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Jonathan Tran on Willie James Jennings, his former teacher

August 15, 2014

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Dr. Willie James Jennings

 

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Dr. Jonathan Tran

Jonathan Tran, who teaches in Baylor’s Department of Religion, offers some of his thoughts on Willie James Jennings, his former teacher and the plenary speaker at this year’s ISAAC Symposium:

It will be a great privilege and challenge to respond to my former teacher Dr. Willie Jennings at the 2014 symposium. Professor Jennings served as Academic Dean while I was a student at Duke Divinity School and later during my graduate training at Duke University. An administrator, teacher, and scholar of the highest order, Professor Jennings has proven to be one of the most lasting influences of my intellectual career. As demonstrated by his wildly successful The Christian Imagination, Professor Jennings has ushered in a mode of Christian theology of exceptional honesty, intellection, and power, one that will relentless change how the church imagines the task of theological reflection. I congratulate ISAAC for the genius move of bringing Professor Jennings’ work into conversation with the demands and promise of Asian American Christian life; the results will be breathtaking.

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