The Bluffton University Pathways to Mission and Vocation project will host a conference on immigration, Beyond Borders: The Role of Immigration in a Global Community, March 19-21, on the Bluffton campus.

The keynote speaker will be Daniel Carroll Rodas, author of Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Bible. Baldemar Velasquez, president of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, will also present a plenary session.

Carroll is a distinguished professor of Old Testament at Denver seminary and adjunct professor at El Seminario Teol'ogico Centroamericano in Guatemala City, Guatemala.

The three-day conference is open to all who would like to participate and has been planned especially for those in the academic community, church community and immigrants and will explore issues relating to immigration and ask the question: How can the Church be faithful to Jesus' call to "welcome the stranger"?

The theme of the conference comes from Matthew 25:35, "For I was a stranger and you welcomed me." There will be over 25 workshops and panel presentations including:

• Immigration in Midwest Rural Community: A Case Study, Paul Neufeld Weaver, Bluffton University
• Pertences Aqui! Latino student transition into private liberal arts colleges, Goshen College faculty and students
• Patrolling Borders: The View from the Ruins of Fort Defiance, presented by Defiance College faculty members
• Fuerza (video), produced by Goshen College students about the connections between Goshen and Ap'a'on, Mexico
• No More Deaths border witness, Paul and Kathleen Helbling
• The U.S. Wall, video and discussion with producer Rev. Ryan Grace and others, United Methodist Church West Ohio Conference
• Comprehensive Immigration Reform, Saulo Padilla, MCC U.S. Immigration Office
• Talkback sessions with both keynote speakers

"Not only does immigration promise to be a major U.S. legislative theme during 2010, but it continues to be a pressing theme in education, in the church and across the world," said Paul Neufeld Weaver, Bluffton University professor of education, 2009-10 Civic Engagement Scholar and conference coordinator. "I am thrilled by the interest generated so far by this conference and I urge church members, community members, immigrants and members of academic communities to attend."

The conference is sponsored and hosted by Bluffton University. Co-sponsors are Ohio Conference of Mennonite Church USA and Mennonite Central Committee Great Lakes.C

Contact Susan Collier at 419-358-3435 or [email protected] for registration information or visit www.bluffton.edu/beyondborders. The Bluffton University Pathways to Mission and Vocation project is possible with funding by the Lilly Endowment, Inc.