William Sloane Coffin

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

William Sloane Coffin
Coffin c. 1980
ChurchUnited Church of Christ
Other post(s)Riverside Church
Orders
OrdinationPresbyterian Church
Personal details
Born
William Sloane Coffin Jr.

(1924-06-01)June 1, 1924
New York City, U.S.
DiedApril 12, 2006(2006-04-12) (aged 81)
Strafford, Vermont, U.S.
DenominationPresbyterian, United Church of Christ
SpouseEva Rubinstein
Harriet Gibney
Virginia Randolph Wilson
EducationYale College
Union Theological Seminary
Alma materYale Divinity School

William Sloane Coffin Jr. (June 1, 1924 – April 12, 2006) was an American

gay rights
.

Biography

Childhood

William Sloane Coffin Jr. was born into the wealthy elite of

William Sloane Coffin, Sr. was an executive in the family business and president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.[1] Famed record producer and civil rights activist John Hammond was a cousin, and singer and musician John P. Hammond
his nephew.

His mother, Catherine Butterfield, had grown up in the Midwest, and as a young woman spent time in France during World War I providing relief to soldiers, and met her future husband there, where he was also engaged in charitable activities. Their three children grew up fluent in French by being taught by their nanny, and attended private schools in New York.

William Sr.'s father, Edmund Coffin, was a prominent

real estate developer, and reformer who owned a property investment and management firm that renovated and rented low-income housing in New York. Upon Edmund's death in 1928, it went to his sons William and Henry, with William managing the firm. When the Great Depression
hit in 1929, William allowed tenants to stay whether or not they could pay the rent, quickly draining his own funds, and at a time when the family's substantial W. & J. Sloane stock was not paying dividends.

Carmel, California, to make life more affordable, but was able to do this only with financial support from her brother-in-law Henry. After years spent in the most exclusive private schools in Manhattan
, the three Coffin children were educated in Carmel's public schools, where William had his first sense that there was injustice—sometimes very great—in the world.

A talented musician, he became devoted to the piano and planned a career as a concert pianist. At the urging of his uncle Henry (who was still contributing to the family's finances), his mother enrolled him in Deerfield Academy in 1938.

The following year (when Edmund left for

Geneva, Switzerland, when World War II came to France in 1940, and then back to the United States, where he enrolled in Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts
.

Early adulthood

Having graduated from high school in 1942, William enrolled at

spy with the Office of Strategic Services in 1943, but was turned down for not having sufficiently "Gallic features" to be effective. He then left school, enlisted in the Army, and was quickly tapped to become an officer. After training, he was assigned to work as liaison to the French and Russian armies in connection with the Army's military intelligence unit, and where he heard first-hand stories of life in Stalin's USSR. Records indicate he was part of the Ritchie Boys
and trained extensively at Camp Ritchie, in Maryland.

After the war, Coffin returned to Yale, where he became president of the Yale Glee Club. Coffin had been a friend of George H. W. Bush since his youth, as they both attended Phillips Academy (1942). In Coffin's senior year, Bush brought Coffin into the exclusive Skull and Bones secret society at the university.

Upon graduating in 1949, Coffin entered the

Mohammed Mossadegh of Iran in 1953, followed by the CIA's orchestration of the coup that removed President Jacobo Árbenz in Guatemala
in 1954.

Ministry and political activism

External audio
audio icon Interview with William Sloane Coffin on Vietnam, the Ministry and political activism

After leaving the CIA, Coffin enrolled at

minister. This same year he married Eva Rubinstein, the daughter of pianist Arthur Rubinstein, and became chaplain at Williams College. Soon, he accepted the position as Chaplain of Yale University, where he remained from 1958 until 1975. Gifted with a rich bass-baritone voice, he was an active member of the Yale Russian Chorus
during the late 1950s and 1960s.

With his CIA background, he was dismayed when he learned in 1964 of the history of French and American involvement in

Lyndon Johnson's escalation of the war.[1]

Coffin had a prominent role in the Freedom Rides challenging segregation and the oppression of black people. As chaplain at Yale in the early 1960s, Coffin organized busloads of Freedom Riders to challenge segregation laws in the South. Through his efforts, hundreds of students at Yale University and elsewhere were recruited into civil rights and anti-war activity. He was jailed many times, but his first conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court.[1]

In 1962, he joined SANE: The Committee for a SANE Nuclear Policy,[2] an organization he would later lead.[3]

Approached by

Scot Sloan" in the comic strip Doonesbury. During the Vietnam War years, Coffin and his friend Howard Zinn often spoke from the same anti-war platform. An inspiring speaker, Coffin was known for optimism and humor: "Remember, young people, even if you win the rat race, you're still a rat."[4]

By 1967, Coffin concentrated increasingly on preaching civil disobedience and supported the young men who turned in their draft cards. He was, however, uncomfortable with draft-card burning, worried that it looked "unnecessarily hostile".[5][6] Coffin was one of several persons who signed an open letter entitled "A Call to Resist Illegitimate Authority", which was printed in several newspapers in October 1967. In that same month, he also raised the possibility of declaring Battell Chapel at Yale a sanctuary for resisters, or possibly as the site of a large demonstration of civil disobedience. School administration barred the use of the church as a sanctuary. Coffin later wrote, "I accused them of behaving more like 'true Blues than true Christians'. They squirmed but weren't about to change their minds.... I realized I was licked."[7]

And so on January 5, 1968, Coffin, Benjamin Spock (the pediatrician and baby book author who was also a Phillips Academy alumnus), Marcus Raskin, and Mitchell Goodman (all signers of "A Call to Resist Illegitimate Authority" and members of the anti-war collective RESIST[8]) were indicted by a Federal grand jury for "conspiracy to counsel, aid and abet draft resistance". All but Raskin were convicted that June, but in 1970 an appeals court overturned the verdict. Coffin remained chaplain of Yale until December 1975.[1]

In 1977, he became senior minister at

gay rights when many liberals still were uncomfortable with homosexuality. Some of the congregation's socially conservative members openly disagreed with his position on sexuality.[1]

Nuclear disarmament

Coffin started a strong nuclear disarmament program at Riverside, and hired Cora Weiss (a secular Jew he had worked with during the Vietnam War and had traveled with to North Vietnam in 1972 to accompany three released U.S. prisoners of war), an action which was uncomfortable for some parishioners. Broadening his reach to an international audience, he met with numerous world leaders and traveled abroad. His visits included going to Iran to perform Christmas services for hostages being held in the U.S. embassy during the Iran hostage crisis in 1979 and to Nicaragua to protest U.S. military intervention there.

In 1987, he resigned from Riverside Church to pursue disarmament activism full-time, saying then that there was no issue more important for a man of faith.[11] He became president of SANE/FREEZE[12] (now Peace Action), the largest peace and justice organization in the United States. He retired with the title president emeritus in the early 1990s, and then taught and lectured across the United States and overseas. Coffin also wrote several books. He cautioned that we are all living in "the shadow of Doomsday", and urged that people turn away from isolationism and become more globally aware. Shortly before his death, Coffin founded Faithful Security, a coalition for people of faith committed to working for a world free of nuclear weapons.[1]

Personal life

Coffin was married three times. His marriages to Eva Rubinstein and Harriet Gibney ended in divorce. His third wife, Virginia Randolph Wilson (called "Randy"), survived him.[13] Rubinstein, his first wife and the mother of his children, was a daughter of pianist Arthur Rubinstein. The loss of their son Alexander, at age 24, in a car accident in 1983 inspired one of Coffin's most requested sermons. They also shared two other children, community developer Amy Coffin and folk musician David Coffin.

Coffin was given only six months to live in early 2004 due to a weakened heart. He and his wife lived in the small town of Strafford, Vermont, a few houses away from his brother Ned, until his death nearly two years later at age 81.[1]

Military awards

Books

By Coffin

  • Letters to a Young Doubter, Westminster John Knox Press, July 2005,
    ISBN 0-664-22929-8
  • Credo, Westminster John Knox Press, December 2003,
    ISBN 0-664-22707-4
  • The Heart Is a Little to the Left: Essays on Public Morality, Dartmouth College, 1st edition, October 1999,
    ISBN 0-87451-958-6
  • The Courage to Love, sermons, Harper & Row, 1982,
    ISBN 0-06-061508-7
  • Once to Every Man: A Memoir, autobiography, Athenaeum Press, 1977,
    ISBN 0-689-10811-7

About Coffin

In popular culture

The Doonesbury character Reverend Scot Sloan is named (in part) for William Sloane Coffin.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Goldstein, Warren. William Sloane Coffin Jr.: A Holy Impatience (2005).
  2. ^ "Service for William Sloane Coffin to be Held at Yale". Yale News. May 11, 2006. Retrieved February 12, 2017.
  3. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved February 12, 2017.
  4. ISBN 9781476782423
    .
  5. ^ “Interview with William Sloane Coffin, 1982.”, August 30, 1982. WGBH Media Library & Archives. Retrieved November 9, 2010.
  6. ISBN 978-0-8078-5436-5
    .
  7. ISBN 9780805077773
    .
  8. ^ Barsky, Robert F. Noam Chomsky: a life of dissent (M.I.T. Press, 1998) online Archived January 16, 2013, at the Wayback Machine
  9. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved November 9, 2019.
  10. ^ Paris et al. 2004, pp. 99–101.
  11. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved November 9, 2019.
  12. Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign in 1987 and was renamed SANE/FREEZE; it was renamed Peace Action
    in 1993.
  13. ^ Schudel, Matt; Bernstein, Adam (April 16, 2006). "The Rev. William Sloane Coffin made his mark as activist, rebel". The Seattle Times. Retrieved February 12, 2017.

Sources

  • Once to Every Man: A Memoir (1977)
  • William Sloane Coffin, Jr.: A Holy Impatience (2004)
  • Passion for the Possible: A Message to U.S. Churches

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to William Sloane Coffin.

Memorials

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=William_Sloane_Coffin&oldid=1217840887"