In this issue

Founded in 1834, the

Institute is a voluntary,

ecumenical agency

affi liated with the

Episcopal Church that

provides pastoral care,

maritime education, and

legal and advocacy

services for mariners.

The Seamen’s Church Institute seamenschurch.org

W

See how SCI has expanded its horizons over the years. Visit http://seamenschurch.org/archives.

FALL 2011 VOLUME 103/NUMBER 3

SCI operates a mobile workforce—not just based in one place. In fact, SCI no longer limits its operations to just a center, or physical building. “Our chaplains go where the water fl ows,” reads the new catchphrase of SCI’s expanded Ministry on the Rivers and Gulf, meaning that where mariners go, we go—on a vessel, shoreside, to the halls where leaders craft

laws and regulations affecting mariners, and to any location where there is an Internet connection.

Maritime commerce constantly moves. If SCI is to meet the needs of mariners serving our world, it must move with them. We must not be content to meet the needs of only what we see, but we must harness resources to take our mission further.

SCI depends on visionaries like you—people who can imagine what lies beyond the horizon. With friends around the world, we can ensure that a mariner never fi nds a friendless port, and with the backing of our generous fi nancial supporters, SCI has the means not just to address what we can see today but anticipate what lies beyond where the sea meets the sky.

WHEN SOMEONE ADVISES YOU to expand your horizons, he or she asks you to open up to new ideas, enlarge your point of view. From a maritime perspective, the horizon represents the line between what you can see and what you have to travel further to see. Our points of view change as we move toward that horizon line, and by adjusting our position we gain new insight.

The Seamen’s Church Institute (SCI) started as a small mission society in New York, established by a handful of parishioners from Trinity Church on Wall Street. SCI’s founders saw a need in their local community. But what started out as a community effort quickly grew. As global trade fl ourished, SCI’s leaders saw the need to experience and learn new things.

Through the years, SCI has gathered more experience from places and people beyond our base in New York. We have pushed past the limits of our immediate fi eld of vision. In our illuminating journeys, we saw a need for our presence in new places, a need to work smarter to deliver to mariners the services and support they need when far from home and a need to advocate for merchant mariners in increasingly more infl uential ways.

Expanding Our Horizonsby Jennifer Koenig, Associate Director of Development

SCI Releases Post-Piracy Care Guidelines 3.0by the Rev. David M. Rider, President & Executive Director

At the International Christian Maritime Association (ICMA) 10th World Congress in Hamburg,

Germany, SCI Director of the Center for Seafarers’ Rights Douglas B. Stevenson and

I made a major plenary presentation debuting SCI’s revised Guidelines (Version 3.0) for the treatment of seafarers who have been held captive by pirates. continued on p .3

Director’s Log

2Special Collections

3SCI Expands Ministry

4A New Chapel

5

New Center for Maritime Education Director

6Summer Intern

7Why I Give

8

Consider increasing your fi nancial contribution to SCI, helping us expand our horizons.

SCI’s President & Executive Director, the Rev. David M. Rider, hit the pavement on Sunday, May 1, to take part in the 42-mile TD Bank Five Boro Bike Tour, seeking fi nancial sponsorship for each mile he rode. The money raised goes to purchase fi tness equipment for the newly renovated Port Newark International Seafarers’ Center.

2•TheSeamen’sChurchInstitute TheLookout Fall2011

Executive Director’s Log

© Fall 2011 Volume 103, Number 3

Published byThe Seamen’s Church Institute

seamenschurch.org

212-349-9090fax: 212-349-8342sci@seamenschurch.org

David S. FrenchChairman, Board of Trustees

The Rev. David M. RiderPresident and Executive Director

Editor, Oliver BrewerAssistant Editor, Susannah Skiver Design & Production, Bliss Design

The Lookout is printed on recycled paper.

SCI SUSTAINING SPONSORS

This edition of the newsletter highlights “expanding our horizons.” At SCI we need to expand not only the ways we offer services to mariners but also the ways in which we raise awareness and money in order to do so.

Last spring, I took a creative and physical approach to fundraising. Seeking sponsorships for each mile, I pedaled across New York City as part of the TD Bank Five Boro Bike Tour to raise money to purchase fi tness equipment for SCI’s new Starr Foundation Center for Wellness at the International Seafarers’ Center in Port Newark.

As one of the many services offered at the International Seafarers’ Center, SCI provides a fi tness facility for seafarers, longshoremen, truckers, and other port workers—the only one of its kind in the port. Facilities like this offer maritime transportation workers, who labor long hours in confi ned spaces, a welcome respite from the rigors of the job.

Imagine the seafarer who has a couple of precious hours off ship to work out after a long transit across the Atlantic; a truck driver who, after staying awake on I-95, rejuvenates between dropping off and picking up a container; or the dock worker with no time to get out of the Port who keeps up with his or her fi tness regime during a lunch break. For these industrious maritime industry workers, I decided to bike approximately 42 miles around the city, my route often overlooking the New York harbor and waterways fi lled with vessels.

Thanks to all who encouraged and supported me. Although I crossed the fi nish line of that race, we have more to go.

As you read through this newsletter, note the other races SCI is running—expanding our ministry to workers in the Gulf of Mexico, presenting revised Guidelines in our Piracy Study to international audiences and increasing our chaplains’ connections with mariners on the new CHAPLAINSBLOG. Help us keep pace with the work we have to do and fi nd new ways to spread the word.

The Rev. David M. RiderPresident & Executive Director

See pictures from the Executive Director’s biketourathttp://smschur.ch/5boropics

Missthebikeracebut want to contribute toward the wellness of themaritimeworkforce?

Go to http://smschur.ch/fi tgive andmakea donation today.

3.0seamenschurch.org TheLookout Fall2011•3

SCI Joins Queens College Special Collections

At the beginning of the 19th century, the absence of international regulations meant merchant mariners frequently experienced mistreatment, ranging from unfair wages to abuse on board. If not for SCI, which helped to pass important legislation for seafarers’

rights, the boom of international shipping might have entirely trampled the human factor of shipping. Fittingly, SCI has signed an agreement with a leading repository for human rights archival collections, the Queens College Department of Special Collections and Archives, to house the archives of one of the nation’s leading promoters of the rights of merchant mariners.

Effective September 2011, an agreement sends SCI’s archives to the academic library of Queens College’s Flushing campus, where they will benefit from collaborative initiatives and improved exposure to researchers and students. The Queens College Civil Rights Collections have attracted international attention, recently featured in a New York Times “City Room” article. SCI’s archives represent a new, major collection for Queens College.

SCI’s archives document 178 years of the Institute’s work providing pastoral and professional assistance to seafarers in the Port of New

York. The collection details the development of maritime workers’ rights from the 19th century to the waterfront labor and political tensions of the 1930s and 1950s. “At its heart,” said SCI Associate Archivist Johnathan Thayer, “this collection represents the voices and perspectives of the working seafarer in New York.”

SCI continues to process records of the Institute, a collection consisting of more than 200 linear feet of paper documents, photographs, artifacts and publications collected over SCI’s history. Highlight items include 19th century journals from the chaplains of SCI’s three floating chapels, letters from long-time SCI Board member Franklin D. Roosevelt and

a photograph collection dating back to the late 1800s.

Post-Piracy Care Guidelines 3.0continued from page 1

SCI originally undertook the study of seafarer medical and mental health treatment in response to an ICMA 2008 resolution calling for humanitarian response to hostage situations. SCI forged a partnership with Disaster Psychiatry Outreach at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and The New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute to tackle the treatment dilemmas associated with international crews and their medical needs after being held hostage. Clinical psychologist Dr. Michael Garfinkle has led SCI’s study, interviewing seafarers impacted by piracy and recommending best practice guidelines for their welfare.

Version 3.0 of the Guidelines incorporates findings from SCI’s research and input from industry groups like INTERTANKO and the International Chamber of Shipping. SCI’s revised Guidelines emphasize balancing the seafarer’s right to medical privacy with the ship owner’s need to evaluate fitness for continuing duty. Also, Version 3.0 stresses the need both for immediate medical triage when crews are liberated and follow-up care once the seafarer returns home. For centuries, seafarers have been guaranteed medical care for conditions occurring on board ship, and post piracy treatment serves as a necessary 21st-century extension of this.

SCI is honored to be part of this critical thought leadership as part of its advocacy commitment to seafarers. Already, the US Coast Guard has responded favorably to an advance copy. We now seek to circulate the Guidelines to ICMA partners, ship owners, insurers, port state authorities, unions and other stakeholders.

Concurrent with our clinical study, Doug Stevenson and I are conducting recorded interviews with seafarers wishing to share their experiences of piracy captivity. Through these individual witnesses, we hope to give seafarers their own voice amid the various debates on their care. We will publish the videos on SCI’s website and use clips in our specialized presentations to the medical, legal and church communities.

To view SCI’s PowerPoint presentation to ICMA, type http://smschur.ch/icmappt into a web browser.

View SCI’s revised Guidelines at http://seamenschurch.org/law-advocacy/piracy-trauma-study

SCI moves 178 years of archives chronicling the history of its service to mariners to the Department of Special Collections and

Archives at Queens College, a leading repository of human rights archival collections. (Image courtesy of Queens College)

View SCI’s Digital Collection containing more than 12,000 items from its archives at http:// seamenschurch.org/archives

4•TheSeamen’sChurchInstitute TheLookout Fall2011

OSCI Expands Pastoral MinistryMinistry on the River adds Gulf of Mexico Chaplain and becomes Ministry on the Rivers and Gulf.On April 1, SCI welcomed a new chaplain dedicated to serving mariners and other workers in the offshore exploration and production industry. The Rev. Winston Rice, a former offshore worker and maritime lawyer, joined two current chaplains for SCI’s Ministry on the River, the nation’s only full-time pastoral care ministry on the Ohio and Lower Mississippi River systems, extending the Institute’s inland ministry efforts into the Gulf of Mexico.

SCI’s new chaplain understands the challenges faced by offshore mariners and workers. With a father and grandfather who between them have worked in the petroleum exploration and production industry over the past 100 years, he says he was “born into the oil patch.” Before becoming a lawyer, Rice worked in the industry, too, including working as a rotary floor

hand, or “roughneck,” and barge engineer on mobile offshore drilling units. Later, as a maritime

lawyer, Rice specialized in marine and energy law, with special emphasis on insurance and reinsurance of those

industries. Over time, Rice’s legal career found him practicing on every continent, except Antarctica.

As an SCI chaplain providing pastoral support services to mariners and other offshore workers in the Gulf

of Mexico, Rice serves the people he came to know well in the offshore maritime industry. Rice says that he understands the unique challenges presented to mariners and offshore workers. “I’ve been there and done that,” he explains.

Oil rig mariners face similar issues to mariners in the river industry and aboard cargo ships, but the offshore industry also carries a distinctive set of challenges. Offshore oil platforms and mobile units have been described as small communities with their own discrete support functions. With 40 years of professional involvement in the maritime industry, including the personal

supervision control of well operations, Rice knows these challenges. To mariners, Rice says, “There are people like me who understand your unique challenges.”

Tailoring pastoral care to the offshore industry enables SCI to meet the needs of the offshore mariners who work in remote and harsh environments. The Rev. David M. Rider, SCI’s President and Executive Director, believes this model of specialized approach to care will better meet the needs of Gulf mariners and other offshore workers.

“As I’ve traveled to the Gulf and met mariners, I realized that with a tweak to its pastoral care team, SCI could do a better job of reaching the offshore worker,” says Rider. “Dedicating a chaplain to the Gulf will enable us to share the range of our services with people who want and need them.”

Ministryon therivers +Gulf

From deep within America’s inland

river system ...

into the Gulf of Mexico, we go where the water flows.

sCi’s

seamenschurch.org

mor+g-info.indd 1 6/29/11 6:19 PMProviding year-round pastoral care, SCI’s Ministry on the Rivers and Gulf (MOR+G) offers pastoral counseling, support, and fellowship to the maritime industry’s employees and shoreside management workingontheOhioandMississippi River systems and in the Gulf of Mexico.

seamenschurch.org TheLookout Fall2011•5

A New Floating Chapel:

SCI’s CHAPLAINSBLOG

In the early nineteenth century, SCI lodged its mission to seafarers in a fl oating chapel in the waters of the Port of New York. SCI prioritized “mobile” spiritual

care, meeting mariners where their work brought them. Today, SCI chaplains remain just as agile, climbing gangways and riding tender vessels to reach mariners on board busy ships. In October, however, SCI stepped up its mobility to bring chaplains’ messages wherever there is an Internet connection, launching a new blog called CHAPLAINSBLOG (http://chaplainsblog.seamenschurch.org).

Over its 177-year ministry to mariners, the Institute has developed a three-fold approach to mission: continuing maritime education, legal advocacy for the merchant mariner and pastoral care. Until now, SCI’s spiritual care has been limited to isolated, small group exchanges. With CHAPLAINSBLOG, SCI embarks on a new chapter, reaching beyond geographical boundaries to share more widely its pastoral ministry to the maritime workforce.

SCI retains a staff of professional maritime chaplains with interfaith and cross-cultural backgrounds whose traits, work experiences and skills vary as much as the mariners they encounter. Each day in their work, SCI chaplains meet individuals from varying backgrounds, cultures and faiths, shaping care to meet the needs of the moment. The entries SCI chaplains make to the blog—text, images, poetry and videos—refl ect the personalized ways SCI tailors its spiritual care for mariners.

A fl oating chapel for the twenty-fi rst century, SCI’s CHAPLAINSBLOG hosts self-published meditations (posted weekly in time for Sunday) containing messages targeted to maritime workers around the world. With the current number of SCI chaplains nationwide, each chaplain posts to the blog once every two months. SCI’s CHAPLAINSBLOG also contains a section called “Ask a Chaplain” where online visitors may publicly ask SCI chaplains about whatever they wish.

SCI has tapped the Rev. Michael Nation to serve as the pastoral coordinator for CHAPLAINSBLOG. Nation coordinates the preaching rotation, supports and encourages bloggers, and coordinates the moderation of the site’s “Ask a Chaplain” feature. “I look forward to reaching our domestic and international mariners through this blog,” remarks Nation. “The Internet exponentially expands our ability to provide hope and comfort to the mariners we serve.”

SCI’s fl oating chapel, dating from 1844, provided seafarers a customized place for spiritual comfort in the hectic goings on of daily life at sea. SCI launches CHAPLAINSBLOG, a new “virtual” fl oating chapel where chaplains reach out to the maritime workforce across geographical boundaries.

SCI chaplains also post from theirdailyworkonSCI’sFacebookpage.Checkoutand“like”http://facebook.com/seamenschurch

CHAPLAINSBLOG

maritime workers around

current number of SCI chaplains nationwide, each

A page from the Rev. Benjamin C. C. Parker’s

Journal of the Floating Chapel dated 1848–1850.

J

6•TheSeamen’sChurchInstitute TheLookout Fall2011

Events on the HorizonJoin us for the Christmas at Sea Gala & Auction on Tuesday, November 29 from 6–8:30 pm at the Union League Club in New York City. Featuring a magnificent live & silent auction, “message in a bottle” grab bag, cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, the Gala highlights SCI’s volunteer knitting and holiday gift distribution program, Christmas at Sea.

On Thursday, December 8, supporters in the maritime community gather in Paducah, KY for the River Bell Awards Luncheon celebrating SCI’s Ministry on the Rivers and Gulf (MOR+G). SCI proudly honors Joseph H. Pyne, Chairman & CEO of Kirby Corporation, with the River Bell Award. The luncheon awards program also recognizes RADM Mary E. Landry (ret.), former

Commander of the USCG 8th District, and river legend Eddie Conrad.

New Center for Maritime Education Director

Taking over the reins from Eric K. Larsson, former Director of SCI’s Center

for Maritime Education, Captain Stephen Polk now commands SCI’s advanced training program for mariners. SCI appointed Polk, a USCG Licensed Captain and US Navy veteran, to begin work as Director earlier this year.

Captain Polk has logged thousands of hours on SCI’s advanced simulators training professional mariners and in the classroom helping them evaluate complex situations. He has also managed the operations of SCI’s Houston Center as Director since 2008, scheduling training and developing coursework for mariners.

In his new appointment, Polk assumes responsibility for both Centers and their training programs. With computer simulators in Paducah, KY and Houston, TX, SCI’s Center for Maritime Education trains over 1,500 mariners each year.

Underpinning his teaching, Polk has extensive industry work experience. A 1997 graduate of Texas A&M University at Galveston, he has managed vessels on the inland waterways and the Gulf Coast, including coastal and deep-sea tankers. Polk is also a veteran of the US Navy, honorably discharged in 2009 with the rank of Lieutenant Commander.

Adapting courses based on feedback and developments in the industry, SCI strives to stay on the cutting edge, according to the Rev. David M. Rider, SCI’s President & Executive Director. He chose Polk to manage SCI’s training offerings because of his proficiency and varied experience. “Stephen has his finger on the pulse of the business, including issues that are shaping the future of maritime commerce.”

Captain Stephen Polk has stepped up to become SCI’s new Director of Maritime Education, supervising the training of over 1,500 professional mariners at SCI’s Centers in Paducah, KY and Houston, TX.

To learn more about event sponsorship opportunities or to

purchasetickets,contact Carrie

Christensen, Special Events Coordinator

at cchristensen @seamenschurch.org

or212-385-6391.

At last year’s Christmas at Sea

Gala & Auction event attendees

enjoyed a festive holiday party

and opportunities to bid on some

interesting auction items.

seamenschurch.org TheLookout Fall2011•7

ExpandingHorizons:“HowISpentMySummerVacation”by Kimberly Rowles

SCI 2011 summer intern Kimberly Rowles, a student at General Theological Seminary in New York, spent this summer at SCI’s International Seafarers’ Center in Port Newark acquiring practical experience in maritime chaplaincy. Rowles says her connection with international seafarers taught her about hospitality and community.

When I was a child, I spent my summers “down the shore” in Wildwood,

NJ. I had no idea at the time that in Newark and Elizabeth, less than 150 miles from where I built sandcastles, nearly everything that I would need, want, or buy was being lifted off container ships. This year, instead of going “down the shore”, I found myself going down to the port, and this is where I spent my summer break from General Theological Seminary.

In the past 3 months, I’ve visited an average of two ships a day, three days a week—about 54 ships. Since most ships’ crews are about 20–24 people strong, I impacted the lives of over 1,000 seafarers either directly or indirectly. That sounds pretty impressive until you think about the hundreds of thousands of seafarers on the ocean every day. These men and women work 24/7/365 to bring us

our “stuff,” and yet most consumers do not know them at all.

As I sit down to refl ect on my summer of climbing up gangways, selling phone cards, transporting seafarers to Jersey Gardens shopping mall and sitting in the newly remodeled seafarers’ center, I recall speaking with a Chief Mate. In the midst of our hour-long conversation, he told Chaplain Megan Sanders and me that he felt like we were “real people.” Living on the ship is almost like living in a hotel—meals are provided; beds are clean, dry and warm. The only thing that you have to give up is … everything. You see the same faces for four, six, ten months. You never see your family. You do not have a normal life. But you do this because you need to— because you have parents and siblings and wives and children to whom you send the money that you make on board ship.

During my time at SCI, the chaplains and I helped seafarers feel like “real

people.” We worked to extend a welcoming handshake or hug. We provided tools that allowed individuals to call, Skype or email home. We sold phone cards and SIM cards—I now know more about cell phone plans than I ever thought I would. We looked every seafarer in the eye and recognized his or her humanity. Chaplains don’t think about the port in terms of export and import; rather, we look at the port as full of strangers and friends.

I believe SCI fulfi lls the mission Christ commanded his disciples to assume, acting each day and in every way in an honest and reciprocal way. I feel privileged to have worked at SCI for this summer break. I have learned more about hospitality and community in these three months from seafarers and the chaplains who serve them than I can express in a few short paragraphs. Thank you, SCI, for showing me how to be a better Christian in my daily life and work.

InterestedininternshipsatSCI?Contactvolunteer@seamenscurch.org

Samantha Smith (pictured center), Partner, Director of Client Service and Marketing, Capital

Counsel, became involved with SCI through her business connection with former SCI Chairman George Isdale.

8•TheSeamen’sChurchInstitute TheLookout Fall2011

Ways to Give to SCISupport the people who deliver the goods that make our modern way of life possible.

Donate Donate online at http://

smschur.ch/give2sci or scan this QR code into your mobile device

Use the envelope in this edition of The Lookout or mail your check to The Seamen’s Church Institute, 241 Water Street, New York, NY 10038.

Call 212-349-9090 and make a contribution over the phone with your credit card.

SponsorSCI provides prominent recognition to its underwriters. Become a corporate sponsor and link your company’s philanthropy with North America’s largest and most comprehensive mariners’ service agency.

VolunteerSCI offers many ways volunteers can contribute to the work of the Institute. Call one of our centers or email volunteer@seamenschurch.org.

CollectIn addition to handknit scarves and hats, SCI’s Christmastime gift to mariners includes items found at most ordinary supermarkets donated by people like you. To fi nd out more, contact cas@seamenschurch.org or visit our website.

Follow Go to http://facebook.com/

seamenschurch and click “like.”

Follow @seamenschurch on Twitter

Check out our photos at http://www.fl ickr.com/photos/seamenschurch/

And, watch videos from our work at http://vimeo.com/channels/scitv

Remember SCI in your estate plans. Email legacygiving@seamenschurch.org for more information.

Meet Samantha Smith. Samantha came on board serving as a member of SCI’s Young Friends, a group of new faces dedicated to advancing and supporting the Institute’s

ministry to mariners. As a leader in that group, Samantha has spoken out on behalf of SCI and merchant mariners. This fall, Samantha took the podium at SCI’s Pilot Boat Harbor Cruise, relaying her passion for our work and explaining why she remains an avid supporter of SCI. Recently, Samantha told us…

“ I am impressed with the evolution and changes I have seen over the

last ten years—a new building in Port Newark, which strengthens the

mission and brings services closer to seafarers; educational programs

that allow SCI to raise standards in the industry; staff development;

and humanitarian outreach … really, the whole mission of raising

awareness of what seafarers do. Every facet of SCI works towards promoting

seafarers. SCI gives critical support to a relatively unknown population that

enriches our everyday lives. I encourage anyone even remotely interested in SCI

to take a port tour/ship visit with a chaplain to witness the work fi rsthand. ”

Samantha’s generosity continues this fall when she hosts a small event at her apartment in New York to introduce new people to the work of SCI. You can follow Samantha’s lead by hosting an event of your own, too. To learn more, contact volunteer@seamenschurch.org. Thanks to outspoken supporters like Samantha, more and more people will know about the contributions of mariners working our world’s oceans and rivers.

Want to share your story ofSCI’sministry?Emailusat sci@seamenschurch.org

Your support makes a difference in the lives of the mariners we serve.