What is the role of the prophet in the Christian church? Can the Church integrate its prophetic elements with its determination to exhibit charity and peace? What is the difference between sterile polemics and fruitful argument? Can controversy be creative for the Church, and if so, under what conditions?

Behind these questions lies the sense that the Christian church is at once a prophetic community and a community that tends towards unity. This conference intends to explore the dynamics of prophetic difference by asking whether controversy is integral to the Christian church.

BRIAN BROCK                                       Controversy in Christian Ethics:
The Case of Stanley Hauerwas

VIGEN GUROIAN                                  
Debating the Status of Same Sex Unions

DAVID BENTLEY HART                             
A Penitential Approach to Controversy

ROBERT JENSON                             
On Creative/Destructive Provocations

PETER LEITHART                                  

Fighting Fair? Athanasius and the 'Ario-maniacs'

MARKUS MUHLING                         

Divergent Oneness: The Church's Unity Without Consensus

SUSAN FRANK PARSONS                 

Prophecy's Grace in Times of Controversy

CARL TRUEMAN                                   

Pictures, Problems and Past Offenders: Protestant Polemics in Seventeenth Century Reformed Orthodoxy

JOHN WEBSTER                                    

Theology and the Peace of the Church