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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Fiona Dieffenbacher is an Associate Professor of Fashion in the School of Fashion at Parsons School of Design. Her research is located at the intersection of dress, embodiment and spirituality. Key projects include: Dress and Emotion, which explored the emotional and sensory act of dressing; The En[...]Clothed Collective, a global group of practitioners whose research centers bodily knowledge in the articulation of theory.

Published works include a second edition of her textbook Fashion Thinking: Creative Approaches to the Design Process, (Bloomsbury, 2020) and chapter entitled, ‘The Future Body as Ultimate Dress’ in: Silhouettes of the Soul: Meditations on Fashion, Religion and Subjectivity (Bloomsbury, 2023) co-edited by Otto von Busch and Jeannine Viau.

She is the volume editor of the forthcoming publication: Teaching Fashion Ethics: Inclusivity, Social Justice and Activism (Bloomsbury, 2027) and editor of Fashion Practice: The Journal of Design, Creative Process and the Fashion Industry.

In 2023, Fiona launched a public program in collaboration with colleagues at Parsons and Eugene Lang entitled: Fashion-Faith: Rituals and Dialogues. This informed the premise for the forthcoming exhibition and symposium by the same name in the Arnold and Sheila Aronson Gallery at Parsons in February 2026.

Prior to Parsons, Fiona designed her eponymous ready-to-wear label Fiona Walker with a commitment to ethical and local production (1998- 2005). Selling to select retailers across the U.S and Asia, the collection garnered press in publications such as WWD, The New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, InStyle and New York Magazine, among others.

Kyle Dugdale is an architect, historian, and Senior Critic at Yale School of Architecture. He holds an undergraduate degree from Corpus Christi College, Oxford, a professional degree from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, and a doctoral degree from Yale. His most recent book is entitled Architecture After God.

Rev. Dr. Malcolm Foley is Special Advisor to the President for Campus Engagement at Baylor University. He earned a PhD in religion from Baylor University in December 2021. His dissertation investigated Black Protestants responding to lynching from the late 19th to the early 20th century.

Before coming to Baylor, Dr. Foley earned a BA in religious studies with a second major in finance and a minor in classics from Washington University in St. Louis. He subsequently completed a Master of Divinity at Yale Divinity School, focusing on the theology of the early and medieval church.

Malcolm also serves as a co-pastor at an intentionally multicultural, nondenominational church, Mosaic Waco. He is the author of The Anti-Greed Gospel: Why The Love of Money is the Root of Racism and How the Church Can Create A New Way Forward (2025).

He lives in Waco with his wife, Desiree, and two daughters, Jasmyne and Junia.

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 played at festivals in the US and abroad in 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.

Ruth López Turley directs the Kinder Institute for Urban Research at Rice University, which brings together data, research, engagement and action to improve lives. In 2011, she founded the Houston Education Research Consortium (HERC), a research-practice partnership between Rice University and 11 Houston area school districts, representing over 700,000 students. A program of the Kinder Institute, HERC works to improve educational equity by connecting research to policy and practice, working directly with district leaders. She directed HERC from 2011 to 2022, during which she raised over $30M so that school districts would not have to pay for research. She also founded the National Network of Education Research-Practice Partnerships, which connects and supports over 60 partnerships between research institutions and education agencies throughout the country. In 2022, President Joe Biden appointed her to the National Board for Education Sciences, which advises and approves priorities for the research arm of the U.S. Department of Education. She is a graduate of Stanford and Harvard and is originally from Laredo, Texas.

Meghan Sullivan is the Wilsey Family College Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, where she directs the University-wide Ethics Initiative and is founding director of the Institute for Ethics and the Common Good. The Institute is Notre Dame's hub for research and teaching in ethics, and is home to the Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C. Center for Virtue Ethics, the Notre Dame–IBM Technology Ethics Lab, and host to a growing cohort of affiliated faculty, postdoctoral fellows, and graduate and undergraduate students, as well as several residential fellowship programs for faculty, nonprofit, and faith leaders.

A philosopher, public intellectual, and author whose work has been widely cited, she is the principal investigator on more than $70 million in grants advancing ethics and human flourishing, including DELTA, a major initiative developing a faith-based framework for human formation and ethics in the age of AI. Sullivan has degrees from the University of Virginia (BA: Philosophy and Politics, Highest Distinction), Oxford (B.Phil: Philosophy), and Rutgers (PhD: Philosophy).

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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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Charlie holds an A.B. in Classical Archaeology from Dartmouth College, where he was editor-in-chief of the Dartmouth Apologia, and a J.D. from the University of Tennessee College of Law. He was a founding editor of Fare Forward. He currently serves as executive director of the Wheelock Society, a network of Christian alumni fostering the integration of faith, reason, and vocation at Dartmouth.

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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Rev. Dr. Malcolm Foley earned a PhD in religion from Baylor University in December 2021. His dissertation investigated Black Protestants responding to lynching from the late 19th to the early 20th century.

Before coming to Baylor, Dr. Foley earned a BA in religious studies with a second major in finance and a minor in classics from Washington University in St. Louis. He subsequently completed a Master of Divinity at Yale Divinity School, focusing on the theology of the early and medieval church.

Malcolm also serves as a co-pastor at an intentionally multicultural, nondenominational church, Mosaic Waco. He is the author of The Anti-Greed Gospel: Why The Love of Money is the Root of Racism and How the Church Can Create A New Way Forward (2025).

He lives in Waco with his wife, Desiree, and two daughters, Jasmyne and Junia.

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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.

Daniel Nayeri is a National Book Award–winning author and the lead storytelling coach for our first-ever class of Veritas Storytelling Fellows. All fall, he has worked with our fellows to shape the true, personal stories they’ll share in back-to-back live performances during our breakout sessions. Daniel will also emcee the storytelling performances. Daniel was born in Iran and spent some years as a refugee before immigrating to Oklahoma at age seven with his family. He is the author of several books, including EVERYTHING SAD IS UNTRUE (A TRUE STORY), winner of the Michael L. Printz Award, the Christopher Medal, and the Middle Eastern Book Award, THE MANY ASSASSINATIONS OF SAMIR, THE SELLER OF DREAMS, winner of the Newbery Honor, and THE TEACHER OF NOMAD LAND, winner of the Newbery Honor and the National Book Award. He lives in the U.S. with his wife and son.

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.

More Speakers to be Announced

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