Fall 2025 Grebel Now

When Marina Gallagher was sitting in Professor Laura Gray’s Music and Landscapes class in 2013, she didn’t imagine that the connections she was making between pastoral music, landscapes, and Classical literature would lead her back to Grebel a decade later, teaching a special topics course on Video Game Music.  

Peace is not just a theory for Maria Lucia Zapata Cancelado (DPCS 2001); it is a daily mission. As a Colombian lawyer and peace scholar, Maria is the Director of the Institute for Human Rights and Conflict Resolution at Javeriana University in Bogotá. Her work at the Jesuit school focuses on restorative justice and post-conflict peacebuilding. Maria earned her PACS diploma from Conrad Grebel University College in 2000, where she developed an interdisciplinary approach that reshaped her perspectives on law and peacebuilding. 

Think about a time when you attended a worship service in a community that was new to you. What stood out as different? What is most important about worship for you? Now imagine you’re 13-29 years old. Would you answer differently? 

Two Grebel alumni, Sarah Kathleen Johnson (BA 2007, MTS 2008) and Mykayla Turner (BSC 2020, MTS 2024), are asking these very questions through a collaboration on the Young People and Christian Worship study. This research project aims to shape better conversations about teenagers, emerging adults, and Christian worship by valuing their experiences as an important theological voice. 

Professors often step into leadership positions in scholarly associations, a demonstration of their commitment to service. When Jeremy Bergen began attending Canadian Theological Society (CTS) annual meetings during his doctoral studies, he didn’t expect that he would end up as its president. “It was a supportive environment for me to present work, test ideas, and meet other scholars,” he shared.

Other Grebel professors also serve in their respective scholarly organizations, reflecting Grebel’s mission to seek wisdom in service to church and society. “Serving on a music board is important for making connections and for supporting others,” said Karen Sunabacka, Associate Professor of Music at Grebel. “It fosters creativity and excitement and allows me to support others in their own creative work.”  

Grebel faculty are experts in Music, Church Music and Worship, Peace and Conflict Studies, History, Theological Studies, Mennonite Studies and Religion, Culture, and Spirituality. Not only are they dedicated professors, but they are esteemed scholars in their respective fields, working on a wide variety of research projects. 

The Conrad Grebel Review, established in 1983, was an initiative of Conrad Grebel University College’s first Chaplain and Religious Studies Professor Walter Klaassen. In his introduction to the first issue, he located the journal at a critical moment of Mennonite self-assurance and noted that the time was ripe for a journal that looked at the present and towards the future.

Research is an important way we can better understand—and take action on—the growing number of challenges our world faces in building peace. As the Centre for Peace Advancement’s dynamic community of participants continues to evolve, we look forward to growing our research capacity and impact. 

Not only does Grebel have a long legacy of talented and engaged professors, but many students in Grebel courses and dorm rooms have gone on to become distinguished scholars in their own right. We were delighted to hear from alumni studying very diverse topics—reflective of the conversations students might have around the lunch table. We asked them to explain their scholarship to a non-expert and to share a question that is the basis of their work right now. We wanted to know if their work today relates to what they studied as an undergraduate student and how Grebel might have influenced their career path. These profiles are just a glimpse into the scholarship of some of the many Grebel alumni inspired by curiosity in their work.