Our speakers include some of the top theologians, academics, artists, musicians, and writers practicing at the intersection of theology and the arts. Echoing the surprising encounter of Jesus and humankind in the Nicene Creed, conference speakers will be brought together in new and surprising ways, across genres, mediums, and disciplines, offering fresh and revitalizing insight on important credal topics of the past and their impact on the present and future.
SPEAKERS
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Author of Orchestra of Minorities and The Fisherman
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Author of Women and the Gender of God and Hebrews: A Commentary for Christian Formation
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Poet-Priest and author of The Singing Bowl
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Rowan Williams was confirmed in 2002 as the 104th bishop of the See of Canterbury: the first Welsh successor to St. Augustine of Canterbury and the first archbishop since the mid-thirteenth century to be appointed from beyond the English Church. He was born in Swansea, south Wales, and was educated at Dynevor School in Swansea and Christ’s College, Cambridge, where he studied theology. He received his DPhil from Wadham College, Oxford, in 1975. From 1977, he spent nine years in academic and parish work in Cambridge. In 1986, he returned to Oxford as Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity and Canon of Christ Church. He became a fellow of the British Academy in 1990. Williams is an accomplished poet and translator and an outstanding theological writer, scholar, and teacher. His interests include music, fiction, and languages. His favorite poets include William Wordsworth, John Keats, and William Shakespeare. His numerous books include On Christian Theology (2000), Being Human (2018), Christ the Heart of Creation (2018), The Collected Poems (2021), and Passions of the Soul (2024).
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Award-winning composer of When Stone Becomes Forest, winner of the 2022 American Prize
Former Archbishop of Canterbury
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Chigozie Obioma was born in Akure, Nigeria. His novels, The Fishermen (2015) and An Orchestra of Minorities (2019), were shortlisted for The Booker Prize. He is also the author of The Road to the Country (2024) released in June 2024. His novels have been translated into more than 29 languages. They have won awards including the inaugural FT/Oppenheimer Award for Fiction, the NAACP Image Award, the Internationaler Literaturpreis, and the LA Times Book Prize, and been nominated for many others. The Fishermen was adapted into an award-winning stage play by Gbolahan Obisesan that played in the U.K. and South Africa between 2018–2019. Obioma was named one of Foreign Policy’s 100 Leading Global Thinkers of 2015 and is the Helen S. Lanier Professor of Creative Writing and English at the University of Georgia and the program director of the Oxbelly Fiction Writers retreat. He divides his time between the U.S. and Nigeria.
Sandra McCracken is a singer-songwriter and hymn writer from Nashville, Tennessee. A prolific recording artist, McCracken has produced 14 solo albums over two decades. Her best-selling release, Psalms (2015), received critical acclaim, followed by God’s Highway (2017) which made the top 50 on Billboard Heatseekers chart without a major label. She has had songs featured on TV, including “Ten Thousand Angels” on ABC’s Grey’s Anatomy, and has over 15 million streams. Blending the old and new, Sandra has also shown a unique ability to recast sacred scripture texts into theologically rich yet accessible songs. Her thoughtful lyrics and gospel melodies in songs like “We Will Feast in the House Of Zion,” “Steadfast,” and “Thy Mercy My God” have become staple anthems in churches across the U.S. As a published writer, she contributes a regular column in Christianity Today and released her first book “Send Out Your Light” in September 2021.
Amy Peeler is the Kenneth T. Wessner Chair of Biblical Studies and Professor of New Testament at Wheaton College. She serves as Associate Priest at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Geneva, IL. Author most recently of Hebrews: A Commentary for Christian Formation (Eerdmans 2024),Women and the Gender of God (Eerdmans 2022), and The New Testament in Color: A Multiethnic Bible Commentary (ed.), she is currently finishing the second volume of Women and the Gender of God and beginning to work on a commentary on the Pastoral Epistles in the NICNT series, for which she serves as Associate Editor. Peeler holds a Ph.D. in New Testament from Princeton Theological Seminary and has served as a Senior Research Fellow with the Logos Institute at the University of St. Andrews. She is an active member of the Institute for Biblical Research, Society of Biblical Literature, and a Fellow with the Center for Pastor Theologians.
James K. A. Smith is Professor of Philosophy at Calvin University where he holds the Gary & Henrietta Byker Chair. As a scholar, Smith has embraced the vocation of being a “translator” of philosophy for wider audiences. As a cultural critic and commentator, he explores the tensions of modern life, inviting readers and audiences to more intentional practices of faith and flourishing. He is the award-winning author of a number of influential books including Desiring the Kingdom (2009), How (Not) To Be Secular: Reading Charles Taylor (2014), You Are What You Love: The Spiritual Power of Habit (2016), On the Road with Saint Augustine (2019), The Nicene Option: An Incarnational Phenomenology (2021), and most recently, How to Inhabit Time: Understanding the Past, Facing the Future, Living Faithfully Now (2022). He is currently at work on a book about contemplative spirituality and contemporary art. Smith served as editor in chief of Comment magazine (2013–2018) and Image journal (2019–2024).
Malcolm Guite is the former chaplain of Girton College, Cambridge, and an award-winning poet. He is the author of various books on contemporary spirituality, including Faith, Hope, and Poetry (2010) and What Do Christians Believe? (2009), as well as literary criticism, including the volume Mariner: A Theological Voyage with Samuel Taylor Coleridge (2018). His poems have appeared in numerous outlets and in the collected volumes Sounding the Seasons (2012),The Singing Bowl (2013), Parable and Paradox (2016), and David’s Crown (2021), among others. He is also a singer-songwriter and founder of the Cambridge-based blues band Mystery Train, and has collaborated with Andrew Peterson and the Rabbit Room since 2013. In 2023, he was awarded the Lanfranc Award for Education and Scholarship, for his outstanding multifaceted promotion of the Gospels through poetry, public speaking, and scholarship.
Natalie Carnes is a constructive theologian invested in questions that cross the fields of aesthetics, feminism, and systematics. She has published several books pursuing such questions, including Beauty: A Theological Engagement with Gregory of Nyssa (Cascade 2014), Image and Presence: A Christological Reflection on Iconcoclasm and Iconophilia (Stanford 2017), Motherhood: A Confession (Stanford 2017), and most recently Attunement: The Art and Politics of Feminist Theology (OUP 2024). She is currently at work on a co-authored volume with Matthew Whelan on art and poverty, beginning a project on creativity that draws from psychological literature, and guest editing a special edition of Modern Theology on divine action and the transcendence of God. After training at Harvard, University of Chicago, and Duke, Natalie began teaching at Baylor University, where she is Professor of Theology in the Religion Department, Affiliate Faculty member in Women’s and Gender Studies, and the Director of the Baylor Initiative in Christianity and the Arts.
Josh Rodriguez is an award-winning composer known for his energetic rhythms, rich harmonic language, and striking colors. Born in Argentina and raised in Guatemala, Mexico, and the United States, Rodriguez’s musical imagination has been formed by this bilingual and multicultural heritage. He collaborates regularly with theatre and film directors and has received several notable concert commissions in a wide range of musical genres. His works include Dos Palabras (winner of the Springfield Chamber Chorus Composition Competition 2022), When Stone Becomes Forest (winner of the American Prize - Professional Band Division 2022), Partita Picosa (a 5-movement piece for solo piano), Contra Spem Spero (violin chamber concerto), and That Crazed Girl Improvising (piano trio), all of which were finalists for the American Prize. Rodriguez serves as Associate Professor of Music Theory and Composition at Elmhurst University. His music can be found on YouTube, Bandcamp, Instagram, Spotify, and at joshrodriguezmusic.com.
