The Rev. Peter W. Marty

Denomination: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)
Organization: St. Paul Lutheran Church, Davenport, IA

Peter W. Marty  serves as senior pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church, a 3500-member congregation in Davenport, Iowa. He is a frequent preacher and speaker at colleges, churches, and conferences across the country. Author of more than 100 articles on leadership, preaching, and parish renewal in America, Marty is also the author of The Anatomy of Grace (Augsburg Fortress, 2008). From 2004-2009, he served as host of the national radio broadcast, Grace Matters, speaking to more than a million listeners through the program's weekly airing. In 2015 he was named the publisher of The Christian Century magazine.   

In 2010, the Academy of Parish Clergy named him "Parish Pastor of the Year," an award recognizing leadership excellence and faithfulness in congregational development.

Peter has preached in some of America's most notable pulpits including Washington National Cathedral, Duke Chapel, and Yale University. 

Pastor Marty has served on various hospital, college, foundation, and community boards. He serves on the board of trustees for Augustana College, Rock Island, IL. Other writings of his include contributions to several multi-volume works on preaching, and chapters in different books on congregational life and theology. He has served as narrator for different faith broadcast documentaries on the Hallmark channel.

Marty is a one-time fellow of the Fund for Theological Education, and has served as a partner on pastoral leadership for the Fund. He has been a member of the Louisville Institute's Pastor's Working Group, and a past participant in the Duke Project for the Study of Ministry. In 2009, he was named the visiting Hoskins Fellow at Yale Divinity School.

Prior to his arrival in Davenport in 1996, he served an eight-year pastorate in Kansas City, Missouri and a two-year pastorate in River Forest, Illinois. He graduated with honors from both The Colorado College and Yale Divinity School. He was the 1979 recipient of an honors fellowship in history for study at Oxford University. Prior to studies at Yale, Marty lived in Cameroun, West Africa for one and a half years, serving as the director of construction for a mission outpost of the Lutheran Church.

Peter W. Marty has piloted interfaith dialogue events, led Lutheran-Episcopal seminars, and served on different ecumenical ministry boards. In the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, he has served as chair of the Senior Pastors' Conference, and twice as a Colleague Program Leader mentoring new pastors. Presently at St. Paul, he leads a pastoral residency program funded by the Lilly Endowment Inc. This program, designed for fostering pastoral excellence, is one of only two in the country situated in a Lutheran Church setting.

He is the recipient of an honorary doctorate from St. Ambrose University (Doctor of Humanities).

Peter is married to Susan and they have two adult children - Jacob (program director for the 5Point Film Festival, Carbondale, CO) and Rachel (a student at Colorado State University). He enjoys family travel, woodworking, tennis, French horn, reading, and the adventure of waking up to a new day every day.