Ted Koontz

Professor of Ethics and Peace Studies; Director, Peace and Justice Studies

• B.A., Bethel College, Kansas, 1969
• M.Div., Harvard Divinity School, 1972
• M.A., Harvard University, 1980
• Ph.D., Harvard University, 1985

E-mail: tkoontz@ambs.edu
Phone: 574 296-6219
Curriculum Vitae

To download a print-quality photo, click on the small photo at right.

The connection between the ethical implications of Christian faith and life in the world has been Ted’s foremost concern beginning when he was a seminary student and continuing through his work with Mennonite Central Committee and his current teaching. He spent a sabbatical and service leave from 1988 to 1990 as an MCC volunteer teaching in the Philippines and taught in Rwanda and Burundi during the summer of 2003. Before coming to AMBS in 1982, Ted taught at Goshen College and Notre Dame. He also was a pastor in Oklahoma (1968–69) and executive secretary of Mennonite Central Committee Peace Section (1972–76).

"My experiences during the Civil Rights movement and the war in Vietnam left me with a commitment to find ways to connect Christian convictions to matters of public policy. Yet, more recently my attention has been drawn to the church’s own life, both for its own sake, and because a credible public witness depends upon the church’s embodiment of that witness. I am convinced that our theological thought dare not be “merely” intellectual. To have integrity and power, theology and ethics must be in constant, honest conversation with our personal life experiences and with the life experiences of communities of Christian faith."

Scholarship

• Christian Attitudes to War, Peace, and Revolution by John Howard Yoder (Brazos, 2009) co-editor
• “Thinking Ethically about War Against Iraq,” in Mennonite Quarterly Review (January 2003)
• “Mennonite Education Administration: An Outside View,” in Mennonite Education in a Post-Christian World (CMBC Publications, 1998)
• “Noncombatant Immunity in Michael Walzer’s Just and Unjust Wars,” in Ethics and International Affairs, Volume 11 (1997)
• Godward: Personal Stories of Grace (Herald, 1996), editor and contributor
• “Christian Nonviolence: An Interpretation” in The Ethics of War and Peace (Princeton University, 1996)

Speakers Bureau Presentations

• Grace to you and peace: towards a gospel of peace for the 21st century
• How Christians think about war: five historical/theological streams