Dear Friends and Colleagues,

I've been asked to help organize a conference/workshop at Western Michigan University in honor of Dr. Rudolf J. Siebert's lifelong scholarly work and his coming retirement. The workshop, sponsored by the Department of Comparative Religion of WMU, will take place this fall in Kalamazoo, Michigan. A date has yet to be set. At this point, we're attempting to gauge the interest and availability of potential attendees and speakers. If you'd be interested in attending and/or presenting some of your work, we'd greatly appreciate if you could email me and let me know your availability. Of course, the conference/workshop will focus on Rudi's Critical Theory of Religion and Society, i.e. Dialectical Religiology, but will nevertheless be open to all matters relating to religion, philosophy, sociology, etc. This event will be a good time to catch up with Dr. Siebert, the Department of Comparative Religion, and Rudi's former students and international colleagues. 

As you may already know, Rudi was recently honored with Emeritus status for his over 50 years of teaching and service to WMU. He was also recently recognized by the state of Michigan, its governor Gretchen Whitmer, and representatives of the legislature, for his "stellar career" at WMU. Congratulations to Rudi! The recognition is well-deserved. 

Also, if you know anyone who you think would be interested in the conference/workshop, please forward their name to me and feel free to forward this email to them. Additionally, if you have contact information for 1) Nicholas Budimir, 2) Federico Velez-Velez, or 3) Anthony Squires, please let me know. We want to extend invitations to all those who studied under and/or with Rudi. 

I hope to see you all in the fall! 

Auf Wiedersehen!