Krister Stendahl

National Catholic Reporter, May 2, 2008

The dean of Harvard Divinity School from 1968 to 1979, credited with opening the school to women and African-Americans, Krister Stendahl, died April 15. He was 86. An ordained Lutheran minister born in Sweden, Stendahl was elected bishop of Sweden in the 1980s, where he led reform efforts on women's ordination and gay rights.

In the 1990s, he became a professor :of Christian Studies at Brandeis University, a Jewish-sponsored school in Waltham, Mass., and with his wife Brita, worked on efforts to build Christian-Jewish relations.