2025 Speakers

Meet the Speakers

The 2025 CSC will feature 5 diverse and stimulating plenary events, all under the conference them of curating and creating community.

Plenary Events

Frank and Della Pack Plenary

Shirley Hoogstra is president emerita of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU), an educational association representing over 185 colleges and universities around the world. She is a regular speaker at conferences and campuses across the country, speaking on and for Christian higher education, and has been quoted in The Washington Post, The New York Times, World Magazine, Christianity Today, and various podcasts, radio, and news programs. She has also contributed chapters on bridge building and covenantal pluralism and writes regularly for CCCU’s Advance magazine.

Hoogstra has extensive board member experience and is serving or has served organizations such as the American Council on Education, National Immigration Forum, The Bridgeport Rescue Mission, Calvin University, National Association of Evangelicals, and The Trinity Forum.

Linda A. Livingstone is the 15th president of Baylor University, having served in that capacity since 2017. During her tenure as president, Dr. Livingstone has overseen the development and implementation of two strategic plans—Illuminate (2018-2023) and Baylor in Deeds (2024-present). These strategic plans have provided a foundation for Baylor’s aspiration to become America’s preeminent Christian research university. In addition, she led Give Light, the most successful comprehensive fundraising campaign in Baylor history. The campaign reached its fundraising goals well before its anticipated conclusion and raised over $1.5 billion for Baylor University. Enhancing the University’s academic enterprise while strengthening its Christian mission has been a key priority for Dr. Livingstone. As a result of her dynamic and collaborative leadership, Baylor was designated a Research 1 university in December 2021. Baylor is the only R1 institution with an explicit, primary identity as a Protestant Christian university.

Dr. Livingstone previously served as dean and professor of management at The George Washington University School of Business, as dean and professor of management at Pepperdine University’s Graziadio School of Business and Management, and as a tenured faculty member and associate dean of graduate programs at Baylor’s Hankamer School of Business. A native of Perkins, Oklahoma, Dr. Livingstone played basketball at Oklahoma State University, where she earned a Bachelor of Science in economics and management, a Master of Business Administration, and a Doctor of Philosophy in management and organizational behavior.

Philip J. Schubert is the president of Abilene Christian University (ACU), where he became its 11th president in June 2010. During his tenure as president of one of the largest private universities in the Southwest, ACU has experienced remarkable growth in facilities, enrollment and financial strength. Total enrollment surpassed 6,700 for the first time in history, while retention and graduation rates remain strong. More than 40 percent of ACU’s student body is racially and ethnically diverse, representing a new hallmark for the university. Abilene Christian is the highest-ranking university in Texas in a U.S. News & World Report benchmark focused on student success. It achieved Top 20 status in three of eight high-impact categories among 1,500 universities in the nation and was the only one in Texas recognized in five of the categories. ACU is a top producer of U.S. Fulbright students and was the first university in Texas to receive recognition as an Adobe Creative Campus. Endowment has grown to more than $800 million, while net worth has risen to more than $1.2 billion.

Prior to becoming president, Schubert served as executive vice president at ACU and was responsible for university-wide strategic planning as well as the oversight of operational areas. He received his B.B.A. in accounting from ACU, an MBA from Duke University, and an Ed.D. in higher education management from the University of Pennsylvania.

R. Gerald Turner is the president of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, a post he has held since 1995. Under his leadership, the university continues to advance as an institution of national excellence and international renown. SMU has achieved significant milestones, including raising the academic quality of entering undergraduate students and those in professional graduate students, increasing the number of doctoral students, increasing enrollment of underrepresented communities up to 35% and quadrupling the endowment. In 2024, after decades of strategic planning, SMU joined the prestigious Atlantic Coast Conference, expanding the university’s reputation both athletically and academically.

Before joining SMU, President Turner was the chancellor of the University of Mississippi. He previously served in administrative positions at the University of Oklahoma and Pepperdine University. A native of New Boston, Texas, he earned an A.A. degree from Lubbock Christian University, a B.S. in psychology and mathematics from Abilene Christian University and an M.A. and a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Texas at Austin. He and his wife, Gail, have two married daughters and five grandchildren.

Fred D. Gray Plenary in Human and Civil Rights

Dr. Robert George is McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. He has frequently been a visiting professor at Harvard Law School, teaching philosophy of law and related subjects.

In addition to his academic service, Professor George has served as Chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. He has also served on the President’s Council on Bioethics, as a presidential appointee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights, and as the U.S. member of UNESCO’s World Commission on the Ethics of Science and Technology. He is a former Judicial Fellow at the Supreme Court of the United States, where he received the Justice Tom C. Clark Award.

He serves on the boards of the Templeton Foundation Religion Trust, the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, the Ethics and Public Policy Center, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the Heritage Foundation, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, and the Center for Individual Rights, among others.

Professor George is author of many books including, Making Men Moral: Civil Liberties and Public Morality (Oxford University Press, 1993), In Defense of Natural Law (Oxford University Press, 1999), The Clash of Orthodoxies (ISI, 2001) and Conscience and Its Enemies (ISI, 2013). He is editor of several volumes, including Natural Law Theory: Contemporary Essays (Oxford University Press, 1992), Great Cases in Constitutional Law (Princeton University Press, 2000), and co-editor of the Cambridge Companion to Natural Law (Cambridge University Press, 2017)

Dr. Cornel West is the Dietrich Bonhoeffer Chair at Union Theological Seminary. Dr. West teaches on the works of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, as well as courses in Philosophy of Religion, African American Critical Thought, and a wide range of subjects -- including but by no means limited to, the classics, philosophy, politics, cultural theory, literature, and music. He has a passion to communicate to a vast variety of publics in order to keep alive the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. – a legacy of telling the truth and bearing witness to love and justice.

Dr. West is the former Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy at Harvard University and Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. Cornel West graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard in three years and obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. in Philosophy at Princeton.

He has written 20 books and has edited 13. He is best known for his classics, Race Matters and Democracy Matters, and for his memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud. His most recent book, Black Prophetic Fire, offers an unflinching look at nineteenth and twentieth-century African American leaders and their visionary legacies.

John T. Willis Plenary

The Dutch Lady is an anonymous play manuscript recently unearthed in the Boston Public Library by Dr. Joseph Stephenson of Abilene Christian University. Scenes from this play will be performed in ACU's Williams Performing Arts Center by the ACU Department of Theatre. With support from various sources, Stephenson's "discovery" has been performed at the University of Birmingham's Shakespeare Institute, Stratford-on-Avon and the Cockpit, Gateforth Street, London. Dr. Stephenson's achievement is considerable; not only has he tracked this work down, but he has drawn scholarly and public attention to the play in a lively and attractive manner.

Robert E. and Bonnie Cone Hooper Plenary

Benjamin Espinoza and Octavio Esqueda will moderate a plenary session that discusses The Hispanic Faculty Experience (ACU Press, 2023). This book shares accounts of Hispanic faculty working in a predominately White Christian institutions. Filled with triumphs, struggles, and penetrating insights, the chapters explain what it is like to experience the shifting demographics of today’s universities, which are bringing increasing numbers of Hispanic students even as the overall number of Hispanic colleagues remains exceedingly small. This book will be especially useful for leaders who may be unaware of how difficult it is to navigate the challenges of Christian higher education as Hispanic faculty.

Benjamin D. Espinoza serves as Vice President of Northeastern Seminary at Roberts Wesleyan University. Espinoza graduated from Cedarville University, Asbury Theological Seminary, and Michigan State University, where he earned his PhD in Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education. He is the editor of Theology and the Star Wars Universe and lead editor of Story, Formation, and Culture. Ben has written numerous articles in the areas of Christian formation and ministry, race and diversity, theological education, and leadership.

Octavio J. Esqueda is Professor of Christian Higher Education and Director of the PhD and EdD Programs in Educational Studies at Talbot School of Theology at Biola University. He graduated from the University of Guadalajara, Dallas Theological Seminary, and the University of North Texas, where he earned a PhD in Higher Education. The author of several journal articles on theological education, Christian higher education, and literature, Esqueda has coauthored Anointed Teaching and The Cruciform Faculty.

Lectures

Landon Saunders Lecture on the Human Being: the Nexus of World and Faith

Dr. John Barton is co-host of the NetVUE podcast, Callings: Conversations on College, Career, and a Life Well Lived. He serves as director of the Center for Faith and Learning at Pepperdine University, where he also has faculty appointments in the religion and philosophy division, the university’s graduate program in social entrepreneurship, and the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution at the Caruso School of Law. John’s areas of research and teaching include African philosophy, Christian and interreligious studies, and faith and philanthropy. He is the author of Better Religion: A Primer for Interreligious Peacebuilding (Baylor, 2022). He holds a BA from Harding University and a PhD from Makerere University in Uganda.

Gailyn Van Rheenen Lecturer in Mission and World Christianity

Dr. Gina A. Zurlo, Adjunct Faculty of World Christianity and Mission and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, will serve as the 2025 Gailyn Van Rheenen Endowed Session on Mission and World Christianity. She is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Boston University Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs and in 2023-2024 was the Yang Visiting Scholar at Harvard Divinity School. Zurlo was named in the BBC 100 Most Inspiring and Influential women from around the world in 2019 for her work in religious statistics and female future of religion. Dr. Zurlo will share insights from her recent book, Women in World Christianity: Building and Sustaining a Global Movement.