On Tuesday, June 3, Phil Schifflin, Esq., Director of SCI’s Center for Mariner Advocacy conducted a training session for U.S. Coast Guard personnel assigned to Marine Safety Unit Morgan City. The session began with a brief overview of the Seamen’s Church Institute’s three mission areas: chaplain support for mariners, mariner training, and advocacy. Following this […]
Read MoreThe Rev. Nancy Simpson — Chaplain, Ministry on the River, Houston Ship Channel & Gulf Coast Region From the June 2025 Quarterly Activity Report Before I began my calling as a Chaplain with the Seamen’s Church Institute, moving from one ministry to another, my bishop offered a simple reminder: keep singing. I had sung in […]
Read MoreThe Rev. Geoffrey Davis — Chaplain, Ministry on the River, Lower Mississippi & Gulf Coast Region From the June 2025 Quarterly Activity Report As a mariner, the arrival of spring marked the beginning of painting season onboard vessels. I remember it well from my own time as a mariner. Painting was a shared task; familiar, […]
Read More2026 Registration 48th Silver Bell Awards Dinner. June 11, 2026 • New York, NY Register Here 47th Silver Bell Awards Dinner – Recap On Thursday, June 12, the Seamen’s Church Institute hosted the 47th Annual Silver Bell Awards Dinner at New York City’s Chelsea Piers. This year, the event honored Christopher J. Wiernicki, Chairman and […]
Read Moreby the Rev. Grace Pardun Supervisory Chaplain, Ministry on the River, Upper Mississippi & Ohio River Region From the June 2025 Quarterly Activity Report On Good Friday, when many of us are preparing for the holiest weekend of the church year, I got a phone call from a maritime company. A well-loved shoreside staffer, who […]
Read MorePrecision Meets Purpose with SCI’s Maritime Simulator Training SCI’s Center for Maritime Education recently welcomed the “M/V Eagle Vellore”, a custom-built VLCC ship model, to our Houston simulation facility. Developed in collaboration with the Maritime Simulation and Resource Centre (MSRC) in Quebec, this high-fidelity simulation is slated to support training for AET’s Ship-to-Ship Lightering Mooring […]
Read MoreThe first time I visited a shipping terminal, I felt like I was on another planet. How could this world of containers, cranes, and ships—larger than anything I’d ever seen—exist in the same world I’ve known my whole life? Or a 24-person crew transporting 5,000 cars or 17,000 tons of orange juice? I was confronted […]
Read More“What do you do?” It’s a common conversation starter. Most people expect to hear about an office job or something universally understood, like being a nurse or a teacher. But 100% of the time when I answer, “I’m the Supervisory Chaplain for Ministry on the River with Seamen’s Church Institute,” people stop what they’re doing […]
Read MoreLeilany Rodriguez of Tulane Law School has been selected as the Center for Mariner Advocacy’s (CMA) summer intern for 2025. Leilany will be the thirtieth intern to serve in this capacity, continuing a partnership between the Seamen’s Church Institute and Tulane Law School that began in 1993. Leilany shares her thoughts on joining CMA: “I’m thrilled to be […]
Read MoreThe Seamen’s Church Institute’s (SCI) Center for Maritime Education (CME) was asked to provide updated data to support Texas A&M University at Galveston’s proposed dock for its new National Security Multi-Mission Vessel, utilized as a training ship for Texas A&M cadets. The request came from Capt. David Foret, of the ACTion Group and Chair of the Navigation Subcommittee, […]
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