William Henry Willimon


William Henry Willimon is an American theologian and bishop in the United Methodist Church, retired, who for eight years served the North Alabama Conference. He is currently Professor of the Practice of Christian Ministry and Director of the Doctor of Ministry program at Duke Divinity School. He is former Dean of the Chapel at Duke University and is considered by many as one of America's best-known and most influential preachers. A Pulpit & Pew Research on Pastoral Leadership survey determined that he was one of the two most frequently read writers by pastors in mainline Protestantism alongside the Roman Catholic writer Henri Nouwen. His books have sold over a million copies. He is also Editor-At-Large of The Christian Century. His 2019 memoir was released to wide acclaim, described by Justo L. Gonzalez as "An exceptional example of theology at its best."

Biography

Bishop Willimon, originally from Greenville, South Carolina and raised at Buncombe Street UMC in Greenville, SC, received a B.A. from Wofford College in 1968, a M. Div. from Yale Divinity School in 1971, and an S.T.D. from Emory University in 1973. He has also received thirteen honorary doctorates, from schools including Colgate, Moravian Seminary, Lafayette, Lehigh, and Westminster. Willimon is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society.

Professional life

Willimon first served as pastor of United Methodist churches in the North Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina Conferences.
From 1976 to 1980, he was on the faculty of Duke Divinity School as Professor of Liturgy and Worship. After serving as pastor of Northside United Methodist Church in Greenville, South Carolina, he became Dean of the Chapel at Duke University in 1984 where he served for twenty years.
He was elected to the episcopacy in 2004 and assigned to the North Alabama Annual Conference. He retired from the episcopacy at the conclusion of the Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference in 2012.
In 2013 he was appointed pastor of the Duke Memorial United Methodist Church in Durham, North Carolina.
He has written over 80 books which have sold over a million copies, been translated into six languages, and won numerous awards. He has collaborated with his friend the theologian Stanley Hauerwas on six books, including their widely influential Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony. which he wrote with Richard Lischer is widely used as a seminary homiletics text. He was, with Joel B. Green, the general editor of The Wesley Study Bible, published in 2009. His book ' is used in dozens of seminaries around the world. In 2018, his book ' was made book of the year by the Evangelical Press Association. With his stress on the wisdom of the church through the centuries, he is sometimes associated with the post-liberal movement and narrative theology.
Willimon has garnered a reputation as an outstanding preacher, being named in a 1996 Baylor University survey along with Billy Graham as one of the 12 best preachers in the English-speaking world. Some of his sermons can be found at .
A former student, Michael A. Turner, says about Willimon in the book which he co-authored with William F. Malambri: "First and foremost Willimon is a pastoral theologian whose primary message is that the God revealed in Jesus matters for everything in life. Thus his most influential work has been in calling the Church to be a faithful witness to the God revealed to us in the person of Jesus Christ." In the same book, they also say: "Willimon, it seems, never tires of telling the Church just how distinctive our way of life should be because of the particular God who has captured us."
He has served as a trustee of Wofford College, Huntingdon College, Birmingham-Southern College, and Emory University.

Personal life

He married Patricia Parker on June 7, 1969. They have two children: Harriet and William.

Publications

Sole Author