…He says his experience as an Egyptian-American nurtured focus on racial justice and reconciliation
THE first Episcopal bishop of Arab and North African descent in the Episcopal Church’s 237-year history, the Revd Adam Shoemaker, will be consecrated as the ninth bishop of Long Island next month.
In an interview with the Episcopal News Service (ENS), Mr Shoemaker, 47, said that he believes he is an “imperfect vessel”. However, his experiences as an Egyptian-American have shaped his faith, and encouraged him to focus on racial justice and reconciliation.
“I think my story has humanised so many of the differences that can sometimes divide — sometimes in tragic ways — and given me a heart for all that diversity,” he said. “It’s been a lifelong journey for me to come fully into my sense of self. It’s been a journey of prayer and introspection.”
The ENS reported that it was the diocese’s embracing of diversity that attracted Mr Shoemaker to the diocese of Long Island, which serves more than 120 congregations across Brooklyn, Queens, Nassau, and Suffolk counties.
Mr Shoemaker, who was raised in Huntington, was elected bishop in April, which is National Arab American Heritage Month.
His mother, Jamie Stanforth, was an Egyptologist of Jewish descent. She met Mr Shoemaker’s father, Hamada Haggagi, when they were in their early twenties in the mid-1970s, in Egypt, before they moved to Manhattan, where Mr Shoemaker was born as Adam James Haggagi. They divorced when Mr Shoemaker was a baby, and his mother later married Thomas Shoemaker.
Mr Shoemaker told the ENS that settling in the US was the “turning point” in his life. He said: “Had I been born in Cairo and not New York City, I think it is highly likely I would have been raised in Egypt and not in the United States. I would have been raised a Muslim and not a Christian. Since God planted in my heart the instinct to pursue a religious vocation, no matter the context I grew up in, I’ve often wondered if I would perhaps be a Muslim imam today.”
He said that the events of 11 September 2001 had been another turning point for him. “I remember seeing Arab people, Muslim people, having to travel around New York City with little American flags on their person so as not to be attacked by anybody who was looking for revenge against terrorists. I remember the vandalism of mosques and the so-called War on Terror,” he said.
“Growing up, many people would look at my Semitic features and would just assume I was Jewish. Because I didn’t look stereotypically Arab to many Americans, I was shielded from any anger and desire for retribution that came out of 9/11.”
He added: “My family never stops yearning for my homecoming. Every time I visit them in Egypt, they make me feel right at home.”
When he told them that he had been elected a bishop, they didn’t seem to think it was a “big deal”, he told the ENS.
“As my youngest brother Hamza put it, ‘That’s great, but when are you coming back to Egypt?’ To my family in Egypt, I’m their brother and their love for me is the same, bishop or not.”
Church Times