Renewing Faith Conference featuring Thomas Jay Oord, Sheri D. Kling, Bruce Epperly, Jeff Wells, and others

Announcing the Renewing Faith Online Conference

January 23-25, 2025

We’ve started planning something really big, and we think you’ll want to hear more about it in the days to come.

Mark Your Calendars!

We hope you’ll join us on a sacred online journey to renew your faith and explore how we live into process and open & relational theology together. Let's bring more beauty into our Christian paths!

During this multi-day online event, we’ll explore several core themes of Christian faith - not academically, but in “big conversations” and practices.

Renewing Faith: A Call for Reimagination and Renewal
Renewing God: Deep Listening, Creativity, Transformation
Renewing Jesus: Atonement, Salvation
Renewing Message: Preaching, Scripture
Renewing Worship: Liturgy, Creeds, Sacraments, Aesthetics
Renewing Spirit: Practices, Religious Experience
Renewing Community: Education, Outreach, Service

We’re going to do our best to not be all heady about it, but actually drop down deeper - into our bodies and souls! It’ll be online, so body and soul can join from home.

Sign up today to receive updates!

Speakers

Thomas Jay Oord

Thomas Jay Oord, Ph.D., is a theologian, philosopher, and scholar of multi-disciplinary studies. He is an award-winning author, and he has written or edited more than thirty books. Oord directs a doctoral program at Northwind Theological Seminary and the Center for Open and Relational Theology. He won the Outstanding Faculty Award twelve times as a full-time professor and now speaks at institutions across the globe. Oord is known for his contributions to research on love, open and relational theology, science and religion, and freedom and relationships for transformation.

Sheri D. Kling

Sheri D. Kling, Ph.D., is the director of Process and Faith (Center for Process Studies of Claremont School of Theology) and the John Cobb Legacy Fund. She is also a writer, teacher, and constructive theologian who integrates the process-relational philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead and the analytical psychology of C. G. Jung for psycho-spiritual wholeness. She is a faculty member of the Haden Institute, the author of A Process Spirituality: Christian and Transreligious Resources for Transformation and Finding Home: Rural Reflections on the Journey to Wholeness and editor or contributor to several other texts. Sheri lives in Bradenton, Florida, where she enjoys Gulf breezes and local wildlife. Follow her work at https://www.sherikling.com/

Bruce Epperly

Rev. Bruce Epperly, Ph.D., is a teacher, pastor, spiritual guide, writer, lecturer, retreat leader, and reiki teacher. He is the author of over 70 books, including Finding God in Suffering: A Journey with Job, Process Theology: Embracing Adventure with God, Become Fire: Guideposts for Spiritual Pilgrims, One World: Process Theology and the Lord’s Prayer, Piglet’s Process: Process Theology for All God’s Children, and Restless Spirit. He is an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and United Church of Christ. He has served on the faculties of Georgetown University, Lancaster Theological Seminary, Wesley Theological Seminary, and Claremont School of Theology.

Jeff Wells

Rev. Jeff Wells is the lead pastor of the Church of the Village, a progressive, radically inclusive, and anti-racist community in the New York City. He preaches, practices, and promotes process-relational and open & relational theology. He is a lifelong passionate advocate for social and economic justice and for the common thriving of humans and other-than-human beings. Jeff is an active member of the Alliance for Ecological Civilization, a gathering of activists and thought leaders from around the world. He co-edited (with Thomas Jay Oord, Vikki Randall, and Nichole Torbitzky) Preaching the Uncontrolling Love of God (SacraSage Press, April 2024), a collection of sermons, essays, and worship elements from the perspective of Open, Relational, and Process theology. In 2022, he helped found and co-chaired the Living Earth Movement. With theologian and environmentalist, John B. Cobb Jr., he authored the short book, Is International Cooperation Possible? A Bold Appeal for a Living Earth (2022).