We will be kicking off the semester with a praise and worship time at Goolsby Chapel.
This is an interdenominational service.
Beau Hughes of the Village Church will be presenting a brief message.
It is open to the entire UNT community.
Ecklund is director of the Religion and Public Life Program in the Social Sciences Research Institute, and the author of Science vs. Religion. She provides a brief synopsis of her work in this article in Huffington Post.
The retreat is sponsored by the SMU Chaplain’s office, and is open to faculty at all area universities and colleges.
Saturday, August 23
9am – 1pm
Lovers Lane United Methodist Church
Dallas, TX
Religious freedom in the United States has declined in recent years, according to a Pew Research Center’s Religion and Public Life Project. Hostilities against all religions have reached a six-year high, with Christians in 151 countries being persecuted.
Columnist Emma Green explains in The Atlantic:
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Chris Littler, acting chair of physics, praised Sam for his professional leadership within the department, and his personal and spiritual mentorship as a friend. |
While many students look to next week as graduation time, Sam Matteson looks forward to life after UNT.
He is the recipient of many awards for research and teaching. His complete list can be found on his UNT profile. Sam has been a UNT faculty member for nearly 30 years, and has chaired three different departments.
Sam and Carolyn are looking forward to splitting time between Nashville, Tennessee (where several of their children and grandchildren reside) and their home in southern Colorado.
To read about his spiritual journey, please visit his page on MeetTheProf.com
Nancy DiMarco (Nutrition, TWU); and UNT profs George Yancey (Sociology), Kay Littler (Physics) and Joseph Oppong (Geography) talked about their spiritual journeys, and gave advice to students on how to live out their faith in academia.
“Don’t forget that you represent the Lord Jesus Christ,” Oppong told the students. “Do all of your studies with excellence. We are not called to mediocrity as Christians; we are called to live with excellence.”
DiMarco talked about her own spiritual journey: growing up in Colorado, going through undergraduate school uncertain about her beliefs, and then attending a Bible study with a Christian friend during her graduate school days. “I was helped because a Christian friend took the time to care,” she explained.
After the presentation, students commented upon the encouragement they received from having Christian professors speak to them. Others said that while they often are encouraged to study their Bibles and share their faith, they don’t always hear a message of doing their class work with excellence; they found the words from the professors helpful.
Michael Strauss spoke last night in Sage Hall on “God? Evidence from Modern Science.” About 100 attended. While the lecture was not recorded, you can view these lectures on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V48tBF6teSM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vvr9q_2sSxs
Strauss is a professor of high-energy physics at the University of Oklahoma, and lectures on various campuses about “Order and Design in the Universe.” He was one of the nearly 1700 scientists worldwide who collaborated on the discovery of the Higgs Boson particle.
Strauss mentioned that in addition to his ongoing research and teaching, he is very interested in helping graduate students succeed in their academic careers, and sees his mentoring as part of his calling as a professor.
Strauss’ earliest years were in Texas, but his degrees were earned while he lived in California.
Here is a PDF if you want to print or share with others.