Albie Sachs.

South African human rights activist Justice Albert Sachs, a foe of apartheid and key player in overturning South Africa’s ban on gay marriage, offers a talk at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 24, in the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave.

Part of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships’ Civic Forum Series, Sachs’ talk is titled Ubuntu: An African Contribution to the Universality of Human Rights. Admission is open to the public at no cost.

The event is co-sponsored by the Office of Intercultural Education; the Multifaith Chaplaincy; the departments of politics, African American studies, anthropology and sociology; the divisions of social sciences and humanities; the Program in Women and Gender Studies; and the Justice for Women Lecture Series of the University of Maine School of Law.

For more information, please call 207-786-6202.

An African National Congress activist during the apartheid years in South Africa, Sachs went on to play an important role in the creation of the country’s first democratic constitution. He gained international attention again in 2005 as the author of the Constitutional Court’s holding that overturned South Africa’s ban on gay marriage.

In 1955, at the age of 21, Sachs opened a law practice. He represented South Africans charged under racial statutes and security laws, with many of his clients risking the death penalty. As a result of this work, his practice was restricted, he was arrested, and was put in solitary confinement for 168 days without a trial.

Sachs went to England in 1966, later moving to Mozambique to teach law. In 1988, while he was teaching in exile, South African agents planted a bomb in his car. The explosion killed a passer-by and cost Sachs an arm and the vision in one eye.

Though he never quit working against apartheid in exile, the bombing moved him to fully devote himself once again to effecting democracy in South Africa.

With regime change achieved in 1990, Sachs served on the Constitutional Committee and advocated strongly for the inclusion of a Bill of Rights and an independent judiciary, as well as rights to housing, health care and other essentials. In 1994, after the first democratic election, President Nelson Mandela appointed Sachs as a justice in the Constitutional Court.

Sachs led the creation of the 1996 South African post-apartheid constitution and was involved in several landmark rulings for the new country, such as the overturning of the gay marriage ban.

Sachs has traveled all over the world to speak about human rights and how to achieve them in partitioned societies. He juggles his passion for human rights with interests in art and architecture, and had a voice in the design of the Constitutional Court Building and the creation of its art collection.

He has written several books, including The Jail Diary of Albie Sachs (Harvill Press, 1966), published during his time in exile in England but banned in his home country. In 1991, Sachs won the Alan Paton Award for his book Soft Vengeance of a Freedom Fighter (University of California Press). His most recent title is The Strange Alchemy of Life and Law, published by Oxford University Press in 2009.

Sponsored by the Multifaith Chaplaincy and the Office of the Special Assistant to the President for Diversity and Inclusion, the event is open to the public at no cost. Audience questions will be welcome. For more information, please call 207-786-8272.

Kirk Read, professor of French and francophone studies at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, will moderate the panel. The panelists are:

Angela Bauer-Levesque, academic dean and Harvey H. Guthrie, Jr. Professor of Bible, Culture, and Interpretation at the Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, Mass.;

the Rev. Patrick Cheng, professor of historical and systematic theology at Episcopal Divinity School;

the Rev. Raymond Clothier, a United Church of Christ pastor, college chaplain and social worker living in Lewiston;

and the Rev. Joseph Daniels, a Roman Catholic priest and the pastor of Corpus Christi Parish, Waterville.

In her teaching and writing, Bauer-Levesque has emphasized various aspects of social location (gender, race, sexual identity) and their impact on biblical interpretation. Her publications include The Indispensable Guide to the Old Testament (Pilgrim Press, 2009); Seeing God in Diversity: Exodus and Acts, coauthored with Episcopal Divinity School alumna Elizabeth Magill (Morehouse Publishing, 2006); and Gender in the Book of Jeremiah: A Feminist-Literary Reading (Peter Lang Publishing, 2003), as well as various essays in anthologies.

A writer and editor for the website Out in Scripture, Bauer-Levesque has served as a co-chair of the Feminist Hermeneutics and the Bible section of the Society of Biblical Literature for the past six years.

Cheng was appointed to the faculty of Episcopal Divinity in 2010. His research interests relate to the intersections of sexuality, race, ethics and theology. He is the author of Radical Love: An Introduction to Queer Theology (Seabury, 2011), which has been used by seminaries and congregations around the world. His most recent book is From Sin to Amazing Grace: Discovering the Queer Christ (Seabury, 2012).

Cheng is an ordained minister with the Metropolitan Community Churches, and he blogs for the Religion and Gay Voices sections of the Huffington Post.

Clothier has particular experience with spiritual direction and guiding people as they discern vocation. For the last 11 years, he helped students explore connections between work and meaning through the Faith and Work Initiative at Millsaps College in Jackson, Miss. He has served as a college chaplain at Millsaps and at Nazareth College of Rochester.

He has also been an HIV social worker for the University of Mississippi Medical Center and an outreach worker to the homeless mentally ill in Nashville.

Daniels was ordained a priest in 1990 and served the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland in various parishes, colleges and hospitals thereafter. He teaches in the formation program for the Permanent Diaconate as a facilitator with Loyola University New Orleans and frequently addresses issues pertaining to bioethics and end-of-life care.

Renowned journalist and political activist Andrew Sullivan will speak at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 4, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave. His topic: The Politics of Homosexuality.

Open to the public at no cost, the event is sponsored by the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Republicans, and co-sponsored so far by the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Democrats, Catholic Student Community, Hillel, the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ Libertarians, the John Galt Press, the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Student Government, the Office of the Dean of Students, and the departments of theater and rhetoric, sociology and political science.

OUTfront, an organization representing gay, lesbian and transgendered students at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, hosts a post-speech reception and book-signing that is open to the public.

One of the most incisive political and social commentators writing today, Sullivan is an essayist for Time magazine and a columnist for the Sunday Times of London.

He is also editor of the Website , a daily destination for readers seeking informed commentary on subjects ranging from international affairs and domestic politics to culture, religion and faith. Sullivan is one of the leading voices in the nation today calling for the acceptance of gay marriage.

“We are thrilled about Mr. Sullivan’s visit,” stated Andrew Simon, a ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ senior from Cincinnati and president of the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College Republicans. “With the recent events across the nation and the new political relevance of the topic of gay marriage, Mr. Sullivan’s speech will be timely and provocative.”

The former editor-in-chief of The New Republic, Sullivan was the youngest editor in the magazine’s history and was acknowledged for making it more relevant to readers of his generation. He was named Editor of the Year by Adweek and received National Magazine Awards for reporting, general excellence and public interest.

A seasoned lecturer, Sullivan has spoken extensively on college campuses and appears on numerous television and radio programs, including ABC’s Nightline, CBS Evening News, National Public Radio’s Fresh Air, Hardball and Larry King Live. His articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal.

Sullivan is the author of Virtually Normal: An Argument About Homosexuality (Knopf, 1995), Same Sex Marriage: Pro and Con: A Reader (Vintage, 1997) and Love Undetectable: Notes on Friendship, Sex and Survival (Vintage, 1999). A practicing Catholic, he has challenged the Church’s position on gay life and has written extensively on the crisis in the Church.

For more information about Sullivan, visit his Website, www.andrewsullivan.com. For more information about his ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ appearance, contact Simon at 513-503-4861 (cell).