Mendenhall Lecture set Tuesday night at DPU

Monday, October 4, 2021
James K. A. Smith

James K. A. Smith, a professor of philosophy at Calvin University, will come to DePauw University Tuesday, Oct. 5 as a speaker for the Mendenhall Lecture Series.

The series focuses on the academic discussion of Christianity and is offered by DePauw’s Center for Spiritual Life and supported by the Bishop Matthew Simpson Endowment and Kerrilla Beamer Fund.

Smith’s lecture, titled “When are We? Facing Our Forgetting and Discerning our Future,” asks listeners to take history seriously and consider the burdens and possibilities that they have inherited. He explores whether people have lost the practice of imagining a different future and forgotten how to hope.

Trained as a philosopher with a focus on contemporary French thought, Smith has expanded on that scholarly platform to become an engaged public intellectual and cultural critic. An award-winning author and a widely traveled speaker, he has emerged as a thought leader with a gift of translation, building bridges between the academy, society and the church.

The lecture, which is free and open to the public, is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. at Gobin United Methodist Church.

Rev. Marmaduke H. Mendenhall in 1905 endowed a lectureship at DePauw that has enabled the university to bring speakers of national and international prominence to campus.

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