Cincinnati Graduation Recognizes Distinguished Alumni and Tomorrow’s Leaders

CINCINNATI, OH - On May 8, 2026, Hebrew Union College celebrated the graduation of six exceptional students receiving their doctorate or masters, and seven alumni receiving their Doctors of Divinity, honoris causa. The entire community engaged in a deeply reflective celebration at Scheur Chapel on the Hebrew Union College Campus.

Judah Cohen, Ph.D. Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Provost, kicked off the morning with a warm welcome to the community gathered in person and those joining via livestream.

"By joining together as one congregation, we affirm that Jewish leadership demands far more than accumulated knowledge or technical skill. In earning these accolades, we answer the call for something deeper: a willingness to give ourselves in service to others, to open our hearts across generations, and to accept our sacred trust as a lifetime of challenge and change, both in the world, and in who we are. In this space, now, we see that sometimes we can most profoundly fulfill that call to Jewish leadership simply by being present."

After noting the challenges of this year, both in Cincinnati and across the world, Andrew Rehfeld, Ph.D., Gus W. Herrman President and Professor of Political Thought, offered some advice. Quoting Emeritus Professor Michael Meyer's charge to "look forward as we take upon ourselves the message and the obligation that our days and years here have placed upon us," President Rehfeld invited our students and alumni to

"keep, and remember. Remember those who came before. To carry forward the principles of this College. … Keep faith with the education that has shaped you. That it may guide your service evermore."

President Rehfeld then introduced the Graduation Speaker, Laurie L. Patton, Ph.D., the President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and conferred upon her an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters.

In her address, Dr. Patton commended the students and asked them to remember:

"You are about to embark on a life of learning and service. That you have chosen that life is an act of courage in a time of chaos. I believe you can take on this challenge because you are the beneficiaries of that tradition of courageous connection. As thinkers and doers in Reform Judaism who are the spiritual descendants of haskalah, you understand the deep and necessary link between knowing about and being in the world."

President Rehfeld and Rabbi Richard Sarason, Ph.D. then presented the Graduate Medallion to Lee M. Fields, Ph.D. '01, following his twenty-four year career at Mid-Atlantic Christian University, where he taught courses in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament. Dr. Fields is also the author of An Anonymous Dialog with a Jew: Introduction, Translation and Notes.

President Rehfeld and Rabbi Sarason awarded the following Graduate Degrees:

• Doctor of Philosophy in Judaic, Hebraic, and Cognate Studies to Mark David Shaffer, in absentia
• Doctor of Hebrew Letters to Rabbi Cathy L. Felix '80
• Master of Philosophy in Judaic, Hebraic, and Cognate Studies to Christopher S. Beecher, William Evan Wossman, and Joel T. Wildermuth
• Master of Arts in Hebrew Letters to Jonathan Benzion

Michael W. Graves, Ph.D. '06, Amerding Professor of Biblical Studies, Wheaton College, provided the Pines School of Graduate Studies Alumni Association Greeting, and David B. Edelson, Chair of the Hebrew Union College Board of Governors confirmed the degrees. Edelson left us with these words:

"Lead with courage, serve with integrity, maintain your senses of humor, and embody the values of justice, compassion, and dignity. The arc of the moral universe does not bend on its own. It bends because people like you choose to bend it."

Closing the ceremonies, Rabbi Haim O. Rechnitzer, Ph.D. said in his Benediction, "Graduates: you embody the lessons of our past and the promise of our future."

Ordination of Cincinnati rabbis followed on May 9th.

View the full Cincinnati graduation livestream here.