Symposium

GORDON COLLEGE SPRING SYMPOSIUM—A TRADITION!
Thursday, April 19, 2012

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS
	Join the Conversation! Tweet #GCSymposium during the event to join the conversation on Twitter.

Theme—"Hope: Making All Things New"

In a time of leadership transition at Gordon College, in a time of worldwide economic and political uncertainty, in a time of immense future promises in the realms of medicine and biotechnology, what are we to make of the Christian virtue of hope?

Traditionally, hope has been understood as one of the three “theological virtues,” derived from I Corinthian 13: 13: “And now these three remain: faith, hope, love. But the greatest of these is love.” We know, then, that love is important, and, as a Protestant community, we know that faith (“faith alone”) is important . . . but what of hope? How do we think well about what the theologian N. T. Wright calls “the ultimate Christian hope” beyond our broken world and hope “for transformation, new possibilities in the present.” And what is the proper relationship between the ultimate and the penultimate?

Purpose and Application Information
The purpose of the Gordon College Symposium is to allow students, faculty and staff to engage in conversation about a major contemporary or perennial issue toward the goal of learning from one another. This year we are especially keen to receive applications that evince student-faculty collaboration, but all applications are welcome. The events of Symposium day (April 19, 2012) will take place mainly in the Ken Olsen Science Center. Coffee and tea will be served in the loggia throughout the day. A faculty keynote lecture (given this year by John Skillen) will close the symposium. Applications may consist of (but are not limited to): panel discussions, debates, interviews, drama, art displays, music, and more.
The application deadline is March 23, 2012.

Past and present themes include:

• 1998–Money and Possessions: Greed or Generosity
• 1999–Art at the Millennium: Makers and Consumers of Culture
• 2000–Who Is My Neighbor? Rights and Responsibilities at the Millennium
• 2001–Body Talk: Embodiment as Blessing, Constraint, and Offense
• 2002–Seeds of Redemption: Evidences of Things Hoped For
• 2003–Work and Play
• 2004–Vocation: Called to Make a Life-Called to Make a Difference
• 2005–The Coming of Global Christianity: Turning the World Upside Down
• 2006–Peace, Justice and Reconciliation: Can You Have One Without the Other
• 2007–Authenticity: To Know Truly and be Truly Known
• 2008–Shalom: The Right Order of Things
• 2009–Creation Care: The Challenges and Opportunities of the Ecological Crisis
• 2010–The Image of God: Who are we that God is mindful of us?
• 2011–Origins and Originality: Keeping the Faith
• 2012–Hope: Making All Things New | keynote address
• 2013—What is Beauty?