Author Archives: Geneva Society

The Geneva Society invites everyone to attend this free public lecture by Luke Glanville. This Geneva Lecture is held in Vancouver (not TWU) and is entitled “Caring for strangers: The historical contribution of Christianity.”
DATE: Wednesday 12 October 2016
LOCATION: Grandview Calvary Baptist Church, 1803 East 1st Ave, Vancouver (see note about parking below)
TIME: 7:30-9:00pm
SUMMARY: In North America, the Christian church has the reputation for being a powerful supporter of conservative ideology. This reputation is a far cry from the early church’s social role. This lecture explores how early Christians radically transformed prevailing Roman understandings of social ethics. Whereas Roman philosophers endorsed a hierarchical and elitist ethic of patronage and reciprocity, the early Christians turned this upside-down, insisting that people should seek to help those most in need and those least able to reciprocate, including not only friends and family but also strangers and foreigners. The lecture traces the impact of this new ethic on the development of ideas about both social justice and international relations.
SPEAKER: Luke Glanville is a senior lecturer in International Relations at the Australian National University. His research and teaching focuses on historical and contemporary efforts to protect vulnerable people. Luke is author of Sovereignty and the Responsibility to Protect: A New History (University of Chicago Press, 2014). He is currently on research leave in Vancouver with his delightful wife, Clare, and their absurdly cute baby, Arthur.
This lecture is co-sponsored by Grandview Calvary Baptist Church, which is where the lecture is being held.
Please help get the word out via our Facebook event page!
PARKING can be a challenge. The best parking option is likely the underground parking at Il Mercato Mall. The mall is at Commercial Drive and 1st Avenue, and the entrance to the underground parking is off Graveley St: 1674 Graveley Street works in Google maps; it’s a 4-minute walk to the church from there. Here is the map locating the entrance to the parking lot.

The Geneva Society invites everyone to attend this free public lecture by Dr. Martin de Wit.
NOW AVAILABLE: Video (low-tech recording; refer to Visuals & Text)
DATE: Wednesday 23 March 2016
LOCATION: Trinity Western University (Northwest Auditorium). Details below.
TIME: 7:30-9:00pm
Maybe you are worried that humanity is not doing a good job in caring for God’s creation, but are uncomfortable about embracing the creation care movement. Maybe you are serious about the call to care for God’s creation, but are worried that all the accompanying “earth-talk” is not really helping in setting our hearts and minds on things above. In this lecture a Christian spirituality for earthkeeping is proposed that starts with who we are as believers in participatory communion with Christ. The theological anthropologies of diverse Christian thinkers such as Augustine, Moltmann and Calvin will be brought into discussion with each other to help clarify what the shape of such an earth-keeping ethic would look like. Listening to the living God who calls us to faithfully walk with Him by being a blessing to all of creation is the only real sustainable alternative to modern culture’s stark and lifeless choices. The lecture will end with some reflections on the importance of understanding our vocations and the ethical shape for Christian hopeful living amidst economic and ecological crises.
Immediately after the lecture, there will be a response by Jerome Lengkeek of Fourth Watch African Investments, submitted remotely from Zambia.
Martin de Wit, who holds a doctorate in economics, is a student in theology at Regent College and prior has worked for 15 years as an environmental economist. Most of Martin’s research and consultancy work to date has focused on the economics of environmental and natural resources as well as the interactions between ecological and socio-economic systems in developing countries, notably in South Africa and China, applied to challenges related to climate, aquaculture, forestry, waste, water quality, ecological restoration and nature conservation. He serves on the board of ASSET research (Africa’s Search for Sound Economic Trajectories), a non-profit organization focused on capacity building of post-graduate students in the fields of economics, ecology and development. Martin and his family are members of Cloverdale Canadian Reformed church.
LOCATION: Auditorium, Northwest Building, Trinity Western University. This is building #21 at this campus map; pay parking is available nearby.
Please print this poster and place it on school, church, and office bulletin boards.
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