Dr. Christian Richard (1889-1955), born in Charmoille, Switzerland, was a lay educator of Catholicism and a teacher of religion. Raised as a Mennonite, he became a Methodist Minister in the United States (from 1919-1927). His education included studies in England, at Harvard University (with Manley O. Hudson and W. E. Hocking), and in France where he obtained his doctorate at the Sorbonne, University of Paris in 1934. While there he converted to Catholicism. After teaching in France, he came to Harvard University as a French instructor before serving as the Catholic chair for the University of Iowa's School of Religion from 1937-1939. In Iowa, he became known among Catholics as an outspoken an enthusiastic advocate for the ecumenical and pluralistic Oxford Group movement (also referred to as Buchmanism after its founder, the Lutheran minister Frank Buchman). In 1939, he served as the Catholic representative of the National Conference of Christians and Jews, the interfaith group sponsoring Iowa City's observance of Brotherhood Day. After leaving Iowa City, he lived for an unspecified time in Morocco. Together with Meyer I. David and input from the historian Will Durant, he authored the Declaration of Interdependence (1944) to promote the essential pluralistic values of a tolerant and multicultural civil society. Later in the 1940s, he taught at Westmont College, Los Angeles. If you have any further details on Dr. Christian Richard's life and career, please contact us.