In Memoriam: Marguerite Shuster

With sorrow yet also with gratitude for her life and legacy, Fuller Seminary announces the passing of Rev. Dr. Marguerite Shuster, Harold John Ockenga Professor Emerita of Preaching and Theology. Dr. Shuster joined Fuller’s faculty in 1992, after years as adjunct assistant professor, and taught until 2013, continuing from then as professor emerita. She died peacefully in Pasadena, California, on April 29, 2026, surrounded by beloved family and friends. She was 78.

Dr. Shuster held a BA in psychology from Stanford University (1968), an MDiv from Fuller Seminary (1975), and a PhD in clinical psychology from Fuller Seminary (1977). A recipient of a Rockefeller “Trial Year in Seminary” Fellowship, she entered Fuller as the only woman in her PhD and MDiv programs. Coming to Fuller with plans to become a clinical psychologist, she was resistant about her MDiv’s required homiletics course and once recalled, “I sat down to write my first sermon with, shall we say, a bad attitude. But God is full of surprises. In writing that sermon, it was as if I felt the heavens open, and my entire reason for being at Fuller changed and never wavered.” Shuster would go on to be ordained as a Presbyterian minister, at a time when only about 3 percent of Presbyterian clergy were women, and to serve in pastoral positions at Arcadia Presbyterian Church and then at Knox Presbyterian Church in Pasadena, where she was the first woman pastor since its founding in 1895. She served at Knox until 1992, when she accepted the call to serve at Fuller as a professor.

At Fuller, Shuster taught courses such as Homiletics, Systematic Theology, Making Doctrine Live, and various preaching practica, among others. Her published books include The Fall and Sin: What We Have Become as Sinners (2004), Perspectives on Christology: Essays in Honor of Paul K. Jewett (1991), and Power, Pathology, Paradox: The Dynamics of Evil and Good (1987). She also edited and completed Jewett’s Who We Are: Our Dignity as Human (1996) and published many articles, sermons, chapters, and reviews. Because her academic training centered on the integration of psychology and theology, many of her publications focused on the question of human flourishing in a broken world.

Shuster was a trailblazer for women in ministry, a profound scholar, a passionate minister of the Word and Sacrament, and an exacting exegete. She was an impactful mentor and pastor who touched countless lives and will be remembered for the way she challenged and guided others to read Scripture deeply and to hold God’s word with reverence. We are profoundly grateful for her lifelong witness and her faithful legacy.

A memorial service for Rev. Dr. Marguerite Shuster will be held Monday, June 8th, 4:00 pm, at Knox Presbyterian Church in Pasadena. All are invited to attend.