Changes at the top

John Pistole

■ John S. Pistole has been named the next president of Anderson University. He will succeed James L. Edwards, the school’s fourth president, who is retiring after 25 years at the helm. Anderson University is affiliated with the Church of God (Anderson, Indiana).

Pistole began his career with the FBI in 1983. After the attacks of September 11, 2001, he headed the FBI’s counter-terrorism program and was eventually promoted to deputy director of the bureau. In 2010, President Barack Obama appointed him head of the Transportation Security Administration.

Pistole is a graduate of Anderson University. His father, Hollis Pistole, taught theology in the Anderson University School of Theology for 25 years before retiring in 1984. John Pistole is also a graduate of the Indiana University School of Law. He and his wife, Kathy Harp, have two daughters.

James Lytle

■ The Rev. James Lytle has been named 10th president of Baptist Bible College and Seminary in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania. He succeeds Jim Jeffrey, president for the last 13 years, who will become chancellor of the school as he returns to pastoral ministry.

Lytle received undergraduate and master’s degrees from Baptist Bible College and Seminary before earning a doctorate of ministry at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He served on the faculty of Baptist Bible College for 13 years and subsequently moved with his wife, Diane, to South Africa to become a missionary church planter. While there, he was president of Baptist Bible College of KwaZulu-Natal from 1995 until 2006.

In 2007, Lytle returned to Pennsylvania, where he was named academic vice president and professor of Bible and theology at his alma mater. In 2008 he was appointed provost and in 2014 became executive vice president. He assumes his new role as president in January 2015.

Gene Wilkes

■ Dr. Gene Wilkes has been named second president of B. H. Carroll Theological Institute in Arlington, Texas. He succeeds Dr. Bruce Corley, the institute’s founding president, who stepped down in October 2013 but has remained a senior fellow of the institute. Wilkes was senior pastor of Legacy Church in Plano, Texas, for 26 years before retiring in 2013. Prior to becoming president of the B. H. Carroll Institute, he served on the school’s board of governors and was vice president for advancement.

Wilkes is a graduate of Baylor University and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He and his wife, Kim Wilkes, have two adult daughters.

Named for the first president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, B. H. Carroll Theological Institute was established in 2004 as a nonresidential alternative to bricks-and-mortar seminaries. Its first chancellor was Russell H. Dilday, former president of Southwestern, and its first four faculty members were all former faculty members of that seminary.

Joseph Gatto

■ Bishop Richard J. Malone of Buffalo, New York, has named Father Joseph Gatto as president-rector of Christ the King Seminary in East Aurora, New York. He succeeds Father Peter Drilling, president-rector since 2008, who has returned to the faculty as professor of systematic theology and pastoral studies.

At the time of his appointment, Father Gatto had served for more than seven years as pastor of St. Gregory the Great Catholic Church in Williamsville, the Buffalo diocese’s largest parish, which has a membership of 5,400 families. He was previously pastor of St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Lockport, New York, and was director of the diocesan Office of Worship.

A graduate of Wadhams Hall Seminary in Ogdensburg, New York, Father Gatto continued his studies in Rome at the North American College, the Gregorian University, and Casa Santa Maria. He was ordained a priest in the Buffalo diocese in 1983.

Christ the King Seminary was founded by the Franciscan Friars at St. Bonaventure University in 1857. In 1974, the seminary moved to East Aurora, New York. The Diocese of Buffalo assumed its administration in 1990.

James Gimble

■ The Rev. James Gimbel has been named president of Concordia Lutheran Seminary in Edmonton, Alberta. He succeeds the Rev. Norman Threinen, professor emeritus of historical theology, who came out of retirement to lead the seminary on an interim basis from 2012 to 2013. The previous president, the Rev. Manfred Zeuch, left in 2012 to become a vice president at Concordia University College of Alberta.

At the time of his appointment, Gimbel was a member of the faculty of Concordia University in St. Paul, Minnesota, teaching leadership and management. He was previously senior editor of youth, family, and Sunday school materials for Concordia Publishing House in St. Louis, Missouri.

Gimbel is a graduate of Concordia Seminary in St. Louis and Regent University in Virginia Beach, Virginia. He and his wife, Jill Rosenwinkel Gimbel, are parents of three adult children. Concordia Lutheran Seminary was founded in 1984 by the Lutheran Church — Canada, a sister church to the Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod.

Jim Martin

■ Dr. Jim Martin has been named vice president of the Harding School of Theology. He succeeds Dr. Evertt W. Huffard, vice president and dean since 1999, who is continuing as dean of the school of theology.

Martin was appointed to his new position by Harding University president Bruce D. McLarty, and he will sit on the university president’s cabinet while leading the administrative team at the school of theology.

From 1993 until the time of his appointment, Martin was minister at the Crestview Church of Christ in Waco, Texas. He is a graduate of the University of North Texas, International Bible College, Abilene Christian University, and Harding School of Theology.

Harding School of Theology, located in Memphis, Tennessee, is a branch campus of Harding University, a liberal arts university in Searcy, Arkansas, that is affiliated with the Churches of Christ. The school of theology opened as an extension site in 1955 and became a graduate division in 1958. 

Sam Lamerson

■ Dr. Sam Lamerson has been named president of Knox Theological Seminary effective August 2014. He was named interim president in January 2014 — one of several interim leaders since Dr. Ronald Kovack retired from the presidency in 2012.

Knox Theological Seminary was founded in 1989 by television evangelist and pastor D. James Kennedy as a ministry of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Lamerson was a member of the seminary’s first graduating class, in 1993, and later earned a doctorate at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. In 1997 he joined the seminary faculty, teaching New Testament, and is now the longest serving faculty member.

Lamerson is a graduate of Bob Jones University. He and his wife, Cynthia Lamerson, are the parents of two adult children.

David J. Lose

■ The Rev. David J. Lose has been named president of Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, one of eight seminaries of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Lose succeeds the Rev. Philip D. W. Krey, who retired in 2014 after 15 years at the helm of the seminary.

A graduate of Franklin and Marshall College, the Lutheran Seminary at Philadelphia, and Princeton Theological Seminary, Lose joined the faculty of Luther Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 2000. He was academic dean at Luther from 2005 to 2008 and was founding director of the seminary’s Center for Biblical Preaching. Lose and his wife, Karin Lose, have two teenage children.

David Vásquez-Levy

■ The Rev. David Vásquez-Levy has been named president of the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, California. He succeeds Dr. Bernard Schlager, dean and vice president of academic affairs, who had been serving as interim president.

At the time of his appointment, Vásquez-Levy had been campus pastor at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, for 13 years; he was previously pastor of St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Batesville, Indiana. Because of his co-leadership of the Postville Relief Effort, a response to a 2008 immigration crackdown in Iowa, he has become a sought-after voice in advocacy for immigration reform.

Vásquez-Levy is a graduate of Texas Lutheran University, the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and the Association of Chicago Theological Schools.

Pacific School of Religion, founded by Congregationalist missionaries in 1868, is a member of the Graduate Theological Union.