William Sloane Coffin | |
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Coffin circa 1980
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Church | United Church of Christ |
Other posts | Riverside Church |
Orders | |
Ordination | Presbyterian church |
Personal details | |
Birth name | William Sloane Coffin Jr. |
Born | June 1, 1924 |
Died | April 12, 2006 | (aged 81)
Nationality | American |
Denomination | Presbyterian, United Church of Christ |
Spouse | Eva Rubinstein, Harriet Gibney, Virginia Randolph Wilson |
Education | Yale College, Union Theological Seminary |
Alma mater | Yale Divinity School |
Interview with William Sloane Coffin on Vietnam, the Ministry and political activism |
William Sloane Coffin Jr. (June 1, 1924 – April 12, 2006) was an American Christian clergyman and long-time peace activist. He was ordained in the Presbyterian church and later received ministerial standing in the United Church of Christ. In his younger days he was an athlete, a talented pianist, a CIA agent, and later chaplain of Yale University, where the influence of Reinhold Niebuhr's social philosophy led him to become a leader in the Civil Rights Movement and peace movements of the 1960s and 1970s. He also was a member of the secret society Skull and Bones. He went on to serve as Senior Minister at the Riverside Church in New York City and President of SANE/Freeze (now Peace Action), the nation's largest peace and justice group, and prominently opposed United States military interventions in conflicts such as the Vietnam War to the Iraq War. He was also an ardent supporter of gay rights.
William Sloane Coffin Jr. was born into the wealthy elite of New York City. His paternal great-grandfather William Sloane was a Scottish immigrant and co-owner of the very successful W. & J. Sloane Company. His uncle was Henry Sloane Coffin, president of Union Theological Seminary and one of the most famous ministers in the U.S. His father, William Sloane Coffin, Sr. was president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and an executive in the family business.