Dr. Chris Momany will lead a workshop on The Gospel of Love and the Work of Justice based on his book Compelling Lives: Five Methodist Abolitionists and the Ideas That Inspired Them.
Tuesday, March 5
9:30 am – Noon
Wesley Foundation of Kalamazoo (2350 Ring Rd N, Kalamazoo)
What motivates Christians to work for justice? How can Wesleyan theology ground our understandings of both love and justice? How might the personal experience of grace move us outside of ourselves in valuing each individual and all people? How may we think, feel, and act for justice?
This free workshop at the Wesley Foundation of Kalamazoo will include worship, presentation, and discussion.
Who should come? Pastors, laity, anyone willing to grow personally and work for justice!
The Rev. Dr. Chris Momany was born in Benton Harbor, Michigan and grew up in the Peace Temple United Methodist Church. He is a graduate of Adrian College, Princeton Theological Seminary, and Drew University. His speaking, teaching, and writing focus on history and human rights. His book on the Wesleyan ethic of love and justice is titled: Doing Good: A Grace-Filled Approach to Holiness (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2011). Chris’s book on ethical theory and the abolitionist movement was released in 2018: For Each and All: The Moral Witness of Asa Mahan (Nashville: Foundery Books). Chris has been active in “Historians Against Slavery” – an organization that explores history to fight human trafficking.
From 2004 until 2019 Chris wrote for the Daily Bible Study of The United Methodist Publishing House. He has also served in leadership among the National Council of Churches and between 2012 and 2020 was a member of the “writing team” that crafted an updated version of the United Methodist Social Principles.
Chris’s latest book profiles five Methodist abolitionists and their witness against slavery: Compelling Lives: Five Methodist Abolitionists and the Ideas That Inspired Them (Cascade, 2023). This book is the third release within a highly regarded series on Wesleyan and Methodist Explorations.
In 2015 Chris helped discover a long-lost, handwritten journal. This artifact, penned during the 1830s and 1840s, documents a ship used in the transatlantic slave trade. Chris is helping to lead a multiracial team of scholars who are telling the story of this ship and working for racial justice today. The “Dialogue on Race and Faith” team journeyed to Benin in December of 2022 to explore historical sites and to begin repairing relationships. Chris is an editor of and a contributor to the book about this effort: Awakening to Justice: Faithful Voices from the Abolitionist Past (InterVarsity Press, 2024).