From the CS Lewis Institute: July 8, 15, 22
Summer Pub Series: Christianity and the American Experiment
As the United States approaches the 250th anniversary of its founding, questions about citizenship, community, and public responsibility remain as pressing as ever.
What does faithful citizenship look like today? How should Christians engage public life in a free and pluralistic society?
And what wisdom do the Church’s traditions offer for the challenges we face?
Join us this July for Christianity & the American Experiment: Conversations on Faith, Citizenship, and Public Life, a three-part series exploring these questions through conversations on localism/subsidiarity, religious liberty, and the virtues necessary for healthy public discourse.
While each evening can stand on its own, the series is designed to be experienced as a whole. We hope you’ll join us for all three conversations as we explore how Christian faith can inform and enrich our common life together.
July 8 – Dustin Messer
Christian Nationalism Localism: Renewing Society Through Revitalizing Neighborhoods.
As Alexander De Tocqueville taught us, the fabric of America is woven from local communities and held together by neighborliness. Technological, economic, and spiritual forces are uprooting citizens from their localities, thus fraying our societal fabric. The church can mend what’s torn in America by engaging culture on a human scale: in neighborhoods.
About the Speaker
Dr. Dustin Messer serves as Vicar of All Saints Dallas and teaches at Reformed Theological Seminary–Dallas. A writer, theologian, and speaker, he previously taught at The King’s College in New York City and serves as an Envoy for Langham Partnership, the ministry founded by John Stott to promote biblical scholarship around the world. He holds degrees from Boyce College, Covenant Theological Seminary, and La Salle University.
July 15 – Gannon Sims
Dissenters and Citizens: Why Baptists Championed Religious Freedom for Everyone
As a religious minority often viewed with suspicion, early Baptists learned that freedom secured only for themselves would never be secure for long. Their defense of liberty of conscience and religious freedom became a defining contribution to the American experiment. Drawing on this history, Gannon Sims explores how the Baptist tradition understood pluralism, why it mattered to the nation’s founding, and what it might offer to all Christians seeking to engage public life faithfully today.
About the Speaker
Gannon Sims serves as Senior Pastor of Cliff Temple Baptist Church in Dallas and is a founding director of Fresh Expressions North America, a movement helping churches develop new forms of mission and community. A church planter and author of Bringing Church Home, he is passionate about discipleship, evangelism, and the role of Christian communities in public life. He holds degrees from Baylor University and Duke Divinity School.
July 22 – Fr. Joshua Whitfield
Faithful Speach in a Fractured Age: Eloquence, Charity and the Christian Voice
Long before social media and twenty-four-hour news cycles, Cicero argued that healthy societies depend upon citizens capable of speaking wisely, persuasively, and for the common good. Drawing on this classical tradition and its Christian reception, Fr. Joshua Whitfield explores how eloquence, character, and virtue shape public life. What might Christians contribute to our civic discourse if they learned not only to hold strong convictions, but also to speak with wisdom, charity, and integrity?
About the Speaker
Fr. Joshua Whitfield serves as Pastoral Administrator of St. Rita Catholic Community in Dallas. A priest, author, and contributing columnist for the Dallas Morning News, he writes and speaks frequently on faith, culture, preaching, and public life. He is the author of several books, including The Crisis of Bad Preaching and Eucharist: Bread of Life, and holds degrees in theology from Duke University and the University of Leeds.
