Sophfronia Scott

Eat and Read at Melba's, New Orleans, LA
2022-01-21 13:00 - 14:00 (America/New_York)
Sophfronia Scott will sign copies of The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton, as part of a communal literacy awareness project. The books will be given away to community members.

Alma College MFA in Creative Writing Winter Residency, Roscommon, MI
2021-12-27 - 2022-01-06
As director of Alma’s MFA program, Sophfronia is pleased to announce its winter residency. Residency is the heart of the MFA experience. Students, faculty, visiting writers, and guest speakers from the publishing industry come together to form a diverse and dynamic artistic community teeming with the energy of a shared commitment to writing.
We’ll convene for our winter residencies at the Ralph A. MacMullan Conference Center on the shore of Higgins Lake in Michigan’s gorgeous northern woods. The center, known for its modern facilities with rustic décor, has a legacy of conservation education. We’ll be able to appreciate Michigan’s abundant natural resources and sparkling winters with activities such as ice fishing, sledding, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing and downhill skiing. Guests will have access to miles and miles of groomed cross-country ski trails located across the main road of the facility.

Seeking Everyday Faith with Thomas Merton, St. Bart's Church, New York, NY
2021-11-14 10:00 - 12:00
Seeking Everyday Faith with Thomas Merton

Author Sophfronia Scott shares her deep dive into the private journals of the famous Trappist monk, and the connection she found in his pages that led to her book The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton. As a Black woman who is not Catholic, Scott both learns from and pushes back against Merton, holding spirited, and intimate conversations on race, ambition, faith, activism, nature, prayer, friendship, and love.
Sophfronia Scott is a Harvard-educated novelist, essayist, and leading contemplative thinker whose work has appeared in numerous publications. She has received a 2020 Artist Fellowship Grant from the Connecticut Office of the Arts as well as the 2021 Thomas Merton Award from the International Thomas Merton Society.
Note: If this event is in person, it will also be livestreamed.

Second Tuesdays Writers Discussion Group, Online
2021-11-09 20:00 - 21:00
Sophfronia Scott will be the featured author for November discussing a writing topic for this group hosted by Brian Allain. Details TBD. Registration at this link.

Writing For Your Life Conference, Online
2021-11-08 - 2021-11-12
Sophfronia Scott will present an informational session on the Alma College MFA in Creative Writing graduate program. Exact date and time TBD.

Seeking Hope with Thomas Merton, River's Edge and Centering Space, Cleveland, Ohio
2021-11-06 13:00 - 14:30
Details TBD

Seeking Everyday Faith with Thomas Merton, Christ Church Greenwich, Greenwich, CT
2021-10-31 11:00 - 12:00
Seeking Everyday Faith with Thomas Merton

In conversation with Deborah Goodrich Royce, author Sophfronia Scott shares her deep dive into the private journals of the famous Trappist monk, and the connection she found in his pages that led to her new book The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton. As a Black woman who is not Catholic, Scott both learns from and pushes back against Merton, holding spirited, and intimate conversations on race, ambition, faith, activism, nature, prayer, friendship, and love.
Sophfronia Scott is a Harvard-educated novelist, essayist, and leading contemplative thinker whose work has appeared in numerous publications and received a 2020 Artist Fellowship Grant from the Connecticut Office of the Arts as well as the 2021 Thomas Merton Award from the International Thomas Merton Society.

The Humanity of Thomas Merton - Retreat Day, Holy Family Passionist Retreat Center, West Hartford, CT
2021-10-23 09:00 - 16:30
The Humanity of Thomas Merton

Contemplative Enrichment Day
Saturday, October 23, 2021
9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (ET)
Sophfronia Scott, M.F.A.
Though Thomas Merton lived as a contemplative monk studying, writing, and praying, he remained vulnerable in his humanity, making him most accessible to us. Seen through the lens of grace, Merton’s teaching can help us learn to reach for God through our imperfections. During our time together, we will focus on developing a relationship with Merton’s spirituality that might deepen our own.
This program will be offered both in-person and online via Zoom. Information on how to access the program on Zoom will be sent to participants in advance.
Offering: $65 (includes lunch)
Register at this link.

Madeleine Mornings, Online Writers' Retreat
2021-10-16 10:00 - 14:00
Inspired by the late Madeleine L’Engle (A Wrinkle in Time), these virtual mini-retreats, co-hosted by Sarah Arthur and Sophfronia Scott, are designed to spark insight, foster connections, deepen your reading, and lend structure to your writing and spiritual life.

Alma MFA Open House featuring David Lynn, Alma College, Alma, MI
2021-10-07 19:00 - 20:00
A reading by fiction writer and Kenyon Review editor emeritus David Lynn. Informational session on applying for the Alma College MFA in Creative Writing.
UPDATE: I’m reading at this event too! I’ll read from The Seeker and the Monk. More details soon.

Progressive Christian Voices: Today and Tomorrow - Webinar
2021-10-06 19:00 - 20:30
A webinar hosted by Brian Allain and intended to deal with “big questions.” The session will feature three Broadleaf Books authors addressing questions such as:

Please tell us briefly about your background and a bit about your most recent book

What have you been reading lately that has most impacted you?

What do you believe are currently the most pressing issues that progressive Christians should address?

In what ways would you suggest that progressive Christians take action to address these needs?

There seems to be an increasingly wide gap between progressive and conservative Christians in the United States. Does that matter? Should we do anything about it?

Looking forward, what plans can you speak about in terms of where your own work is headed? (future books, activism, etc.)

Ladyparts-A Memoir: Deborah Copaken in Conversation with Sophfronia Scott
2021-09-29 19:00 - 20:00
Twenty years after her iconic memoir Shutterbabe, Deborah Copaken is at her darkly comedic nadir: battered, broke, divorcing, dissected, and dying—literally—on sexism’s battlefield as she scoops up what she believes to be her internal organs into a glass container before heading off to the hospital . . . in an UberPool.
Ladyparts is her irreverent inventory of both the female body and the body politic of womanhood in America, the story of one woman brought to her knees by the one-two-twelve punch of divorce, solo motherhood, healthcare Frogger, unaffordable childcare, shady landlords, her father’s death, college tuitions, sexual harassment, corporate indifference, ageism, sexism, and plain old bad luck. Plus seven serious illnesses, one atop the other, which provide the book’s narrative skeleton: vagina, uterus, breast, heart, cervix, brain, and lungs. She bounces back from each bum body part, finds workarounds for every setback—she transforms her home into a commune to pay rent; sells her soul for health insurance; turns FBI informant when her sexual harasser is nominated to the White House—but in her slippery struggle to survive a steep plunge off the middle-class ladder, she is suddenly awoken to what it means to have no safety net.
Side-splittingly funny one minute, a freak horror show the next, quintessentially American, Ladyparts is an era-defining memoir for our time.
Copaken will be in conversation with author (and college classmate) Sophfronia Scott.
FREE program, but donations are gratefully accepted. REGISTER HERE.
Signed copies of Ladyparts are available for purchase through the Mark Twain Store; proceeds benefit The Mark Twain House & Museum. Books will be shipped after the event. We regret that we are NOT able to ship books outside the United States as it is cost-prohibitive to do so.
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Deborah Copaken is the New York Times bestselling author of several books, including Shutterbabe, The Red Book, and Between Here and April. A contributing writer at The Atlantic, she was also a TV writer on Emily in Paris, a performer (The Moth, etc.), and an Emmy Award–winning news producer and photojournalist. Her photographs have appeared in Time, Newsweek, and The New York Times. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Guardian, The Financial Times, Observer, The Wall Street Journal, The Nation, Slate, O, the Oprah Magazine, and Paris Match, among others. Her column “When Cupid Is a Prying Journalist” was adapted for the Modern Love streaming series. She lives in Brooklyn with her family.
Sophfronia Scott is the director of the Alma College MFA in Creative Writing for the 21st Century program and the author of novels and works of nonfiction including, most recently, The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton, about which she spoke for the Twain House in May.

Tuesdays with Merton, Online Presentation
2021-09-14 20:00 - 21:30
Sophfronia Scott will be in conversation with members of the International Thomas Merton Society. Details TBD, but registration will be at link below when available.
Registration

Publishing in Color Conference, Online
2021-09-13 - 2021-09-17

Emerging Writers Workshop, Online
2021-07-30 - 2021-08-01
Collegeville Institute participants (accepted via application) attend a virtual writing workshop that will involve formal seminars, individual mentorship and goal setting, peer-to-peer work, and time for participants to develop, write, and polish their first article.
After the workshop, McGregor and Scott will continue to work online with their assigned participants to develop a series of articles and/or essays to be published in Bearings Online. This work will include direct feedback on writing, Zoom sessions, and instruction on specific writing techniques. On occasion all six writers may gather together online for instruction.

Breaking the Academic Mold - Workshop, Online
2021-07-21 - 2021-07-26
Breaking the Academic Mold
Liberating the Powerful, Personal Voice Inside You
Many scholars yearn to speak to a broader audience through creative nonfiction, blogs, op-eds, and memoir. This workshop is for academics who have written mainly for peers but long to share their knowledge or personal experience in a more innovative way with a wider audience.
Participants in this workshop will develop their writing voice in service of topics about which they care, and about which they have some expertise. A combination of seminars, workshops, and individual instruction, our week together will help you unlearn the worst academic habits, free your creative spirit, structure your work more effectively, and speak on the page in a truer, more engaging voice. Our focus will be on releasing the professors’ voice to the public square.
This inaugural jointly sponsored Wabash Center/Collegeville Institute workshop is by invitation only. Invited participants are scholars and teachers of religion and theology.
Due to COVID precautions, the workshop will meet in the virtual sphere via Zoom.
Leadership Team
Sophfronia Scott, Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing, Alma College
Michael N. McGregor, Writing Faculty, Collegeville Institute
Dr. P. Kimberleigh Jordan, Associate Director of Educational Design, The Wabash Center

Alma College MFA in Creative Writing Summer Residency, Alma, MI
2021-06-17 - 2021-06-27
As director of Alma’s MFA program, Sophfronia is pleased to announce its first residency. Residency is the heart of the MFA experience. Students, faculty, visiting writers, and guest speakers from the publishing industry come together to form a diverse and dynamic artistic community teeming with the energy of a shared commitment to writing. U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo will kick off the residency with a craft talk for students in the afternoon and a public reading in the evening.

Deviate with Rolf Potts Podcast
2021-04-17
Sophfronia’s interview with Deviate Podcast host Rolf Potts will be recorded March 22. A link will be posted when available.

Encountering Silence Podcast
2021-04-16
Sophfronia’s interview with Encountering Silence Podcast host Cassidy Hall goes live in early April. A link will be posted when available.

Contemplating Now Podcast
2021-04-15
Sophfronia’s interview with Contemplating Now Podcast host Cassidy Hall goes live in early April. A link will be posted when available.

Guest Speaker, International Thomas Merton Society, CT Chapter
2021-04-14 19:00 - 21:00
JOIN US FOR A SPECIAL EVENING WITH SOPHFRONIA SCOTT AS SHE REFLECTS ON HER NEW BOOK ON THOMAS MERTON, AVAILABLE ON MARCH 16, 2021!
THIS ZOOM EVENT WILL BE ON WEDNESDAY, APRIL 14, 2021 FROM 7:00 P.M. TO 9:00 P.M. EASTERN TIME
SEE DETAILS AND REGISTER HERE.
​The Humanity of Thomas Merton and the Key to Grace for an Impossible World

​The Thomas Merton who lived as a contemplative monk studying, writing, and praying was also a man who could be impatient, rambunctious, charming, deceptive, in pain and in love. In other words, he was completely human and in the vulnerability of that messy humanity he most felt the grace of God. That humanity can take Merton beyond the realm of mystic/saint, making him more accessible to us so that through him we may learn how to reach for God in the midst of our own imperfections. Author Sophfronia Scott considers this connection and, recognizing that so many of the issues of Merton’s time (race, peace, ambition, materialism, love) are, sometimes frustratingly so, still our issues today, will discuss how Merton’s work helps us to see through a lens of grace, allowing us to love the impossible world even as we seek to redeem it.

VCFA Alumnx Reading
2021-04-08 20:00 - 21:00
Sophfronia will be a featured reader in this virtual gathering of graduates and students of the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing program. Registration link TBA.

Spark My Muse Book Club Discussion
2021-04-07 19:30 - 20:30
Register here for this discussion led by Lisa Colon Delay.
What if we truly belong to each other? What if we are all walking around shining like the sun?
Mystic, monk, and activist Thomas Merton asked those questions in the twentieth century. Writer Sophfronia Scott is asking them today.
In The Seeker and the Monk, Scott mines the extensive private journals of one of the most influential contemplative thinkers of the past for guidance on how to live in these fraught times.
As a Black woman who is not Catholic, Scott both learns from and pushes back against Merton, holding spirited, and intimate conversations on race, ambition, faith, activism, nature, prayer, friendship, and love. She asks: What is the connection between contemplation and action? Is there ever such a thing as a wrong answer to a spiritual question? How do we care about the brutality in the world while not becoming overwhelmed by it?
By engaging in this lively discourse, readers will gain a steady sense of how to dwell more deeply within–and even to love–this despairing and radiant world.
Sophfronia Scott is a novelist, essayist, and leading contemplative thinker whose work has appeared in Time, People, O: The Oprah Magazine, and numerous other outlets. When her first novel, All I Need to Get By, was published, she was nominated for best new author at the African American Literary Awards and hailed by Henry Louis Gates Jr. as “one of the best writers of her generation.” Her other books include Unforgivable Love, Love’s Long Line, and This Child of Faith. Scott holds degrees from Harvard and the Vermont College of Fine Arts. She lives in Sandy Hook, Connecticut.
Ask questions of the author, discuss the material, find out more about Thomas Merton and the book “The Seeker and the Monk” during our time together.

DIY MFA Podcast
2021-03-31
Sophfronia’s interview with DIY MFA Podcast host Gabriela Pereira goes live on March 31 and will be available at www.diymfa.com.

Pagination Bookshop Virtual Author Event
2021-03-25 19:00 - 20:00
Join us on Thursday, March 25th at 7 PM ET, as we speak with author Sophfronia Scott and celebrate the publication of her new book The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton, available for preorder now here: https://shop.paginationbookshop.com/book/9781506464961
Webinar link for the event: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82736482810

Reading, Virginia Theological Seminary
2021-03-24 12:30 - 14:00
Sophfronia Scott will give a reading and take questions in this virtual event hosted by the Virginia Theological Seminary.
Registration information TBA.

Guest Speaker, Virginia Theological Seminar Class
2021-03-23 15:00 - 16:00
Sophfronia will visit, via Zoom, the course Evangelism: Theology and Practice, taught by The Rev. Patricia Lyons. This event is not open to the public.

Virtual Book Launch Party, Zoom
2021-03-16 11:00 - 12:00
Join Sophfronia Scott in conversation with Sarah Arthur and editor Valerie Weaver-Zercher to celebrate the publication of Sophfronia’s new book, The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton. Register here.

Book Launch You Tube Interview with Brian Allain
2021-03-16
Sophfronia will be interviewed by Brian Allain in a recorded interview. Link to the recording will be posted here and in social media.
Brian Allain leads Writing for Your Life, a resource center for spiritual writers, and provides marketing services for authors and companies through Who Are You Trying To Serve? His work includes the Publishing in Color conference series, which is intended to increase the number of books published by spiritual writers of color, who have been under-represented in terms of the number of books published. Brian also leads the team that produces Compassionate Christianity. Previously Brian served as Founding Director of the Frederick Buechner Center where he led the launch of Mr. Buechner’s online presence and established several new programs and strategic partnerships. Brian has developed and led spiritual writers conferences at Princeton Theological Seminary, Drew Theological Seminary, Western Theological Seminary, Belmont University, New Brunswick Seminary, and several churches. He led the DIY-publishing effort for the book Buechner 101: An Introduction to Frederick Buechner, in collaboration with Anne Lamott. All of this is a second career, coming after successful business and technology leadership in high-tech. Brian has an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was designated a Palmer Scholar, their highest academic award.

Spark My Muse Podcast
2021-03-14 - 2021-03-31
From Lisa Colón DeLay, author of the forthcoming The Wild Land Within and host of the “Spark My Muse” Podcast: Enjoy my conversation with Sophfronia Scott today as we converse about her book “The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton”. This is an enriching and down-to-earth interaction with the private journals of the famous author monk of the mid-20th Century in conversation with Sophfronia’s own life and spiritual growth. We also talk about the Lenten online retreat Pilgrimage of Renewal she and writer Lisa Deam are offering and the resources available for anyone interested. Listen using the audio player below.
