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Academics

Menno Simons Lectures

The Menno Simons Lectureship endowment fund promotes research and public lectures by recognized scholars relating to Anabaptist-Mennonite history, thought, life and culture, both past and present.

In 1950, the John P. and Carolina Schrag Kaufman family established the Menno Simons Lectureship Endowment. In 1997, the family of William E. and Meta Goering Juhnke contributed substantially to the endowment. The Kaufman and Juhnke families had their roots in the Eden Mennonite Church, Moundridge, Kan.

2022

Brad S. Gregory presented "The Radical Reformation and the Makings of the Modern World." Gregory is Henkels Family College Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame, where he has taught since 2003. From 1996 to 2003, he taught at Stanford University. He specializes in the history of Christianity in Europe during the Reformation era and on the long-term influence of the Reformation era on the modern world. Gregory earned his Ph.D. in history at Princeton University and was a Junior Fellow in the Harvard Society of Fellows. He also has two degrees in philosophy from the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. He has received two teaching awards at Stanford and three more at Notre Dame. Gregory is the author of the award-winning books Salvation at Stake: Christian Martyrdom in Early Modern Europe (Harvard, 1999), his first, and The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society (Belknap, 2012). His most recent book is Rebel in the Ranks: Martin Luther, the Reformation, and the Conflicts that Continue to Shape Our World (Harper, 2017).

Lecture 1: "In Pursuit of Christian Freedom, 1520-1790"

Lecture 2: "Be Careful What You Wish For, 1790-Present"

If you would like to be notified of upcoming Menno Simons Lectures as they are announced, please sign up for email notifications here: https://forms.gle/87Mmk69CZ3r44KVZ8

Past lectures

List of past speakers (PDF)

About Bethel

As the first Mennonite college founded in North America, Bethel College celebrates a tradition of progressive Christian liberal arts education, diversity within community, and lifelong learning.