Brief history
The earliest forums were organized and sponsored by the Institute of Mennonite Studies (IMS) at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS). From the early 1990s to 2006, IMS and the Toronto Mennonite Theological Centre (TMTC) oversaw a system in which each year a different post-secondary institution planned, hosted, and paid for the forum and reception. Around 2006, TMTC assumed primary responsibility to organize the forums. A Program Committee was established in 2011 to plan the forums. Costs are shared annually by 15 different institutions. All events listed below were held at concurrent sessions of AAR and SBL, except from 2008 to 2010, when these societies met separately. If anyone has information about the gaps in the list below, please contact us.
2022 – Denver, CO
Theme: Interculturality
- Jamie Pitts, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, presiding
- Safwat Marzouk, Union Presbyterian Seminary, "Intercultural Worship and Decolonialization: Insights from the Book of Psalms"
- Sunder John Boopalan, Canadian Mennonite University, responding
- Rebecca Janzen, University of South Carolina, responding
- Hyung Jin (Pablo) Kim Sun, Christian Reformed Church in North America, responding
- Deanna Zantingh, University of St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto, responding
2021 – Online/San Antonio
Theme: Women, Liberation, and the Bible
- Nancy Heisey, Eastern Mennonite University, presiding
- Benjamin Bixler, Drew Theological School, “Luke’s Use of the Samuel Narrative: Disrupting Male Homosocial Spaces”
- Nathan Hershberger, Duke University, “Healing the Wounds of Scripture: Anna Jansz and Biblical Apocalypticism”
- Jackie Wyse-Rhodes, Bluffton University, “Eglon’s Fatness: An Experiment in Ethical Interpretation”
- Noemi Vega Quiñones, Southern Methodist University, “Reclaiming Consent: A Latinx Ideological Hermeneutic on Rahab in the Wakes of #MeToo and #ChurchToo”
You can view the recording here.
2020 – Online
Theme: Round table on Recovering from the Anabaptist Vision
- David Cramer, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, presiding
- Laura Schmidt Roberts, Fresno Pacific University, panelist
- Paul Martens, Baylor University, panelist
- Myron A. Penner, Trinity Western University, panelist
- Karl Koop, Canadian Mennonite University, panelist
- Carol Penner, Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo, panelist
- Stephanie Chandler Burns, Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo, panelist
- Melanie Kampen, Canadian Mennonite University, panelist
- Jeremy M. Bergen, Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo, panelist
- R. Bruce Yoder, Independent scholar, panelist
- Paul Doerksen, Canadian Mennonite University, panelist
You can view the recording here.
2019 – San Diego
Theme: Migration, Borders, and Belonging
- Melanie Howard, Fresno Pacific University, presiding
- Jennifer Graber, University of Texas, "Missionary Encounters with Native Christian Epistemologies"
- Felipe Hinojosa, Texas A&M University, "Borderlands in the Mennonite Imagination"
- Joseph Wiebe, University of Alberta, Augustana, "Race, Religion, and Land in The Gods of Indian Country"
- Hyejung Jessie Yum, University of Toronto, "A Postcolonial Response to Felipe Hinojosa’s Latino Mennonites"
Papers published in Anabaptist Witness, vol. 7, no. 22 (October 2020).
2018 – Denver
Theme: Mission
- Jamie Pitts, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, presiding
- Ryan R. Gladwin, Palm Beach Atlantic University, "Anabaptism as a Help and Hindrance to Latin American Protestant Theologies of Mission: Moving Towards a Trinitarian and Postcolonial Theology of Mission"
- Melanie A. Howard, Fresno Pacific University, "Peaceful Pedagogy: Paul’s Areopagus Speech (Acts 17:16–34) as a Model for Education-Based Mennonite Missions"
- Joe Sawatsky, Mennonite Mission Network, "Translation, Contextualization, and North American Mennonite Mission with African Initiated Churches"
- R. Bruce Yoder, Mennonite Mission Network, "Mennonite Missionary Contributions to the Emergence of ‘World Christianity’ as a Field of Study"
2017 – Boston
Theme: Supersessionism
- Kimberly Penner, Emmanuel College, Toronto School of Theology, presiding
- John Kampen, Methodist Theological School in Ohio, “The Gospel of Matthew and Antisemitism”
- Maxwell Kennel, McMaster University, “Emancipatory History: Anabaptist Restitution and Jacob Taubes’ Occidental Eschatology”
- Lois Barrett, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, responding
2016 – San Antonio
Theme: Responses to Willie James Jennings, The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race
- Joseph R. Wiebe, University of Alberta, Augustana, presiding
- Drew Hart, Messiah College, “White Supremacy, Mennonite Ethnicity, and the Loss of Gentile Identity”
- Tobin Miller Shearer, University of Montana, “Dislocation, Relocation, Cultivation: Pedagogical Strategies for Reaching White Mennonites”
- Melanie Kampen, Emmanuel College, University of Toronto, “The Martyr’s Mirror: A Mennonite Fantasy of Theocolonial Desire”
- Deanna Zantingh, Canadian Mennonite University, “Taashikaywin”
- Willie James Jennings, Yale University, responding
2015 – Atlanta
Theme: Human Being and/as Creation: Biblical, Theological, and Historical Perspectives
- Melanie Howard, Princeton Theological Seminary, presiding
- David Rensberger, independent scholar, Decatur, Georgia, “Being Human in Creation: Three Views from the Psalms”
- Justin Heinzekehr, Hesston College, “Shattering Hubmaier’s Human: Rethinking Anabaptist Freedom for an Ecological Context”
- Ry O. Siggelkow, Princeton Theological Seminary, “The Earth is a Battlefield and No One Can Remain Neutral: Theological Anthropology as Apocalyptic Cosmology”
- Laura Schmidt Roberts, Fresno Pacific University, “‘In the beginning is relation’: Re-Forming Understanding of Human Creatureliness”
2014 – San Diego
Theme: Human Sexuality and Theological Vocation in the Context of Personal, Institutional, and Ecclesial Practice
- Jamie Pitts, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, presiding
- Peter C. Blum, Hillsdale College, “Explicit Sex and Mennonite Scruples: On Normative and Descriptive Topographies of Sexuality”
- Kim Penner, Emmanuel College, Toronto School of Theology, “‘God with Skin on’: The Implications of an Embodied View of the Incarnation for Mennonite Ecclesiology and Ethics”
- Susanne Guenther Loewen, Emmanuel College, Toronto School of Theology, “Welcoming the Stranger: Toward a New Biblical-Theological Paradigm for Mennonite Dialogue on Same-Sex Marriage”
- Hilary Jerome Scarsella, Vanderbilt University, “The Lord’s Supper in Relation to Sexualized Violence: Harm and Healing throughout the Ecclesial Body”
- David C. Cramer, Baylor University, “Avoidance and Acknowledgement: Discipleship, Pain, and Healing in the Mennonite Church in the Wake of John Howard Yoder”
2013 – Baltimore
Theme: From ‘Creation Care’ to ‘Watershed Discipleship’: An Anabaptist Approach to Ecological Theology and Practice
- Laura Schmidt Roberts, Fresno Pacific University, presiding
- Ched Myers, Bartimaeus Cooperative Ministries, “From ‘Creation Care’ to ‘Watershed Discipleship’: An Anabaptist Approach to Ecological Theology and Practice
- Elaine Enns, Bartimaeus Cooperative Ministries, “The Relevance of Restorative Justice to Ecotheology”
- Jennifer Halteman Schrock, Merry Lea Center, Goshen College, “Perspectives on Mennonite Environmental Education”
- Sylvia Keesmaat, Russet House Farm and Toronto School of Theology, “The Biblical and Pedagogic Challenges of Paradigm Shifting”
- Chris Grataski, Ezekiel’s Guild, “Theological Permaculture—How the Biosphere Teaches Us”
Main paper by Ched Myers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 32/3 (Fall 2014)
2012 – Chicago
Theme: Judgment and Wrath of God
- Gordon Matties, Canadian Mennonite University, moderating
- W. Derek Suderman, Conrad Grebel University College, “Assyria the Ax, God the Lumberjack: Jeremiah 29, the Logic of the Prophet, and the Quest for a Nonviolent God”
- Mary K. Schmitt, Princeton Theological Seminary, “Peace and Wrath in Paul’s Epistle to the Romans”
- Grant Poettcker, McMaster University, “A ‘Fitting’ Sacrifice: Reassessing Divine Wrath with Girard and Anselm”
- Justin Heinzekehr, Claremont School of Theology, “When Mennonites Get Angry: The Wrath of God in a Process-Anabaptist Perspective”
- Mary Schertz, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, responding
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 32/1 (Winter 2014)
2011 – San Francisco
Host: Fresno Pacific University/Fresno Pacific University Biblical Seminary
Theme: The Prophetic Role of Anabaptism in the Academy, the Church and the World
- Laura Schmidt Roberts, Fresno Pacific University, moderator
- Miguel A. de la Torre, Iliff School of Theology, panelist
- Greg A. Camp, Fresno Pacific University, panelist
- Valerie Rempel, Fresno Pacific University Biblical Seminary, panelist
2010 – Atlanta (AAR only)
Theme: Spiritual Formation and Ethics: Anabaptist Reflections
- Laura Schmidt Roberts, Fresno Pacific University, presiding
- Angela Reed, Baylor University, “Wholly Anabaptist? Uncovering Contemporary Spiritual Practices that Attend to Person, Community, and Mission”
- Paul Martens, Baylor University, “If Ethics is Not Spiritual Formation, What is it? Reflections in an Anabaptist Vein”
- Thomas Finger, independent scholar, responding
2010 – Atlanta (SBL only)
Topic: Book Panel Discussion of Eric A. Seibert, Disturbing Divine Behavior: Troubling Old Testament Images of God
- Thomas R. Yoder Neufeld, Conrad Grebel University College, presiding
- Wilma Bailey, Christian Theological Seminary, panelist
- Gordon Matties, Canadian Mennonite University, panelist
- Derek Suderman, Conrad Grebel University College, panelist
- Eric A. Seibert, Messiah College, responding
Papers published in Direction 40/2 (Fall 2011)
2009 – no forums
2008 – Chicago (AAR only)
Host: Goshen College
Theme: How Taking Vengeance Seriously Can Strengthen Peace Theology and Ethics
- Keith Graber Miller, Goshen College, presiding
- Joseph Liechty, Goshen, College, panelist
- Paul Keim, Goshen College, panelist
- Ted Grimsrud, Eastern Mennonite University, responding
2008 – Boston (SBL only)
Host: Conrad Grebel University College
Theme: Teaching the Bible: Setting, Method, Agenda
- Tom Yoder Neufeld, Conrad Grebel University College, presiding
- Jo-Ann Brant, Goshen College
- Jon Isaak, Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary
- Wes Bergen, Wichita State University
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 28/2 (Spring 2010)
2007 – San Diego
Host: Eastern Mennonite University
Theme: Reflections on J. Denny Weaver’s The Nonviolent Atonement
- Ted Grimsrud, Eastern Mennonite University, presiding
- Sharon Baker, Messiah College
- Mark Thiessen Nation, Eastern Mennonite University
- Tom Yoder Neufeld, Conrad Grebel University College
- J. Denny Weaver, Bluffton University, responding
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 27/2 (Spring 2009)
2006 – Washington D.C.
Host: Bluffton University
Theme: Boyarin on Yoder: Expanding the Conversation
- Trevor Bechtel, presiding, Bluffton University
- Daniel Boyarin, University of California Berkeley, “Judaism as a Free Church: Footnotes to John Howard Yoder’s “The Jewish-Christian Schism Revisited”
- Gerald Biesecker-Mast, Bluffton University, “Further Notes on Rhetoric”
- Laura Brenneman, Bluffton University, “Further Notes on Paul”
- Randi Rashkover, York College of Pennsylvania, “Further Notes on Judaism”
- Alain Epp Weaver, University of Chicago, “Further Notes on Zionism and Palestine”
- J. Denny Weaver, Bluffton University, “Further Notes on Jesus”
Papers published in CrossCurrents 56/4 (Winter 2007)
2005 – Philadelphia
Host: Canadian Mennonite University
Theme: Paul, Empire, and Political Philosophy
- Chris K. Huebner, Canadian Mennonite University, presiding
- P. Travis Kroeker, McMaster University
- Laura Brenneman, Bluffton University
- Alex Sider, Duke University
- Gordon Zerbe, Canadian Mennonite University
2004 – San Antonio
Theme: Responses to Ted Grimsrud, “Anabaptist Faith & American Democracy”
- Malinda Berry, Union Theological Seminary, presiding
- Jeremy Bergen, Toronto School of Theology
- Peter Blum, Hillsdale College
- Peter Dula, Duke University
- Matt Hamsher, Fuller Theological Seminary
- Scott Holland, Bethany Theological Seminary
- Ted Grimsrud, Eastern Mennonite University, responding
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 23/2 (Spring 2005)
2003 – Atlanta
Host: Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary
Theme: (How) Should Christian Academics Serve the Church in their Scholarship?
- Loren Johns, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, presiding
- Gerald Gerbrandt, Canadian Mennonite University
- Brenda Martin Hurst, Eastern Mennonite University
- Ben Ollenburger, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary
- Elaine Swartzentruber, Wake Forest University
- Jo-Ann Brant, Goshen College
- J. Denny Weaver, Bluffton College
Papers published in Direction 33/2 (Fall 2004)
2002 – Toronto
Host: Conrad Grebel University College
Theme: Radical Orthodoxy and the Radical Reformation
- A. James Reimer, Conrad Grebel University College, presiding
- John Milbank, University of Virginia
- Travis Kroeker, McMaster University
- Laura Roberts, Fresno Pacific University
- Chris Huebner, Duke University
- Malinda Berry, Union Theological Seminary (NY)
- Gerald Schlabach, University of St. Thomas
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 23/2 (Spring 2005)
2001 – Denver
Host: Eastern Mennonite University; Bethel College
Theme: Is God Violent?
- Ray Gingerich, Eastern Mennonite University, presiding
- Gordon Kaufman, Harvard Divinity School
- Mary Schertz, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary
- Paul Keim, Goshen College
- Ted Grimsrud, Eastern Mennonite University
- Duane Friesen, Bethel College
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 21/1 (Winter 2003)
2000 – Nashville
Host: Eastern Mennonite University
Theme: Responses to Willard Swartley on Rene Girard
1999 – Boston
Host: Bluffton College
Theme: The Mennonite Challenge of Particularism and Universalism: A Liberation Perspective
- John Kampen, Bluffton College, “The Mennonite Challenge of Particularism and Universalism: A Liberation Perspective”
- Malinda Berry, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary, responding
- Gilberto Flores, General Conference Mennonite Church, responding
- Nancy Heisey, Eastern Mennonite University, responding
- Tom Yoder Neufeld, Conrad Grebel College, responding
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 19/2 (Spring 2001)
1998 – Orlando
Host: Goshen College
Theme: Aesthetics and Mennonite Theology
- Cheryl Nafziger-Leis, Wilfrid Laurier University
- Phil Stoltzfus, Harvard Divinity School
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 16/3 (Fall 1998)
1997 – San Francisco
Host: Fresno Pacific University and Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary
Theme: Discussion with Nancy Murphy
1996 – New Orleans
Host: Eastern Mennonite University
Theme: Biblical scholars reflecting on experience of writing commentaries
1995 – Philadelphia
Host: Messiah College
Theme: Mennonite Minority Self-Identity and Multiculturalism
- Crystal Downing, Messiah College
- John Yeatts, Messiah College
- Ronald Burwell, Messiah College
- John Kampen, Payne Seminary
1994 – Chicago
Hosts: Canadian Mennonite Bible College/ TMTC
Theme: Following Jesus: Which One? The Relevance of the Historical Jesus for Mennonite Theology
- Lydia Harder, Toronto Mennonite Theological Centre, presiding
- Willi Braun, Bishop’s University
- Mary Schertz, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary
- J. Lawrence Burkholder, Goshen College
- Tim Gaeddert, Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary
1993 – Washington D.C.
Host: Conrad Grebel College
Theme: Mennonites on Hauerwas: Hauerwas on Mennonites
- James Reimer, Conrad Grebel College/TMTC, presiding
- Stanley Hauerwas, Duke University
- Lydia Harder, Toronto Mennonite Theological Centre
- Travis Kroeker, McMaster University
- Scott Holland, Duquesne University
- Ben Ollenburger, Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary
- Harry Huebner, Canadian Mennonite Bible College
Papers published in The Conrad Grebel Review 13/2 (Spring 1995)
1992 – San Francisco
Theme: The Future Direction of Mennonite Theology: A Look at the Theologies of Tom Finger and Daniel Liechty
1991 – Kansas City
Theme: Social Ethics and New Approaches to Biblical Studies
1990 – New Orleans
Theme: Religious Pluralism and Christian Understanding (Toward a Theological Understanding of Other Religions)
1989 – Los Angeles
Themes: “Christian Faith: Necessary or Problematical in Biblical Understanding” and “Christian Community: Necessary or Problematical in Theological Understanding”