Neichelle Guidry, ‘10 M.Div.

2019William Sloane Coffin '56 Award for Peace and Justice

The Coffin award is given in honor of the life and ministry of William Sloane Coffin, former Chaplain to the University and one of the 20th century’s most significant religious leaders. The recipient of the Coffin award will be someone who shares Coffin’s passionate and prophetic witness, a courageous devotion to the dignity and worth of all persons, and who has made a notable contribution to the work of peace and reconciliation.

Rev. Dr. Neichelle R. Guidry currently serves as the Dean of Sisters Chapel and Director of the WISDOM Center at Spelman College in Atlanta. She is a spiritual daughter of New Creation Christian Fellowship of San Antonio, Texas, where she was ordained to ministry in 2010.

Dr. Guidry is a graduate of Clark Atlanta University (2007, BA, Lambda Pi Eta) and YDS, where she was the 2010 recipient of the Walcott Prize for Clear and Effective Public and Pulpit Speaking. She is also a graduate of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary (2017), where she completed her Doctor of Philosophy in the area of Liturgical Studies with a concentration in Homiletics. Her dissertation is entitled, “Towards a Womanist Homiletical Theology for Subverting Rape Culture.” She is the creator of shepreaches, a virtual community and professional development organization that aspires to uplift African-American millennial women in ministry through theological reflection, fellowship, and liturgical curation.

For six years, Guidry served as the Associate Pastor to Young Adults and the Liaison to Worship and Arts Ministries in the Office of the Senior Pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ on the South Side of Chicago, where the Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III is Senior Pastor. She served as the 2016 Preacher/Pastor-In-Residence at the Black Theology and Leadership Institute at Princeton Theological Seminary.

Guidry was listed as one of “12 New Faces of Black Leadership” in TIME Magazine (January 2015). She was recognized for “quickly becoming one of her generation’s most powerful female faith leaders” on Ebony Magazine’s 2015 Power 100 list (December 2015) and one of “Ten Women of Faith Leading the Charge Ahead” by Sojourners. Additionally, Guidry and the work of shepreaches were featured in the New York Times (April 3, 2015).

She is a contributor to What Would Jesus Ask?: Christian Leaders Reflect on His Questions of Faith (Time Books, 2015), and the author of Curating a World: Sermonic Words from a Young Woman Who Preaches (self-published, June 2016).

Guidry is a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority.