[1]Bethany professor Tara Hornbacker will present her professorial lecture on Saturday, October 27, at 7:15 pm (EDT) in honor of her promotion to full professor of ministry formation. Entitled “Incarnational Education and Improvisational Evangelism,” the lecture is open to the public and will be webcast live from Bethany’s Nicarry Chapel.
Hornbacker will explore the practice of theatrical improvisation as a method for evangelism that is both appropriate for a pluralistic society and coherent with the Anabaptist-Pietist understanding of Incarnational love. Having begun her professional life in the theater, she finds a natural connection in relating that earlier dramatic training to current contextual challenges for sharing the gospel.
Beginning with Acts 17:16-33 as a model for contextual theology, the presentation will explore several New Testament texts from the perspective of improvisational evangelism. The audience can anticipate participation in improvisation exercises, encounters with biblical texts, and fresh expressions of the gospel story.
A member of the Bethany faculty since 1998, Hornbacker oversees the ministry formation program, the key component of the master of divinity course of study. She has been instrumental in implementing a distance education model for doing ministry formation through the Seminary’s Connections program. She holds an MDiv from the Earlham School of Religion and a DMin from Fuller Theological Seminary. An ordained minister in the Church of the Brethren, Hornbacker is also active in district and denominational leadership. Her involvement with the two professional guilds for field education includes leadership within the Association of Theological Field Educators.
View the webcast [1]