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Founded in 2004, the John Perkins Center for Reconciliation is a first-of-its-kind partnership between Seattle Pacific University and John Perkins, one of the important evangelical voices to come out of the American civil rights movement. By creating the Center, located on the SPU campus, our goal is to equip generations of global urban leaders to engage the culture and change the world through reconciliation, leadership training, and community development.
In everything we do, we seek to model reconciliation at Seattle Pacific. Through the Perkins Center, we are building bridges into the community, creating partnerships with urban churches and organizations, launching scholarship and reflection, and changing the shape and face of our own campus community.
Internationally known for his groundbreaking work in Christian community development, John Perkins describes reconciliation as “the centerpiece of the gospel” — a conviction echoed by Perkins Center Director Tali Hairston. “Reconciliation calls for a coalition of people coming together with different strengths, different gifts, different ways of doing things, to solve the problem of dividedness in our culture,” says Hairston. “Reconciliation is transformative, not just for individuals, but also for the whole community. When we practice reconciliation, it leads to cultural change.”
• Civil Rights leader John Perkins was keynote speaker for the SPU President's Symposium on Reconciliation. He spoke to a capacity crowd about the biblical call to make things right with our brothers and sisters. "Reconciliation is the … work of Jesus coming into the world," he says. "It's what God used to bring us back to Himself."
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