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Watch the Recordings of the Fall 2024 Speaks Lecture Series
Hood Theological Seminary will hold its annual Ruben L. Speaks Endowed Memorial Lecture Series on Friday and Saturday, October 4 and 5, 2024. This year’s featured presenter is Bishop Gregory Vaughn Palmer, who is the former (now retired) Presiding Prelate of the West Ohio Conference of the United Methodist Church and, previously, the longest serving active UMC bishop. The lectures, which are free of charge and open to the public, will be held at 6:00 p.m. on Friday, October 4, and 10:00 a.m. on Saturday, October 5. This year the lecture series are in-person at the campus of Hood Theological Seminary, Aymer Center, 1810 Lutheran Synod Drive, Salisbury, NC 28144 or through Zoom (see Zoom link information below). *Please note, there are two Zoom links, one for Friday and one for Saturday.*
AME Zion Bishop Darryl Starnes will be responding to Bishop Palmer’s remarks about the most recent UMC General Conference and the future of the UMC. Bishop Darryl B. Starnes is Senior Bishop of the A.M.E. Zion Church and the Presiding Bishop of the Piedmont Episcopal District.
The Ruben L. Speaks Lecture Series is named in honor of the late Bishop Ruben Lee Speaks, who served in the A.M.E. Zion Church as bishop, pastor, preacher, teacher, and writer. Bishop Speaks authored A Handbook for Ministers and Lay Leaders, The Minister and His Task, The Church and Black Liberation, God in an Age of Scarcity, and Prelude to Pentecost. Bishop Speaks received the Chancellor’s Award from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington and the Distinguished Citizen Award from the Brooklyn Advisory Committee of the New York Urban League. Ebony Magazine once named him one of the “100 Most Influential Black Leaders in America.” As Bishop, he served in Africa, the Caribbean, and the United States. He was acknowledged on numerous occasions for his leadership and creative engagement in ministry. When he presided over the Liberia Conference, the late President of Liberia, William Tolbert, dubbed him, “Knight of African Redemption.”
Hood Theological Seminary, located at 1810 Lutheran Synod Drive in Salisbury, NC, is a graduate and professional school sponsored by the A.M.E. Zion Church and approved by the University Senate of The United Methodist Church. Its student body, faculty and staff currently comprise persons from many different denominations. Hood's mission is to prepare women and men for bold and creative leadership for the Christian church for a diverse world.
Bishop Gregory Vaughn Palmer
