People

Pat Robertson will retire in 2010 as president of Regent University, the Virginia school he founded, announced officials of the university, with 4,500 students on campus or online. The 79-year-old Robertson founded the school in Virginia Beach in 1978 and has been president since 2000. After July 1 he will remain the university’s chancellor and a member of its board of trustees. He earlier reduced his role at Christian Broad casting Network. His son, Gordon, became CEO of the network in late 2007 as the elder Robertson remained its chair.

Carl S. Dudley, 76, whose research and writing influenced how congregations connect with their communities, died April 22 at his Hartford, Connecticut, home of heart disease. Author or editor of 16 books, Dudley published his seminal Making the Small Church Effective during his two decades of teaching at Chicago’s Mc Cormick Theological Seminary, starting in 1973. He joined the Hartford Seminary faculty in 1993 and was codirector of the Hartford Institute for Religious Research for six years before his active retirement. Besides mobilizing local churches for community ministry, Dudley was known for working with peace movements, supporting housing reform and civil rights for the incarcerated, and supporting legislation for food stamps and gay rights.