My name is Earl Leininger–first name is Charles but only my mother used it and that’s when she was scolding me about something–“Charles Earl!”

I was born and grew up in Ft. Smith, Arkansas, raised in a loving family and a very conservative, fundamentalist Baptist Church, although my current religious/theological perspective has been the result of a long and thoughtful journey, which these blogs will no doubt reflect.  I received my undergraduate degree, with a major in speech and theatre and a minor in psychology, from Oklahoma Baptist University, a BD and PhD from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary–“back in the day” when it was, from my perspective, an excellent educational institution–’nuff said.  During those seminary years, I served as pastor of several churches although I had begun to suspect as early as my sophomore year in college that my gifts, my “calling,” might be more suited to teaching than to pastoral ministry.  That early intuition turned out to be correct.

I served for most of my professional career–thirty-four years–at Mars Hill College (now University) in several roles: for most of the first half teaching philosophy, religion and a variety of interdisciplinary general education courses; then–beginning a journey to “the dark side”–for four years as Chair of the Division of Humanities, and for eleven years as Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs before returning to the classroom for a couple of years before retirement.  Then, in a wholly unexpected post-retirement career, over the next fourteen years I was privileged to serve for ten years, in two “iterations,” as Associate Provost for the College of Arts and Sciences and as Provost and Executive Vice-President at Gardner-Webb University.  Finally, in an also unanticipated development, I accepted a one-year position as Interim Chair of the Department of Theatre Arts, back where I started, at Mars Hill University.

Over these past decades, I also was privileged to enjoy a long avocational career as a professional actor–mostly with the Southern Appalachian Repertory Theatre–and doing commercial voice-overs for radio and TV.  Now having retired for the fifth–and last time!–I am pleased to be able to begin this venture in writing from time to time in this blog.