In anticipation of the conference a few of us at Epiphaneia have been reading books by some of the authors who will be speaking.  One such author is Stanley Hauerwas and if you haven't read him yet we encourage you to pick up some of his works, including the classic Resident Aliens, co-authored with Will Willimon.  Below are two quotes from the book that will probably give you some idea of where he'll be coming from when he speaks at the conference.

"We would like a church that asserts again that God, not nations, rules the world, that the boundaries of God's kingdom transcends those of Caesar and that the main political task of the church is the formation of people who clearly see the cost of discipleship and are willing to pay the price". (48)

"The cross is not a sign of the church's quiet suffering submission to the powers-that-be, but rather the churches revolutionary participation in the victory of Christ over those powers.  The cross is not a symbol for general human suffering and oppression.  Rather the cross is a sign of what happens when someone takes God's account of reality more seriously than Caesar's.  The cross stands as God's (and ours) eternal 'no' to the powers of death as well as God's eternal 'yes' to humanity, God's remarkable determination not to leave us to our own devices.  The overriding political task of the church is to be a community of the cross". (47)