant Dean of Students Allison Henderson-Brooks says that no other hybrid student has given more to Candler than Stevens. Not only has Stevens been an active representative on the school’s student government council, but she’s also traveled each year from Texas to Atlanta at her own expense to serve as a New Student Orientation volunteer.
“Tara is a respected consensus builder among the students,” says Henderson-Brooks. “Her contributions to our student community and her invaluable feedback on ways to improve the student experience are well noted.”
When she embarked on her journey at Candler, Stevens arrived with a sense of calling and a deep care for justice, faith and people on the margins. One of the things she leaves Candler with is a greater understanding of the relationship between theology and real human suffering.
“The women I work with are not abstract subjects of a social justice conversation,” she says. “They are complex, wounded, resilient human beings whose lives demand a theology that can bear the full weight of their stories, their lived experiences and the acknowledgement that, more often than not, they have been harmed by systems and people.
“Candler gave me that theology,” Stevens adds. “It gave me the intellectual tools to develop curriculum that takes seriously both the trauma these women have survived and supports them to reclaim the agency they still possess. My desire is not simply about reducing recidivism. For me, it is a theological conviction about what human dignity requires, and ways to call attention to the fact that our current systems merely further marginalize the already marginalized.”
Stevens also leaves Candler with knowledge and community support that fuels her determination. She sees herself as a teacher, a pastor, a curriculum builder and — with some hesitation — a writer. And she leaves with questions — deep questions.
“Questions about justice, and the hypocrisy in a nation that claims to be built on ‘Christian values.’ Questions about forgiveness, reconciliation, restoration. Questions about the church, what it could be, what it sometimes refuses to be and what faithfulness looks like when those two things are in tension,” she says.
“Candler didn’t resolve those questions for me. It taught me to respect them and how to find comfort in the uncomfortable spaces of just sitting with them.”