Andy Crouch is partner for theology and culture at Praxis, a venture-building ecosystem advancing redemptive entrepreneurship. His writing explores faith, culture, and the image of God in the domains of technology, power, leadership, and the arts. He is the author of five books (plus another with his daughter, Amy Crouch): The Life We're Looking For: Reclaiming Relationship in a Technological World, The Tech-Wise Family: Everyday Steps for Putting Technology in Its Proper Place, Strong and Weak: Embracing a Life of Love, Risk and True Flourishing, Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power, and Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling.

Andy serves on the governing board of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. For more than ten years he was an editor and producer at Christianity Today, including serving as executive editor from 2012 to 2016. He served the John Templeton Foundation in 2017 as senior strategist for communication. His work and writing have been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Time, and several editions of Best Christian Writing and Best Spiritual Writing—and, most importantly, received a shout-out in Lecrae's 2014 single "Non-Fiction."

From 1998 to 2003, Andy was the editor-in-chief of re:generation quarterly, a magazine for an emerging generation of culturally creative Christians. For ten years he was a campus minister with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship at Harvard University. He studied classics at Cornell University and received an M.Div. summa cum laude from Boston University School of Theology. A classically trained musician who draws on pop, folk, rock, jazz, and gospel, he has led musical worship for congregations of 5 to 20,000. He and his wife, Catherine, raised two children and live in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

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Justin recently completed his dissertation from Yale University’s Department of Religious Studies, where he studies virtue ethics and political theory. He is currently a researcher in bioethics at Columbia University Medical School.

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Sara Hendren is an artist, design researcher, writer, and professor at Northeastern University. Her book What Can A Body Do? How We Meet the Built World explores the places where disability shows up in design at all scales: assistive technology, furniture, architecture, urban planning, and more. It was named one of the Best Books of 2020 by NPR and won the 2021 Science in Society Journalism book prize. Her art and design works have been exhibited on the White House lawn under the Obama presidency, at the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Seoul Museum of Art, the Vitra Museum, and many others, and her work is held in the permanent collections at MoMA and the Cooper Hewitt. Her first short documentary film Simple Machine will play at festivals in the US and abroad throughout 2025. She has been an NEH Public Scholar and a fellow at New America, and her commentary and criticism have been published in Harper’s, Art in America, The New York Times, the Washington Post, and elsewhere.

Lia Howard is a political scientist who specializes in American politics. As Fellows Director for the SNF Paideia Program, Lia teaches SNF Paideia designated courses, designs curriculum and programming, and oversees advising and support for 75 undergraduate Fellows across three cohorts. She is the director of the Political Empathy Lab, and also leads with a team of Penn colleagues the Penn Commonwealth Engaged Scholars program, one of Penn’s inaugural Draw Down the Lightning Grants.  Prior to joining the SNF Paideia Program, Lia Howard served as the executive director of the Philadelphia Commons Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the practice of civic dialogue. She has taught at St. Joseph’s University, Villanova University, Eastern University, as well as at the University of Pennsylvania. She is a non-resident senior affiliate at the Program for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society, and a senior fellow at the Robert A. Fox Leadership Program at Penn. Her research interests lie at the intersection of political culture, American political development, education policy, and citizenship. She received her Ph.D. in political science from the University of Pennsylvania where she also received her B.A. in English and French.

Ruth L. Okediji is the Jeremiah Smith Jr. Professor of Law at Harvard Law School where she teaches courses in contracts, intellectual property (IP) law, and courses in biblical law. A widely cited prolific scholar and a foremost authority on the role of intellectual property in social and economic development, Professor Okediji has advised inter-governmental organizations, regional economic communities, and national governments on a range of matters related to patents, copyright, innovation policy, and human development. Okediji is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the University of Jos. She is the recipient of numerous awards for excellence in scholarship, teaching, mentorship and service, including recognition as one of the world’s top 50 leaders in IP law.

Angel Adams Parham is Associate Professor of Sociology and senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia.  She is also the Associate Director for UVA’s major in Political and Social Thought where she equips students to examine transformations in political and social thought from antiquity through the present.  Her research is in the area of historical sociology, engaging in inquiry that examines the past in order to better understand how to live well in the present and envision wisely for the future. She is the author of American Routes: Racial Palimpsests and the Transformation of Race (Oxford, 2017) which examines changes in race and racialization in New Orleans under the French, Spanish and Anglo-American administrations. The book was co-winner of the Social Science History Association’s Allan Sharlin Memorial book award (2018) and co-winner of the American Sociological Association’s Barrington Moore book award in comparative-historical sociology (2018). Her most recent book, co-authored with Anika Prather, was published in 2022 and is entitled The Black Intellectual Tradition: Reading Freedom in Classical Literature.  Parham has published articles on the intersection of Black writers and the classics in popular outlets including the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Public Discourse, and Common Good Magazine.  She is the co-founder and executive director of Nyansa Classical Community which provides curricula and programming designed to connect with K-12 students from diverse backgrounds, inviting them to take part in the Great Conversation, cultivate the moral imagination, and pursue truth, goodness, and beauty. Parham has been a member of the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, as well as the recipient of a Fulbright grant. She received her bachelor’s degree from Yale University and completed her doctoral work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

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Rosalind Picard is an engineer, scientist, inventor, entrepreneur, and professor at the MIT Media Lab.  She authored the book Affective Computing, envisioning the field giving skills of emotional intelligence to computers, and co-founded Affectiva, providing Emotion-AI software. She is co-founder and chief scientist of Empatica, providing FDA-cleared wearables to detect seizures and AI-biomarkers used in clinical trials.  She is a named inventor on over 100 patents, is a highly-cited author and a popular speaker, with a TED talk of over 2 million views.  Her awards include the 2022 Lombardia è Ricerca Prize and the 2024 Trotter Prize.

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Praveen is Professor of Physiological Genomics and Chair of the Department of Biomedical Sciences at Cornell University.  He leads a research lab focused on genome-scale and molecular approaches to understand physiology and human disease.  Praveen 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 the previous NIH Director 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. Praveen has authored over 150 peer-reviewed publications in scientific journals such as PNAS, Cell and Science and has served as a reviewer for over 50 different journals.  Honors include a faculty merit award for outstanding teaching and mentoring, the prestigious American Diabetes Association Pathway To Stop Diabetes Research Accelerator (which is awarded to only three people per year), and the inaugural Boehringer Ingelheim Award for Excellence in Research Mentorship.  Praveen is an advocate for thoughtful discussion at the interface of science and faith and has served on the advisory board of the Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion in the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), has served on the Board of BioLogos, is a frequent speaker for the Veritas Forum, and a mentor in the Veritas Faculty Scholars program.

More Speakers to Be Announced

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Peter serves as the Director of the Augustine Collective and Veritas Institute at The Veritas Forum, helping to support student publications at universities across the country. While attending Dartmouth College, he was the third editor-in-chief of The Dartmouth Apologia, one of the first publications in the Augustine Collective network. After graduating, Peter served as a writer and an editor at The American Interest, a magazine of politics and culture in Washington, DC. He then joined Thomistic Institute, an academic institute in DC, where he was the Campus Program Coordinator. Peter occasionally writes on a freelance basis, and he tweets at @PeterAWBlair.

Ashley Byrd is the Director of Forums and leads the effort to support campus partners to design and host forums that model discourse about life’s biggest questions across different worldviews characterized by intellectual humility and rigor. Previously, Ashley served as Regional Director for Veritas, where he coached planning teams in New York and New Jersey.

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As a graduate of Columbia University, he developed a love for the campus that led him to serve students and faculty there as a Religious Life Advisor through InterVarsity Christian Fellowship for 17 years. Ashley currently lives with his wife Carly and his daughters in Kailua, Hawaii.

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Timothy serves as Forums Program Manager for The Veritas Forum. Before joining Veritas, he has pastored college students at Rice University, served as a worship leader and church musician, and directed operations for the Credo Festival. He holds a BMus in Viola Performance from Rice University and an MTS in Bible from Duke Divinity School.

Timothy and his wife Sophia now live near Ann Arbor, MI. They spend their free time cycling and kayaking around Southeast Michigan, reading (preferably with large mugs of tea or coffee in hand), and playing with their two cats, Clive and Staples.

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Haley serves as the Director of Operations & Strategic Initiatives, where she facilitates strategic collaborative projects and works to implement the cohesion of Veritas Forum's operational systems. She brings experience as a Higher Education administrator and a consultant for nonprofit organizations. Haley holds a BA from Sarah Lawrence College and a MS in Nonprofit Management from Columbia University. She lives on Cape Cod with her husband and rescue dog Koda.

Moriah serves as Program Manager for the Augustine Collective at the Veritas Forum. Prior to joining Veritas, she was assistant editor at First Things, a journal of religion and public life in New York City. She holds a BA in English from Baylor University and an MAR in Religion and Literature from Yale Divinity School. Moriah currently lives in New Haven, Connecticut, where in her free time she enjoys kayaking in Connecticut’s many waterways.

Micah serves as the Coordinator of University Partnerships at The Veritas Forum. Before joining Veritas he completed a Bachelor of Arts degree from Vanderbilt University with degrees in Economics, History, and Philosophy. At Vanderbilt Micah served as the Executive Editor and Managing Editor for Vanderbilt Synesis, a journal of Christian thought, and as the President of the Veritas Forum student team. Micah is an avid hockey fan, lover of philosophy, and has a background in financial services and investment banking. Micah lives with his wife in Nashville, TN, and enjoys outdoor activities, live music, and coffee.

Teal is University Engagement Director and Director of Student Development, Forums, for The Veritas Forum, jumping into Forum planning and student engagement with great excitement. After earning her BA in English at the University of Mary Washington, Teal earned her MA in Religion from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Teal spent a rewarding five years as a Ministry Fellow at Harvard University with Christian Union before joining the team. She lives with her husband Jeff north of Boston where they are always on the hunt for delicious coffee and new running routes.

Ana serves as Forums Program Coordinator for The Veritas Forum. Before joining the Veritas team, she worked in the administrative office of her local church. Her background also includes experience in campus ministry and freelance publication design. Ana received her Bachelor’s degree in the History of Science with a secondary in Comparative Religion from Harvard University. She currently lives north of Boston with her husband, Cam, and their son. Together, they love cooking, playing board games, and hiking Colorado’s tallest peaks.

More Speakers to be Announced

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