Western Theological Seminary is pleased to welcome Dr. Vincent Bacote as the speaker of the 2026 Leonard F. Stoutemire Lecture in Multicultural Ministry. 

Dr. Vincent Bacote is a Professor of Theology and the Director of the Center for Applied Christian Ethics at Wheaton College in Wheaton, IL. He is eager to help individuals build strong connections between their beliefs and every area of life.

He is the author of Reckoning with Race and Performing the Good News: In Search of a Better Evangelical Theology (2020), The Political Disciple: A Theology of Public Life (2015), The Spirit in Public Theology: Appropriating the Legacy of Abraham Kuyper (2005), and has contributed to books including On Kuyper (2013), Aliens in the Promised Land (2013), Keep Your Head Up (2012) and Prophetic Evangelicals (2012).

He is a regular columnist for Comment Magazine and contributes to other magazines, including Books and Culture, Christianity Today, Think Christian and re:generation quarterly, and journals such as Christian Scholars Review, Urban Mission and the Journal for Christian Theological Research. 

Dr. Vincent Bacote narrated and co-created the film Black + Evangelical, which challenges the church to listen anew to voices whose theological and social journeys speak prophetically to the challenges facing the church today.  

About the Stoutemire Lecture in Multicultural Ministry

The Leonard F. Stoutemire Lectures in Multicultural Ministry are named in honor of the late Reverend Leonard Foster and Gladis Stoutemire, a pioneer African American clergyman and Holland, Michigan church planters. Although they originally wanted to enlist in missionary service in Africa, in 1944, the Stoutemires migrated to Holland, MI, to plant the city’s first intentionally multi-racial congregation, the All Nations Full Gospel Church of Holland.

The lectures equip seminarians, faculty, staff, alumni/ae, and local congregations with resources to increase intercultural competence and enhance effectiveness in Christian ministry.