Vol. 6, Nr. 1SPRING, 2001

From the President

As I noted in my presidential address at the biennial meetinglast

October, thereis much for us to celebrate as the Conference on Faith and

History approaches its35th anniversary. The organization has over 500

members; it is financially solvent; it puts out botha well-regarded historical

journal and an interesting andinformative organizational newsletter; it

continues to put on lively biennial conferencesand annual sessions at the

AHA.

This success did not just happen. It is due in great partto a group of

historians who have shepherded this organization from its initial meeting at

Greenville College in 1967 through thenext three decades and into the

twenty-first century. Those of us who try to follow in their footsteps owe

these men and women anenormous debt of gratitude for their vision and

their leadership.

Of course, allhealthy organizations either change over time or they

become irrelevant.In this regard, and as I argued in my talk at Point Loma,

the Conference on Faith andHistory must address some fundamental

questions regarding its future: How do we create amore inclusive

organization that includes more women and more people of color, andthat

includes individuals from agreater variety of Christian traditions beyond

evangelicalism? What isthe purpose of our organization, and how can we

address in a more sophisticated fashion the question of what it means tohave

a Christianperspective on history? And what can we do to encourage high-

quality scholarship whilealso maintaining the organization's commitment to

promoting interaction and fellowship among historians of faith?