Syracuse University Chancellor J. Michael Haynie today announced the appointment of the Rev. Corey S. MacPherson, D.Min., Ph.D., as dean of Hendricks Chapel. Reporting directly to the chancellor, Dean MacPherson will guide the chapel’s multifaith community and continue its role as the spiritual and civic heart of the University. MacPherson’s appointment is effective Aug. 9 and has been approved by the Board of Trustees Executive Committee.

“Hendricks Chapel has been the spiritual heart and soul of this university for nearly 100 years, and it has meaningfully touched the lives of generations of students,” says Chancellor Haynie. “Corey has spent two decades building trust across different faiths and communities, and he knows how to lead an institution through change. I’m confident he’s the right person to lead Hendricks Chapel into its next century.”

MacPherson comes to Syracuse from Penn State University, where he currently serves as director of the Center for Spiritual and Ethical Development. In that role, he restructured the office, developed a new religious affiliate agreement and authored a strategic plan to guide the center’s future growth, supporting more than 50 religious and spiritual communities across the campus.

“Hendricks Chapel means a great deal to this University, and to me personally, and I’m honored to help lead it into its next chapter,” says MacPherson. “I’ve spent my career building spaces where people from many traditions, and no tradition, feel welcomed, respected and supported. I look forward to working with students, faculty, staff and the broader Syracuse community to carry that work forward as we approach the chapel’s 100th anniversary.”

MacPherson brings more than two decades of multifaith chaplaincy and institutional leadership to the role. From 2015 to 2025, he served as university chaplain and Protestant campus minister at Colgate University, where he supported 12 religious and secular communities, served as a voting member within the faculty governance structure and participated in the university’s Emergency Operations Command during moments of campus crisis.

Prior to that, MacPherson served from 2009 to 2015 as vice president for spiritual development and church relations at Eastern Nazarene College, where he served on the president’s cabinet and stewarded relationships with more than 700 churches that generated more than $1.3 million annually in support of the college’s mission. Earlier in his career, he founded and led North Shore Church of the Nazarene in Stony Brook, New York, growing it from a house church into a fully organized congregation.

MacPherson holds a Ph.D. in leadership studies and a master of arts degree in organizational leadership from Gonzaga University, a doctor of ministry degree from Asbury Theological Seminary and a master of divinity degree from Nazarene Theological Seminary. He is an ordained elder in the Church of the Nazarene and currently serves as a chaplain with the U.S. Army Reserve’s 403rd Civil Affairs Battalion, where he advises battalion commanders on ethical concerns and spiritual readiness. MacPherson’s chapter, “A Fractured and Divided Church: A Call to Be One,” will appear in the forthcoming edited volume “Dispatches from Campus,” set for publication by Augsburg Press in spring 2027.

“I’m grateful for the hard work of the search committee,” says Chancellor Haynie. “They moved quickly and carefully, and because of that, we’ll have a strong, experienced leader in place before the new academic year begins.”

The search committee was co-chaired by Dawn Singleton, vice president for the student experience, and David Aitken ’94, G’97, chair of the Hendricks Chapel Advisory Board, and included students, faculty, staff and alumni from across the Orange community.

MacPherson and his family have roots in Central New York, where they lived for more than a decade during his prior work at Colgate University.