Updates from the May 2025 Board of Trustees Meeting

Dear Fuller Community,

As we approach the end of another fantastic academic year at Fuller Seminary, we look forward to the joy and accomplishment of more than 500 graduates in June. Together, we are moving forward in many ways. One example is our digital forward transformation, in which we are reimagining processes and engaging new technologies to enhance enrollment, student experience, and faculty and staff flourishing. Another example is the growth of the TENx10 Collaboration which is engaging diverse Christian leaders, organizations, denominations, and influencers that are committed to making faith matter more for 10 million young people over the next 10 years. There is so much to thank God for.

During the recent meeting of the Board of Trustees in Pasadena, on May 18 and 19, the board continued to be prayerful and mindful of those impacted by the devastating January wildfires, while rejoicing in the seminary’s recovery efforts and the incredible generosity of donors who have supported Fuller faculty, staff, students, and their families who were impacted. Our prayers and financial support continue, as we are committed to caring for those in need.

After several years of consultation, feedback, and dialogue, the Board of Trustees reconfirmed the institution’s commitment to its historic theological understanding of marriage and human sexuality—a union between a man and a woman and sexual intimacy within the context of that union. At the same time, we acknowledge that faithful Christians—through prayerful study, spiritual discernment, and lived experience—have come to affirm other covenantal forms of relationship.

The Board of Trustees is committed to continuing Fuller’s long history of educating leaders in various fields of theology and psychology with the competencies needed for the various settings and contexts God calls them to serve. We rejoice to welcome and train students who desire to engage in this global evangelical institution of higher education committed to serving the church and the world. Fuller Seminary has historically shunned ideological polarities. We continue to seek another way—a Fuller way—that is a critical contribution to the church and the world. I look forward to working with the Board of Trustees, the administration, and the faculty to develop guidelines to continue living out our commitments.

As Fuller seeks to live generatively and constructively into areas of current challenge or polarization, the Board of Trustees approved the establishment of a Center for Peacebuilding and Conflict Transformation. Christy Vines, president and CEO of Ideos Institute, will join Fuller to curate this new effort of equipping leaders and organizations for the current and continuing work of building peace and transforming conflict. Experience, resources, and relationships at Ideos Institute will come together within the Fuller ecology with its multi-ecclesial, multicultural, and multinational assets to offer a new expression of conflict transformation from a global evangelical institution.

Finally, the Board of Trustees elected Dr. Joseph Clair to join the board. Dr. Clair is associate provost in the division of humanities, honors & education and professor of theology and culture at George Fox University. With degrees from Duke University, Fordham University, University of Cambridge, and Princeton University, he brings expertise as a scholar and higher education administrator in service to the Board of Trustees. We welcome Dr. Clair to the Fuller community.

I look forward to seeing many of you at commencement in June and hope that you all enjoy a rewarding summer.

David Emmanuel Goatley
Clifford L. Penner Presidential Chair