Few Lecture: 'Joyful, Anyway' with Kate Bowler

The scholar and popular podcast host Dr. Kate Bowler explores the tension of life's overlapping deep ache and great joy during this public conversation.

The event is free and open to the public, but registration is required via the Duke Box Office. Registration opens for students on Tuesday, October 13, and for the general public on Thursday, October 15. Register here: https://duke.is/c/q56p

Dr. Bowler hosts the award-winning podcast Everything Happens and is an associate professor of American religious history at Duke Divinity School. A five-time New York Times bestselling author, her most recent book is Joyful, Anyway.

Also titled "Joyful, Anyway," the event is Duke Chapel's fifth annual William Preston Few Lecture. Chapel Dean Luke Powery will moderate the discussion.

"One place where I will be expecting joy is in this conversation with my wise, warm, and funny friend and colleague Kate Bowler," Dean Powery said. "So many of us can relate to what she describes in Joyful, Anyway: We are beset by heartaches we don't expect and can't control, and yet 'joy reminds us that, no matter what, life is still worth loving.'"

A scholar of the prosperity gospel in North America, Dr. Bowler was unexpectedly diagnosed with Stage IV cancer at age thirty-five, causing her to think in different terms about the research and beliefs she had been studying. She wrote Everything Happens for a Reason (and Other Lies I've Loved) about her struggle to understand the personal and intellectual dimensions of the American belief that all tragedies are tests of character. In her Everything Happens podcast, she speaks with artists, actors, writers, religious leaders, and others about what wisdom and truth they've uncovered during difficult circumstances. In her newest book Joyful, Anyway, Dr. Bowler illuminates the surprising nature of joy in a world filled with distraction, pain, and grief.

The Chapel's annual Few Lecture takes its name from Duke's first president, who articulated a vision of education promoting the courage to seek the truth and the conviction to live it.

Campus co-sponsors of the event include Duke Divinity School, Duke University Hospital Chaplain Services and Education, Office of Community Health, Religious Life at Duke, and Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative.