If you’re a newspaper reader as I am, mornings can sometimes be a challenge for my equilibrium. Bad news makes the front page and does its best to assault my conviction that God is sovereign in this world. There is great value being rooted in the scriptures, and in understanding the times. 1 Peter reiterates for us the truth that our joy and hope is rooted in what we know to be true of God and his working in the world – from day one to the day when all things are made new in Christ. In that light I can rejoice.
“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice”, Philippians 4:4.
Paul’s letter to the Philippians is full of joy and thanksgiving – he used his own thankful heart to teach and encourage the church to live joyfully in light of the gospel. Even, and perhaps especially, in challenging times. This season of Lent is a time of reflection and repentance that leads directly and unequivocally to an unencumbered joy in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We have an abundant new life in Christ, and the hope of all things being made new.
The National Intelligence Council produces a report every five years which looks at global trends and how they will shape the following decade. This report makes for fascinating reading for those interested in causes and effects on a global scale – determining trends, assessing their causes, and extrapolating their probable outcomes.
September is a funny month; while working professionals no longer have summer breaks we nevertheless continue to lean toward the academic calendar. For those older with children, the September ritual of school starting remains a family focal point. For those just out of college, well, old habits die hard and September remains the month of new beginnings. This is true as well of Christian Union New York.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet
Consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed eget mi vestibulum sem aliquam condimentum. Quisque et justo nec ante tincidunt mollis. Fusce a congue lorem, a malesuada nulla. Vestibulum ultrices ante a ligula sodales, nec aliquet orci euismod. Sed fringilla metus non lorem rhoncus, in maximus tortor consequat. Integer sagittis urna vitae tellus commodo ornare.Nullam euismod libero eget quam dapibus hendrerit. Nunc dictum justo id nisi consequat auctor. Nulla sit amet elit lectus. Praesent sed fringilla eros, id cursus lacus. Integer eget neque non lacus commodo gravida. Proin pulvinar interdum nisl. Vestibulum hendrerit elit a nibh pretium malesuada. Etiam at quam egestas, volutpat mi pulvinar, eleifend mi. Ut lorem nisi, ultrices egestas aliquam bibendum, molestie gravida nisi.
Morbi vel leo nec nulla sollicitudin mattis. Suspendisse potenti. Proin semper ac sapien eget dignissim. Orci varius natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. Nulla posuere id turpis a interdum. Donec lacinia sagittis diam quis gravida. Aenean rhoncus imperdiet tristique. Praesent feugiat ullamcorper ligula vel bibendum. Praesent viverra nisi ac pulvinar hendrerit. Morbi commodo semper nisi eget egestas. Donec vestibulum imperdiet luctus. Ut pulvinar luctus urna, blandit rutrum justo. Nunc finibus erat sem, et molestie lectus accumsan ut.
June 22 - June 23, 2018, New York City
The CU Cities Conference 2018 convened graduate students and diverse professionals, from recent graduates to seasoned pros, from across industries, to explore compelling ideas about faith and its relevance to every facet of our lives. Graduates of Columbia, Dartmouth, Harvard, University of Pennslyvania, Princeton and Yale explored their role in becoming Christian leaders. Click here to watch the videos and click here to listen to the audio from the conference.
Katie Lentz, CU New York young professional: “The most impactful thing about this conference was the coming together of a network of people striving towards the same goal. It was so encouraging to gather with Christians from this city and other cities with the same Christ-centered personal mission in the workplace.”Photo Gallery
Click on one of the pictures below to access the photo gallery from the CU Cities Conference.
Vaclav Havel, in his essay Politics, Morality, and Civility, shares his thoughts on how society is established to produce a flourishing culture. Having come out of a dark period of communist rule that chose many of the tools and structures of a democratic system and turned them to other ends Havel knew well that structures ultimately rest on something much more fundamental. They rest on morality – our understanding of good and evil, and the willingness to pursue that which is good. Havel calls “living in truth”.
Greetings from New York!
Dr. William Hurlbut, professor at Stanford Medical School, spoke at a recent CU New York forum on “The Challenge and Opportunity of Gene Editing: Scientific and Ethical Considerations”. Prof. Hurlbut addressed the ethical issues associated with advancing biomedical technology, especially when applied to direct interventions in human life. The evening stands as an example of thoughtful Christians exploring both a deeper understanding of a key scientific advance, and the range of implications it contains. CU New York’s mission is to equip and encourage Christians in New York in engaging culture in redemptive and transformative ways. You can watch the video of the talk here.
A belated Welcome to 2017 — a year that promises to be eventful, no matter how you look at it. A verse that jumps to mind is Psalm 28: 7, The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in Him, and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise Him. Because He is my strength, and because I trust in Him — my response must be joy, and this is how I look at the year ahead.
Greetings from New York!
Welcome to Fall — that is what has been going through my mind for the past week. Cooler temperatures are a joy to me; I look forward to this season starting early August, and this joy lasts until I am finally driven mad by the fixation on all things flavored pumpkin — usually by mid-October.
I’m always excited to be at this point in May — the promise of summer and the greater promise of newly arrived graduates in New York and other cities. They are excited to be done with their formal schooling (at least for a time) and many of us a little further down the path are excited for them as they begin to connect to the wider world of work and life that faith calls us into.
Greetings from New York!
During the past century it has been an interesting development where the celebration of Christmas has taken on greater social and cultural significance. Historically the church has elevated Easter, or Resurrection Sunday, as the more defining event to mark. The death of Jesus as the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of humanity, and His subsequent resurrection overcoming death and the power of Satan are defining factors in the uniqueness of the Christian faith. It resolves the overwhelming problem of the human condition and it points to a future where all is made whole. I hope this has been a remarkable season of hope and renewal for you.
Greetings from New York!
I’m not sure if you view this month in quite the same way as I do — a somewhat comical juxtaposition of the silliness/romantic celebration of Valentine's Day and the sobering start of the Lenten season when we consider the path of Christ as He approaches His crucifixion and resurrection. Certainly any serious celebration of the former would be rather empty without the tangible demonstration of the love of Christ shown for us in the latter.
Greetings from New York City!
There is much to relate in this letter, all of it encouraging. We seem to be in a season of great activity in a number of areas, all of which provide some wonderful opportunities for those of you in the New York area.
Excellent Additions to Your Reading List
The Square and the Tower: Networks and Power, from the Freemasons to Facebook
by Niall Ferguson
The 21st century has been hailed as the Age of Networks. However, in The Square and the Tower, Niall Ferguson argues that networks have always been with us, from the structure of the brain to the food chain, from the family tree to freemasonry. Throughout history, hierarchies housed in high towers have claimed to rule, but often real power has resided in the networks in the town square below. For it is networks that tend to innovate. And it is through networks that revolutionary ideas can contagiously spread. Just because conspiracy theorists like to fantasize about such networks doesn't mean they are not real. (Amazon)
The Common Rule: Habits of Purpose for an Age of Distraction
by Justin Whitmel Earley
Twenty-first-century Christianity has experienced a much-needed renaissance in its theology of work, but it takes formational habits to work with the purpose we preach, and this ingredient is still largely missing from the conversation. In the meantime our workplaces are being fragmented by the distractions of technology, uncontrollable busyness, and the question of whether we want a job driven by purpose or upward mobility. This book addresses the need to pair our theology on the meaning of work with the formational practice of spiritual work habits in order to bring order and purpose back to the workplace - and to our lives.
True Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of Our Complex World
by David Skeel
Although the twentieth century saw several landmark contributions to Christian apologetics, these Christian classics have lost some of their effectiveness in an era when America is more pluralistic than ever before and many Americans imagine that science has explained or will soon explain all of the mysteries of life. Skeel, however, argues that Christianity actually offers better explanations than materialism or other perspectives for many of the most important puzzles of our existence - such as our idea-making capacity, our perceptions of beauty and suffering, and our repeated optimism that we can create a truly just social order and repeated failure to do so.
On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books
by Karen Swallow Prior
Reading great literature well has the power to cultivate virtue. Great literature increases knowledge of and desire for the good life by showing readers what virtue looks like and where vice leads. It is not just what one reads but how one reads that cultivates virtue. Reading good literature well requires one to practice numerous virtues, such as patience, diligence, and prudence. And learning to judge wisely a character in a book, in turn, forms the reader's own character.
Prior takes readers on a guided tour through works of great literature both ancient and modern, exploring twelve virtues that philosophers and theologians throughout history have identified as most essential for good character and the good life. (Amazon)
The Road to Character
by David Brooks
"Brooks focuses on the deeper values that should inform our lives. Responding to what he calls the culture of the Big Me, which emphasizes external success, Brooks challenges us, and himself, to rebalance the scales between our "résumé virtues"—achieving wealth, fame, and status—and our "eulogy virtues," those that exist at the core of our being: kindness, bravery, honesty, or faithfulness, focusing on what kind of relationships we have formed." (Amazon)A Hobbit, a Wardrobe, and a Great War: How J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis Rediscovered Faith, Friendship, and Heroism in the Cataclysm of 1914-1918
by Joseph Loconte
"The First World War laid waste to a continent and permanently altered the political and religious landscape of the West. For a generation of men and women, it brought the end of innocence—and the end of faith. Yet for J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis, the Great War deepened their spiritual quest. Both men served as soldiers on the Western Front, survived the trenches, and used the experience of that conflict to ignite their Christian imagination. Had there been no Great War, there would have been noHobbit, no Lord of the Rings, no Narnia, and perhaps no conversion to Christianity by C. S. Lewis." (Amazon)by Stephen Hess
"Written by Stephen Hess, who served on the White House staff during both the Eisenhower and Nixon presidencies, this book is a uniquely personal account of what happened behind closed doors when conservative Richard Nixon made Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a liberal Ivy League professor, his top urban affairs adviser." (Brookings)Ministers at War: Winston Churchill and His War Cabinet
by Jonathan Schneer
"Ministers at War tells the gripping story of how the man who certainly saved Britain and arguably saved western civilization managed his cabinet "team of rivals," a coalition of men who had spent most of their interrelated, pre-war political lives at daggers drawn." (First Things)To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, & Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World
by James Davison Hunter
"The call to make the world a better place is inherent in the Christian belief and practice. But why have efforts to change the world by Christians so often failed or gone tragically awry? And how might Christians in the 21st century live in ways that have integrity with their traditions and are more truly transformative? Hunter argues that all too often current political theologies worsen the very problems they are designed to solve. What is really needed is a different paradigm of Christian engagement with the world, one that Hunter calls "faithful presence"-- an ideal of Christian practice that is not only individual but institutional; a model that plays out not only in all relationships but in our work and all spheres of social life." (Amazon)
Forums and Salons Develop Thoughtful Christian Engagement in Wide-Ranging Topics Throughout Year
Forums on Christian Leadership
Forums occur quarterly, in venues suitable for 100-150 participants. Topics address broad themes of Christian leadership, and keynote speakers will include inspiring Christians who are leaders in their respective fields. These events are excellent networking opportunities among Christian professionals who are growing in their vision, strategy and effectiveness to change New York City and Washington, DC culture for Christ.Recent forum speakers include:
- Dr. Robert Louis Wilken, Professor Emeritus of the University of Virginia (pictured, above)
- Dr. Os Guinness, Author and Social Critic
- Mako Fujimura, Artist and Director
- Abbie Killeen, Producer Babette's Feast
- Cherie Harder, President The Trinity Forum
- Dr. David R. Young, Founder and Chairman of Oxford Analytica
- Dr. Anthony Bradley, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at The King's College in New York City
- Matthew Bishop, US Business Editor and New York Bureau Chief for The Economist
- Fernando Cabrera, NYC Council Member and senior pastor of New Life Outreach International
Salons
Salons provide an intimate gathering for around 20 Christian leaders at a time to develop strong ties, and interact on a more narrowly defined topic that strengthens either the intellectual or supernatural dimensions of your Christian faith. Expert speakers will go in-depth, but the setting affords participants opportunities for question and answer, and interaction with the speaker, as well as one another. If you are interested in hosting a salon, please contact: cunewyork@christianunion.org.Upcoming salons are announced in Christian Union New York Events.
- Jeff Smith, President Generosity NY
- Jay Jakub, Director of Eternal Research at Mars Catalyst
- Paul Horrocks, President Rocksurance Solutions
- Ken Fish, Founder Kingdom Fire Ministries
- Dr. Seth Ward, Music Director at Central Presbyterian Church in Manhattan
- Michael Rowntree, Senior Pastor of Wellspring Church in Fort Worth, Texas
- Joseph Loconte, PhD, Associate Professor of History, The King's College, New York City
- Dr. Gordon Isaac, Berkshire Associate Professor at Gordon-Conwell Seminary
- Prof. Paul Lim, Associate Professor of the History of Christianity, Vanderbilt University, Divinity School
Past Events
Click here to view past events and correlating video and audio recordings. Questions
For more information on Christian Union New York please email cunewyork@christianunion.org and for more information on Christian Union.Christian Union New York highlight thoughtful leaders in various fields speaking on leading and engaging the world with faith. These forums provide an opportunity for Christian leaders to discuss and debate the role and implications of faith in the public square.
Leadership for the New York Ministry
Linda L. Huang, DDS, MD, FACS
A Columbia University School of Dental Medicine graduate and clinical professor, Linda is one of the most specialized dental and oral surgeons in the New York area. She owns her own highly successful practice, serves on medical missions, frequently offers prayers with and for her patients, and serves on the ministry team for CU NY’s Gospel of the Kingdom Conferences.
Chris Shortell 
Chris is a graduate of Cornell University who has held various leadership roles in the U.S. and Asia in insurance and international trade while living in some of the most dynamic cities such as Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore and Shanghai, and is the former Euler Hermes China CEO. He is now moving back to NYC to permanently re-join his wife, Joon, after a stint of overseas commuting in the wake of the global pandemic, and is passionate about mentoring young men.
Joon Shortell
Joon is a graduate of the Parson School of Design with a concentration in Fashion Design, and was a clothing designer and boutique owner. Joon’s passion and zeal for Bible teaching, prayer, and a move of the Holy Spirit have her now using her time primarily serving the kingdom of Jesus globally and in NYC.
Christian Union seeks a spiritually vibrant nation marked by Christian values permeating every corner of society. Christian Union New York works to bring revival to America, starting right here in the city.
In Jesus, Christian leaders can be made whole spiritually, mentally, physically, emotionally, and in their families. Beyond that, they can be strengthened and equipped with kingdom strategy and anointing to be used by God to transform those within their spheres of influence.
From the City to the Nation... and Beyond
A revived and kingdom-minded New York City can begin to turn the heart of the entire nation back to the Lord. To some, this might sound unlikely. But the Lord has done it before. A simple prayer meeting in Manhattan, started in 1857 by a businessman named Jeremiah Lanphier, grew and multiplied in supernatural ways, ultimately leading to what we now call the Third Great Awakening—a revival that spread across America and beyond.
This is why Christian Union New York exists. It serves, ministers to, equips, and connects influential leaders in business, government, finance, law, media, medicine, vocational ministry, and other key industries. The multiplicative power of connecting spiritually vibrant, high-level leaders in every sector of society in NYC can transform the city.
Through seeking God together and stepping out in bold faith, the city-wide and national impact of Spirit-filled key leaders working in tandem cannot be overstated.
CU New York is available to any Christian professional living in the area. God has called Christian Union to particularly target developing Christian leaders, so as to maximize the reach of those believers to impact culture. The ministry also offers a unique continuation of community for alumni of Christian Union's university ministries.
Get Connected
More information regarding our NYC opportunities:- Events, Salons and Forums
- Connect with Us: follow us on social media, join a community group, find a mentor/mentee, receive our Enewsletter, and sign up for our email list
- For questions or to learn more about Christian Union New York please contact us at: cunewyork@christianunion.org
Pursuing Leadership Impact ... Together
We are called not only to a new and transformed life - but to be part of the redemptive process of "making all things new."Are you interested in:
- Building a vibrant network of friends in a fast-paced, time-starved city?
- Experiencing the richness of abiding friendship, cultural engagement and seeking the Lord's presence with a group of like-minded leaders in NYC?
- Working with others to engage a complex and diverse city to make it a different and transformed place - a place that God intended it to be?
. . . . . . . . . . . .
Community Groups are small groups of Christian men or women pursuing leadership impact in three specific ways:
- Community: Building a network of abiding friendships with other leaders in NYC;
- Spiritual Cultivation: Developing an intellectually-satisfying and wholehearted pursuit of the God who made them;
- Engagement: Actively engaging and changing the culture around them.
These groups meet every other week with an active Bible study component and periodic projects designed by the group.
Projects range from reimagining a particular vocation in light of the gospel to involvement in a critical social issue in the city.
The intellectually curious and those longing to assimilate their faith in the culture we inhabit will find these groups stimulating and life-changing.
For more information, or to join a Community Group, please cunewyork@christianunion.org or call Scott Crosby at (347) 682-5653.
Connects Christian Professionals to Share Life Lessons, Disciple & Inspire
Young professionals crave input from Christians who have faced the challenges they are now confronting.
It's vital that older, established Christians share their spiritual and life lessons, and disciple those new to the city. How wonderful would it be to find someone who has faced many of the same questions you face in the context of the city? Christian Union can help you become a mentor and share your experience and insights, or connect with a mentor.
Young professionals are looking for someone who has walked through the experiences they're facing. They are seeking godly wisdom to the questions they're facing in their work, their own personal life, their Christian growth, and their future. Does this sound like you?
Or, perhaps this is you. A Christian who has been around NYC with insights and lessons learned. You are more than willing to share with those who are just getting started. Perhaps you are looking to be used by God to meet a unique need in a personal way.
Close Christian friendship is vital to spiritual maturity, and a mentoring relationship is an incredibly important tool for developing Christian leaders. Whichever profile you fit, Christian Union can help you connect.
Mentor Program Details
- Would-be mentors and mentees submit an application stating their desire to participate in the Mentoring Program along with some (limited) personal background information. This process will allow us to screen mentors and mentees as well as to gain a sufficient amount of information so as to make the best match possible with waiting mentees.
- The mentor will commit to serve as a mentor to the mentee for six months.
- The mentor will meet with the mentee once a month for those six months in order to introduce the mentee to life in the city and have a context to get to know one another.
- At the end of the six months, there is an expectation that either party may or may not move forward in a mentoring relationship.
- In the case that the mentoring relationship does not continue, the mentor will help find the mentee a suitable mentor.
