Buies Creek, N.C.—Dr. Samuel Wells, Dean of Duke University Chapel, will deliver the Campbell Divinity School’s James C. Cammack Institute of Preaching annual lecture on Monday, March 21, at 7 p.m. and Tuesday, March 22, at 10:40 a.m. and 1 p.m. in Butler Chapel. His topic is “The Power of Preaching.” The public is invited to attend.
The Dean of Duke University Chapel since 2005, Wells’ role is to preach, teach and write in a way that merges faith and intellect for the good of the university and its church. Wells also leads the chapel staff, oversees the Religious Life staff and is a faith leader for all levels of the university.
Wells’ pastoral experience before coming to Duke includes being a community worker in inner-city Liverpool, England and serving four parishes as a Church of England priest from 1991-2005. Most of his time as a pastor was spent in the post-industrial Northeast and in a socially disadvantaged neighborhood in East Anglia. Wells also served suburban and urban village communities in Cambridge. From 1998-2003, he was closely involved in establishing a community-led development trust, the first such organization in the east of England. During this time, he also launched a nonprofit organization for disadvantaged children. In addition to his role at Duke Chapel, Wells is Research Professor of Christian Ethics at Duke Divinity School. He holds a master’s degree in modern history from Merton College, Oxford, a B.D. in Systematic Theology from Edinburgh University and a Ph.D. in Christian Ethics from Durham University. In addition, he has published seven academic titles. Since 2004, Wells has been an honorary canon theologian in the Diocese of Chichester, UK, a role that involves occasional lectures and lay and clergy training and formation.
The Campbell Divinity School Cammack Institute of Preaching Lecture series is named in honor of Dr. James C. Cammack, pastor of Snyder Memorial Baptist Church in Fayetteville for 30 years. Camack is a graduate of Baylor University and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. During his tenure at Snyder Memorial, over 5,000 people became members of the church. Cammack’s son Chris established the James C. Cammack Institute of Preaching Lectures at Campbell in 2011 to honor his father’s love and legacy of preaching.
Photo Copy: Dr. Samuel Wells, Dean of the Chapel at Duke University