Gideon Strauss Appointed New CPJ President

May 12, 2009

“Today the trustees of the Center for Public Justice are very pleased to announce the appointment of Gideon Strauss to serve as the Center’s new president, beginning October 1, 2009,” said Harold Heie, chair of the Center’s board of trustees. “Jim Skillen, who has served as executive director and now president since 1981, will continue to serve CPJ as a Senior Fellow, turning his attention to writing, mentoring, and some speaking.”

Dr. Gideon Strauss is a native of South Africa. He earned his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1995 from the then University of the Orange Free State (UOFS) in Bloemfontein, where he wrote a dissertation on The Ethics of Public Welfare. He worked as a senior researcher in public policy at the UOFS, and as an interpreter for the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (under Anglican Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu). He was an advisor to the South African constitutional assembly on the language clauses in the founding provisions and bill of rights included in the 1996 Constitution of the Republic of South Africa.

Since 1999, Strauss has served as Research and Education Director of the Christian Labour Association of Canada (CLAC), a labor union with about 200 employees and 50,000 members, committed to “seeking justice in the workplace.” During his tenure, he led the development of a comprehensive education program for CLAC staff, including a one-year “CLAC College” for new staff.

During this time, Strauss also served as a Senior Fellow at the think tank Cardus (previously known as the Work Research Foundation), and as editor of the electronic and print journal Comment, which seeks to communicate a Christian worldview and cultural strategy to the next generation of cultural leaders.

In his role at Cardus, he has participated in several research projects on the integration of faith and work by corporate executives. Strauss has also taught part time at Tyndale University College and Seminary, Trinity Western University, the Institute for Christian Studies, and Redeemer University College.

Over the past decade, Strauss has developed a network of contacts and friends in the United States, where he has traveled and lectured widely. He has, for example, been engaged with the Coalition for Christian Outreach in Pittsburgh and Redeemer Church in New York City, and has delivered the annual lectures in Moral Formation at Wheaton College. He is currently working on a book tentatively titled Wonder, Heartbreak and Hope, on reading the Psalms in devotional preparation for social action. Strauss and his wife, Angela, have two daughters, Tala and Hannah.

He expressed his debt to CPJ from early on in his own education, having been impressed by Skillen’s 1990 book, The Scattered Voice: Christians at Odds in the Public Square. One of his hopes is that in the future the Center can do more to help overcome that “scatteredness” of the Christian voice in American politics through the Center’s Civitas education programs and other ventures that he will develop in the years ahead. Upon his appointment as the next CPJ president, Strauss said, “It is an honor and privilege to follow someone like Jim Skillen in this position – I am sure I have much yet to learn from him.”

In reflecting on the reasons for the Board’s unanimous choice of Strauss as the next CPJ president, Chairman Heie noted Strauss’s “deep commitment to the mission and philosophy of CPJ, his extraordinary gift of being able to communicate important ideas to broad audiences, and his entrepreneurial and organizational building skills.” Heie cites Strauss’s own words that one of his top priorities will be to “significantly expand and deepen the network of Christian citizens and leaders whom the Center serves,” since “CPJ is uniquely positioned to bring together a new generation of politically responsible evangelicals [what he calls the ‘evangelical center’] and other Christians and to give them a voice in the national dialogue.”

As one of Strauss’s references said, he is “visionary, determined, bold, and imaginative.” In that light, Heie notes the confidence of the Board that “Strauss will be able to build effectively on the excellent foundational work that has been accomplished by Dr. Skillen, taking CPJ to its next level of excellence.”

Strauss has made it clear that one of his top priorities when he begins work in October will be to meet and talk with the Center’s longtime supporters. “I want to spend a great deal of time on the road,” he said. “And I want to draw the network I already know into the work of the Center while reaching out to make new contacts throughout the country.”

After his appointment, Strauss noted that his vision for the future of CPJ is one in which the purpose of the Center—to serve God, advance justice, and transform public life—will be faithfully served and in which its mission—to equip citizens, develop leaders, and shape policy—will be realized, in partnership with an expanding constituency of politically responsible Christian citizens. He expressed excitement about the task ahead, based on conversations he had with potential CPJ constituents in Pittsburgh, Washington, Los Angeles, New York City, and elsewhere while assessing the potential of the Center. He said, “The approach of the Center seems to strike a chord with many young evangelicals who are looking for a new way of political engagement.”

While Strauss will take on his formal responsibilities with the Center in October, he will quickly begin connecting with the CPJ constituency by means of frequent writing at http://cpjustice.org/gideonstrauss/.

President Jim Skillen (left) welcomes Gideon Strauss, who will become the Center's second president on Oct. 1, 2009.