PERSON: Jim Wallis

Archbishop, Founder & Director, Professor, Research Fellow

James E. Wallis Jr. (born June 4, 1948) is an American theologian, writer, teacher and political activist. He is best known as the founder and former editor of Sojourners magazine and as the founder of the Washington, D.C.–based Christian community of the same name. In 2021, Wallis joined Georgetown University as the inaugural Archbishop Desmond Tutu Chair in Faith and Justice. He also leads the Center on Faith and Justice at Georgetown. Wallis is known for his advocacy on issues of peace and social justice. Although Wallis actively eschews political labels, he describes himself as an evangelical and is often associated with the evangelical left and the wider Christian left. He worked as a spiritual advisor to President Barack Obama. He is also a leader in the Red-Letter Christian movement.

Wallis was born in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Phyllis and James E. Wallis, Sr. He was raised in a traditional Plymouth Brethren family. As a young man Wallis became active in Students for a Democratic Society and the civil rights movement. Wallis graduated from Michigan State University and attended Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Illinois, where he joined with other young seminarians in establishing the community that eventually became Sojourners. The journal Sojourners originated in Deerfield, Illinois, as The Post American in 1971.

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