Indiana Wesleyan University to host fifth annual Luther Lee Lecture

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The John Wesley Honors College at Indiana Wesleyan University will host its fifth annual Luther Lee Lecture Series at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, March 20 at College Wesleyan Church in Marion, Indiana. This year’s lecture, titled “The Hope of Difference in a Fractured World,” will explore that central to Christian theology is the idea that we are dependent on other people. But, we live in a world that has created structures and divisions—particularly along race and gender lines—that too often hide our need for people who aren’t like us. 
 
The lecture will feature Brian Bantum, an associate professor of Theology at Seattle Pacific University. His teaching and research focus on the intersection of theology and identity, exploring how the claims of Christian identity are illuminated and challenged by the realities of race, ethnicity and gender. He is the author of “Redeeming Mulatto: A Theology of Race and Christian Hybridity” and “The Death of Race: Building a New Christianity in a Racial World.”
 
“The Church has a responsibility to be ambassadors of reconciliation across those social divides that separate us,” said Dr. Rusty Hawkins, Luther Lee Lecture Series coordinator and associate dean of John Wesley Honors College. “And we do this reconciliation work not out of a sense of political correctness or in the name of tolerance, rather, Christians should be reconcilers in order to demonstrate the tangible power of the Gospel to transform lives.” 
 
The Luther Lee Lecture is named in honor of the nineteenth century abolitionist, feminist and co-founder of the Wesleyan denomination. Highlighting research occurring at the intersection of race, class, and/or gender and the Christian faith, the annual public lecture supports theologically informed visions of cultural responsiveness and provides resources to assist Christians in becoming ambassadors of reconciliation to a divided and broken world.
 
“Helping equip Christians to live into the reconciled lives to which we are all called is what the Luther Lee lecture is all about,” said Hawkins. “Dr. Bantum will be a stellar addition to the long line of prominent scholars we’ve had come to campus for this lecture series.”
 
For more information on the John Wesley Honors College, visit www.indwes.edu/academics/jwhc/.