Friday, May 01, 2020

DR. TOD BOLSINGER AND DR. MICHAEL GORMAN TO SPEAK AT 2020 CHURCH OF THE BRETHREN ANNUAL CONFERENCE

ELGIN, IL – Dr. Tod Bolsinger and Dr. Michael J. Gorman, two nationally acclaimed church leaders, will be featured resource persons at the 2020 Church of the Brethren Annual Conference to be held July 1-5, 2020, at DeVos Place Convention Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Dr. Bolsinger will be the featured speaker at an all-conference equipping session on Friday, July 3, where he will address “Doing Church in Uncharted Territory.” On Thursday, July 2, he will speak at the Moderator’s Dinner on the topic of “Adventure or Die” and lead an insight session themed “Standing the Heat, Surviving the Sabotage.” He will also speak at a breakfast event Friday morning, July 3, on “The Fire and the Anvil.”

Dr. Gorman will resource the Church of the Brethren Minister’s Association pre-conference on June 30 and July 1. His focus will be “1 Corinthians: Challenges for Today’s Church.” He will also serve as Bible study leader each morning for the entire Annual Conference on selected passages from the book of Revelation. In addition, Dr. Gorman will lead an insight session on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday evenings on the topic “Reading the Bible Missionally.” On Saturday, he will speak at a luncheon on the theme “Non-Violence in the Writings of Paul.”

Dr. Tod Bolsinger serves as Vice President and Chief of Leadership Formation at Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, California. Previously, he served the seminary as Vice President of Vocation and Formation and Assistant Professor of Practical Theology. Holding both a PhD in Theology and Master of Divinity from Fuller, Dr. Bolsinger also serves as an executive coach for corporate, nonprofit, educational, and church organizations in transformational leadership. He has authored three books, including his most recent, Canoeing the Mountains: Christian Leadership in Uncharted Territory. For seventeen years, he was the senior pastor of San Clemente Presbyterian Church in San Clemente, California, after serving for ten years at First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood. Dr. Bolsinger and his wife Beth have two children.

Dr. Michael J. Gorman holds the Raymond E. Brown Chair in Biblical Studies and Theology at St. Mary’s Seminary & University in Baltimore, Maryland. He has taught at St. Mary’s since 1991, as well as serving as the Dean of St. Mary’s Ecumenical Institute from 1995 to 2012. Dr. Gorman is the author of nearly twenty books and scores of articles, including several books on Paul; books on Revelation, the Gospel of John, and the atonement; volumes on biblical interpretation; and short books on topics in Christian ethics. Dr. Gorman received his B.A. in French from Gordon College and his M.Div. and Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary, where he taught Greek. He is a member of the Society of Biblical Literature and an elected member of the Society for New Testament Studies. A United Methodist layperson, Dr. Gorman is a frequent lecturer at churches, institutions of higher education, and clergy gatherings of many traditions in the U.S. and abroad. He is married to his high school sweetheart, Nancy, and they have three adult children.

For more information on the 2020 Annual Conference, entitled “God’s Adventurous Future,” visit the Annual Conference website at www.brethren.org/ac/.