Dina Zingaro was a Woman of the Week in 2021, nominated for her work in religious journalism at major news outlets such as CBS Evening News and 60 Minutes. For her undergraduate thesis, she lived in monasteries in Greece and the U.S. where she tried to understand both the nuns’ and their traditions’ beliefs about physical and spiritual motherhood, and how these women foster religious community.
In 2021, Dina told us, “Those interviews and fieldwork foreshadowed my later career in journalism. After graduation, I started at CBS News as a News Associate in the Evening News research department. A year later, I became the Broadcast Associate and Editorial Assistant to Scott Pelley, the anchor of the Evening News, and three years after that, an Associate Producer at 60 Minutes. Though I initially hoped to pursue a master’s in religion immediately after Swarthmore, the newsroom turned out to be a place ripe with opportunities to continue learning about religion. After nearly eight years at CBS News, I am now heading to Harvard Divinity School this September for a Master of Divinity.”
We asked Dina to share with us what she has been up to since then, and how her career and studies have continued:
“Since I wrote in 2022 during my first year at Harvard Divinity School, I have combined my Master of Divinity with a law degree, so I am in my fourth year of a five-year dual degree program in religion (MDiv) and law (JD) at Harvard Divinity and Law School.
“Since beginning graduate school, I have also recognized that my focus in Orthodoxy on women, sex, gender, and sexuality is also about embodiment. How we speak about having a body in relationship to the Divine can be deeply damaging or life-affirming, particularly for bodies that are Othered, whether because of gender, sexuality, race, size, or disability.
“In December 2023, I learned that women can preach in Orthodoxy. As someone who grew up in the Church but had never seen a woman preach, I was shocked but also optimistic. As my spiritual father told me, when you give a sermon, “you have the grace of the Liturgy and the Holy Spirit to speak to people’s hearts and insides.”
“So, I am preaching this academic year for my field education placement with Public Orthodoxy, the online public forum of Fordham’s Orthodox Christian Studies Center. I am publishing essays with Public Orthodoxy, and bringing a theological idea from each essay to a sermon that is in conversation with Scripture. I am being trained in preaching at Holy Cross Orthodox seminary with Fr. Luke Veronis.
“Since October, I have given four sermons, all of which can be found on my YouTube page. My first essay published as part of my field education with Public Orthodoxy was my essay, “What I’ve Learned in Eating Disorder Recovery: ‘More Spacious than the Heavens’” (read here). To accompany the essay, I gave my first sermon at my parish, St. George on West 54th St., with the blessing of Fr. Sophronios, about Paul’s letter to the Corinthians where he calls us “temples of the living God.”
“My hope for sharing this essay and sermon, in particular, is that they reach those within and beyond my Orthodox community who may also find something life-giving in the theology that has helped me reclaim my body and my faith.”
Thank you, Dina!
