Keynote Speaker

Kenda Creasy Dean is an ordained United Methodist pastor and the Mary D. Synnott Professor of Youth, Church and Culture at Princeton Theological Seminary, where she works closely with the Institute for Youth Ministry and the Farminary. She currently serves as the senior strategist and principle investigator for three major PTS initiatives: the Polaris Young Adult Leadership Network (to support and connect young Christian leaders), the Ministry Collaboratory (to support congregations working with young adults), and the Teaching Spiritual Entrepreneurship Initiative (a 9-seminary initiative to create more entrepreneurial/creative faith leaders).

Kenda is the author of numerous books, including Innovating for Love: Joining God’s Expedition through Christian Social Innovation, Almost Christian: What the Faith of Our Teenagers Is Telling the American Church, and The Godbearing Life: The Art of Soul-Tending in Youth Ministry with Ron Foster and Megan DeWald (the 25th anniversary edition was updated and released in 2023).  See full list below. A Buckeye by birth, Kenda hails from a long line of Ohio farmers and Kentucky coal miners, although she herself is a P.K.—a politician’s kid. At 15 she attended a church missions camp on Lake Erie that pretty much changed everything. 

Recently named the 2024 Distinguished Leader in Innovation by Wesleyan Impact Partners, Kenda co-founded Ministry Incubators in 2014 with fellow PTS alumnus Mark DeVries to support theologically-responsible innovation and sustainability in ministry.  A graduate of Miami University (Ohio), Wesley Theological Seminary (Washington, DC), and Princeton Theological Seminary (New Jersey), Kenda has pastored churches in Arlington, VA, College Park, MD, and Kingston, NJ. She and her husband Kevin love hanging out with their hilarious grown kids and digging their toes in the sand on the Jersey shore.