Forming a Christian Mind Autumn Conference 2025

Date and location

You are warmly invited to a Forming a Christian Mind day conference, entitled 'This Gospel I Believe: Confidence and Crisis in the Christian Academic Mind', with Dr Carl R. Trueman, which will take place on Saturday 22 November 2025 at the McGrath Centre, St Catharine's College, Cambridge.

This event is for postgraduate students, postdoctoral researchers and junior academics, based in the UK or wider Europe.

Topic

What is the relevance of the gospel, as clarified in the Reformation, for the work of Christian academics? It can seem that the gospel is true but that it does not speak directly to the issues Christian academics in the modern world wrestle with on a daily basis. But why is that?

At our autumn conference, Dr Carl R. Trueman will draw on his forthcoming book, The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades our Humanity (to be published Spring 2026), to argue that too often we misdiagnose the real issue at the heart of modernity. The real issue at the heart of modernity is not, for example, disenchantment, but a blasphemous rejection of the imago Dei, which degrades our humanity and society as a whole by extension.

Since that rejection of the imago Dei is rooted in rebellion against God, the foundation for renewal must be theological and spiritual. Only the gospel of Jesus Christ, centred on his death and resurrection, can restore humanity. Dr Trueman will make the case that responding to this rejection of the imago Dei in our academic work requires gospel clarity: not a generic theism or ‘enchantment’, for example, but a clear articulation of our hope, including justification by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Dr Trueman will show why confidence in the truth and relevance of that gospel is necessary for Christian academics as they seek to (re-)build culture, and he will make the call for Christian academics to be courageous, clear and theologically deep in a time of profound cultural confusion and desecration.

Dr Trueman’s talks will be followed by discipline-specific seminars led by academics in a range of fields who will consider how his argument can be applied to different academic fields.

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Not a postgraduate student, postdoctoral researcher or academic at a university in the UK or Europe? We may be able to accommodate you if do not fit into one of the categories of the Eventbrite tickets and registration form. Please fill in this application form and we will then review your application.

Please note that this conference will be in-person only. Tickets are non-transferable. Register by 22 October to get the £5-off early-bird discount!

For more information and to join our mailing list to stay up to date please visit: www.formingachristianmind.org

Keynote Speaker: Dr Carl R. Trueman

Dr Carl R. Trueman is Professor of Biblical & Theological Studies at Grove City College, Pennsylvania. He studied Classics at St Catharine's College, Cambridge, before completing his PhD in Church History at the University of Aberdeen. He previously held positions at the University of Aberdeen, the University of Nottingham, and Westminster Theological Seminary, before moving to Grove City in 2018.

Trueman has authored or edited more than a dozen books, including:

• The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution (Crossway, 2020) and its condensed version, Strange New World: How Thinkers and Activists Redefined Identity and Sparked the Sexual Revolution (Crossway, 2022);
• Crisis of Confidence: Reclaiming the Historic Faith in a Culture Consumed with Individualism and Identity (Crossway, 2024);
• To Change All Worlds: Critical Theory from Marx to Marcuse (B&H Academic, 2024);
• The Creedal Imperative (Crossway, 2012); and
• Histories and Fallacies: Problems Faced in the Writing of History (Crossway, 2010).

His forthcoming book, The Desecration of Man: How the Rejection of God Degrades Our Humanity (due to be published in Spring 2026), addresses the social ills of our time, and argues that modern man’s crisis of meaning stems from a rejection of a simple fact—that he was made in the image of God.

Trueman also contributes to First Things (The Institute on Religion and Public Life) and co-hosts the 'Mortification of Spin' podcast.

Conference Programme

09.30 - Arrival and registration​

10.00 - Welcome

10.15 - Plenary lecture and Q&A: Cultural Crisis and the Image of God (Carl Trueman)

11.15 - Tea & coffee

11.45 - Plenary lecture and Q&A: The Gospel as an Intellectual Foundation (Carl Trueman)

13.00 - Lunch (provided in the Round Church)​

14.30 - Plenary lecture: Building on a Gospel Foundation (Carl Trueman)

15.00 - Discipline-specific seminars

16.15 - Panel discussion

17:15 - Finish and optional pub trip​