Conference on Faith and Science 2021 - Events

Organized by Arizona Center for Christian Studies

BioLogos Voices speakers Deborah Haarsma, Praveen Sethupathy, Gregg Davidson, Ted Davis; BioLogos Advisors Elaine Howard Ecklund, Denis Alexander, and Greg Cootsona; and Board Member Jeff Hardin will will be speaking at at the Arizona Center for Christian Studies’ Conference on Faith and Science (COFAS) 2021, taking place from February 12-13, 2021. Elaine Howard Ecklund will deliver the keynote address

“The Conference on Faith and Science (COFAS) at Arizona State University will take place online on February 12-13, 2021 (Friday 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. MST and Saturday 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. MST). COFAS 2021 will share the theme of COFAS 2019: “Pursuing Science and Christian Faith for Human Flourishing.” COFAS is free and open to everyone; however, college and university students are our priority.”

This event is hosted by the Arizona Center for Christian Studies.

Featured Speaker

Elaine Howard Ecklund

Elaine Howard Ecklund is the Herbert S. Autrey Chair in Social Sciences and Professor of Sociology at Rice University, as well as founding director of the Religion and Public Life Program. Ecklund is a sociologist of religion, immigration, and science who examines how individuals bring changes to religious and scientific institutions. She is the author of four books with Oxford University Press, one book with New York University Press, and numerous research articles and op-eds. Her most recent book is Secularity and Science: What Scientists Around the World Really Think About Religion (Oxford University Press, 2019) with coauthors David R. Johnson, Brandon Vaidyanathan, Kirstin R.W. Matthews, Steven W. Lewis, Robert A. Thomson Jr., and Di Di. Her forthcoming book, Why Science and Faith Need Each Other: Eight Shared Values That Move Us Beyond Fear, will be published with Brazos Press, a division of Baker Books, in May 2020. She has received grants from the National Science Foundation, Russell Sage Foundation, John Templeton Foundation, Templeton World Charity Foundation, and Society for the Scientific Study of Religion. Her research has been cited thousands of times times by local, national, and international media. In 2013, she received Rice University’s Charles O. Duncan Award for Most Outstanding Academic Achievement and Teaching, and in 2018 she gave the Gifford Lecture in Scotland.

Featured Speaker

Denis Alexander

Denis Alexander is the Emeritus Director of The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion at St. Edmund’s College, Cambridge, where he is a Fellow. He has spent the past 40 years in the biological research community. From 1992-2012 he was editor of the journal Science & Christian Belief, and he currently serves as an Executive Committee member of the International Society for Science and Religion. In his book Creation or Evolution: Do We Have to Choose? Alexander presents his belief in both the biblical doctrine of creation and the coherence of evolutionary theory. Alexander’s other books include Rebuilding the Matrix – Science and Faith in the 21st Century; Science, Faith and Ethics: Grid or Gridlock? (co-authored with Robert White); and The Language of Genetics – an Introduction. Dr Alexander gave the Gifford Lectures at St. Andrews University in December 2012 on the theme ‘Genes, Determinism and God’ to be published by Cambridge University Press 2016/17

Featured Speaker

Greg Cootsona

Greg Cootsona is Lecturer in Religious Studies and Humanities at California State University at Chico and directs Science and Theology for Emerging Adult Ministries (or STEAM), a $2 million grant funded by the John Templeton Foundation and housed at Fuller Theological Seminary. STEAM is designed to catalyze the engagement of faith and science in Christian ministries with 18-30 year olds. His books include Creation and Last Things: At the Intersection of Theology and Science (Geneva, 2002), C. S. Lewis and the Crisis of a Christian (Westminster John Knox, 2014), Mere Science and Christian Faith: Bridging the Divide with Emerging Adults (InterVarsity, 2018), and Negotiating Science and Religion In America: Past, Present, and Future (Routledge, 2020). He is also co-director of Science for the Church, an initiative that brings the resources of science to enhance the effectiveness of Christian congregations. Greg studied comparative literature at U.C. Berkeley and theology at Princeton Theological Seminary (M. Div.), the Universities of Tübingen and Heidelberg, as well as Berkeley’s Graduate Theological Union (the latter where he received his Ph.D.) He has just finished 18 years as Associate Pastor for Adult Discipleship at Bidwell Presbyterian Church in Chico and Fifth Avenue Presbyterian in New York City. Greg has written for several periodicals such as Zygon, Theology and Science, as well as the Wall Street Journal and Christianity Today. He has been interviewed by CNN and The New York Times, and has appeared on the Today Show three times. He and his wife, Laura, live in Chico, California and have two daughters (18 and 21). Besides hanging out with his family, he loves to bike, read (and write), and drink good coffee.

Featured Speaker

Gregg Davidson

Gregg Davidson has been a professor of Geology & Geological Engineering since 1996, specializing in hydrology and geochemistry, and serving for many years as the department chair. His professional writing is divided between the purely scientific, usually tied in some way to water, and the intersection of science and Christian faith. Gregg has a passion for understanding and communicating the harmony (or at least lack of conflict) that exists between the Bible and modern science.

Featured Speaker

Ted Davis

Ted Davis is Professor of the History of Science at Messiah College. A former high school science teacher, Ted studied history and philosophy of science at Indiana University, where his mentor was the late Richard S. Westfall, author of the definitive biography of Isaac Newton. With the English historian Michael Hunter, Ted edited The Works of Robert Boyle, 14 vols. (London: Pickering & Chatto, 1999-2000), but his interests include the whole 2000-year interaction of Christianity and science. Author of dozens of scholarly articles and essays, Ted is one of few historians who have written extensively about both the Scientific Revolution and modern America. He and his wife Kathy enjoy theater, music, and traveling to new places.

Featured Speaker

Praveen Sethupathy

Praveen is a Professor of Biomedical Sciences and Director of the Center for Vertebrate Genomics at Cornell University, where he directs a research lab focused on genomic approaches to understand human health and disease. He received his BA degree from Cornell University and his PhD in Genomics from the University of Pennsylvania. After completing a post-doctoral fellowship at the National Human Genome Research Institute under the mentorship of Dr. Francis Collins, he moved in 2011 to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Genetics. The same year he was selected by Genome Technology as one of the nation's top 25 rising young investigators in genomics. In 2017, he returned to Cornell University as an Associate Professor. Praveen has authored over 95 peer-reviewed publications in scientific journals and has served as a reviewer for over 35 different journals. Recent honors include a faculty merit award for outstanding teaching and mentoring and the prestigious American Diabetes Association Pathway To Stop Diabetes Research Accelerator, which is awarded to only three people per year. Praveen has been an invited speaker for the Veritas Forum, has served on the advisory board for the AAAS Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion, and serves on the Board of Directors for BioLogos. He lives in Ithaca, NY with his wife and three children.

Featured Speaker

Jeff Hardin

Jeff Hardin is chair of the Department of Integrative Biology at the University of Wisconsin. In addition to numerous scientific research articles relating to embryonic development, Hardin is senior author of World of the Cell. He received a Master of Divinity degree at the International School of Theology in Southern California, where he met his wife, Susie, who worked in campus ministry with Cru (Campus Crusade for Christ). He is on the national advisory board for Intervarsity Christian Fellowship’s Faculty Ministry and serves as faculty advisor for the Navigators and InterVarsity Graduate Christian Fellowship on the UW-Madison campus.

Featured Speaker

Deborah Haarsma

Deborah Haarsma is President of BioLogos. She is an astronomer and frequent speaker on modern science and Christian faith at research universities, churches, and public venues like the National Press Club. Her work appears in several recent books, including Four Views on Creation, Evolution, and Design and Christ and the Created Order. She wrote the book Origins with her husband and fellow physicist, Loren Haarsma, presenting the agreements and disagreements among Christians regarding the history of life and the universe. She edited the anthology Delight in Creation: Scientists Share Their Work with the Church with Rev. Scott Hoezee. Previously, Haarsma served as professor and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Calvin University. She is an experienced research scientist, with several publications in the Astrophysical Journal and the Astronomical Journal on extragalactic astronomy and cosmology. She has studied large galaxies, galaxy clusters, the curvature of space, and the expansion of the universe using telescopes around the world and in orbit. Haarsma completed her doctoral work in astrophysics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and her undergraduate work in physics and music at Bethel University. She and Loren enjoy science fiction and classical music, and live in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

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