The Centre for Patristics and Early Christianity (CPEC) at McMaster Divinity College hosted its annual Exploring Early Christianity student conference on January 23–24, 2026, beginning with an evening session followed by a full day of student papers, discussion, and scholarly exchange. The conference welcomed over 50 registrants from across North America and beyond, with participants joining from Oxford, Boston, Los Angeles, Oklahoma, Vancouver, Montreal, and Ottawa. The event was generously sponsored in part by the H. H. Bingham Trust.
The conference featured 23 student presenters representing a wide range of institutions, offering original research across diverse areas of early Christian studies. Paper sessions explored topics including the Church at Nicaea, Reading Augustine, Women and Gender in Early Christianity, Texts, Liturgies, and Ethics, Creatureliness and Embodiment, Christology and Mariology, Retrieving the Pre-Nicene Fathers, and the Alexandrian Tradition.
The conference included plenary addresses by Professor James R. Payton, Professor of Patristics and Historical Theology at McMaster Divinity College, and Dr. Han-luen Kantzer Komline, Marvin and Jerene DeWitt Professor of Theology and Church History at Western Theological Seminary in Holland, Michigan.
The Best Essay Award was presented to Tessa Brubaker of Biola University for her paper, “From Polemic to Poetry: The Cappadocians and St. Ephrem on Divine Unknowability.” As the award recipient, Brubaker’s article will be published in an upcoming volume of the Patristic Theology journal.
Photos from the event are below.
