BANNOCKBURN, IL — “If the Christian faith is not relevant in the workplace, it is not relevant at all,” says Ken Costa, Chairman of Lazard International, the world renowned financial services company, and author of the groundbreaking book "God at Work": Discover the Real Purpose of Your Life.
Mr. Costa, an international investment banker for over 30 years, recently brokered the sale of Harrods to the Qataris.
This month, Costa will travel the East Coast on a mission to stir faith and call to action students, business leaders and government staff. His message: The God who created and sustains the world is also the God of the workplace.
“People often ask how I reconcile being a banker and a Christian,” says Costa, “There is a widespread view that God and business simply don’t mix.”
Conducted in partnership with Alpha USA, Costa’s speaking tour will put him before students at the University of Pennsylvania, along with business leaders in Pennsylvania, New York and Connecticut, and government staff in D.C., where he will talk about the ethical foundations of capitalism and his personal journey of faith and the workplace.
Costa recounts that journey in his book, "God at Work." Born in South Africa, he grew up in the apartheid era and became active during his university years in protests against the so-called “Christian” doctrine of apartheid. Offended by injustices carried out in the name of Christianity, he became anesthetized to the claims of Christ.
It was while studying law at Cambridge University in England that Costa met students who helped him realize that “at the center of the Christian faith there was not so much a system of thought, but rather a person, Jesus Christ. I therefore embraced the faith that I had been taught but had hitherto neglected.”
Costa decided to extend his time at Cambridge to study theology for a year, exploring whether the claims for Christianity could stand up to the rigors of academic examination. During this time, he found “overwhelming evidence for the truth of Christ’s claims to be God.”
He considered a career as a church minister but he opted for a corporate necktie over a clerical collar. For more than three decades, he has lived out his faith as a high-profile executive in the finance industry and has inspired tens of thousands to live out their faith at work, as well—first as an executive at UBS Investment Bank, a global financial institution where he advised international businesses and world leaders for 30 years, then as Chairman of Lazard International, starting in 2007, where he advises some of the world’s largest corporations and governments.
While believers once kept faith and work relatively separate, they are now increasingly intertwining, Costa says. In "God at Work," he contends that the workplace is “the coalface where faith is tested and sharpened by day-to-day encounters with the ambiguities and stresses of modern commerce.”
This philosophy has provided Costa with opportunities to address both the moral strengths and failings of capitalism: “The market economy remains a good servant but a bad master—it needs to operate within a wider moral context which sees all human beings, and all the world’s resources, as valuable, precisely because they matter to God.”
Costa also serves as chairman of Alpha International, which promotes the Alpha course—an introduction to the Christian faith that has been attended by 15 million people in 169 countries around the world. More than 200,000 people will attend an Alpha course this year in the U.S. alone.
Costa is scheduled to speak in the following cities. For more information, or to request an interview, contact Janine Longoria at 224-588-8526 or janinelongoria@alphausa.org.
Tuesday, October 19
Philadelphia, PA
Wednesday, October 20
Malvern, PA
McLean, VA
Thursday, October 21
New York, NY
Friday, October 22
Darien, CT
Mr. Costa, an international investment banker for over 30 years, recently brokered the sale of Harrods to the Qataris.
This month, Costa will travel the East Coast on a mission to stir faith and call to action students, business leaders and government staff. His message: The God who created and sustains the world is also the God of the workplace.
“People often ask how I reconcile being a banker and a Christian,” says Costa, “There is a widespread view that God and business simply don’t mix.”
Conducted in partnership with Alpha USA, Costa’s speaking tour will put him before students at the University of Pennsylvania, along with business leaders in Pennsylvania, New York and Connecticut, and government staff in D.C., where he will talk about the ethical foundations of capitalism and his personal journey of faith and the workplace.
Costa recounts that journey in his book, "God at Work." Born in South Africa, he grew up in the apartheid era and became active during his university years in protests against the so-called “Christian” doctrine of apartheid. Offended by injustices carried out in the name of Christianity, he became anesthetized to the claims of Christ.
It was while studying law at Cambridge University in England that Costa met students who helped him realize that “at the center of the Christian faith there was not so much a system of thought, but rather a person, Jesus Christ. I therefore embraced the faith that I had been taught but had hitherto neglected.”
Costa decided to extend his time at Cambridge to study theology for a year, exploring whether the claims for Christianity could stand up to the rigors of academic examination. During this time, he found “overwhelming evidence for the truth of Christ’s claims to be God.”
He considered a career as a church minister but he opted for a corporate necktie over a clerical collar. For more than three decades, he has lived out his faith as a high-profile executive in the finance industry and has inspired tens of thousands to live out their faith at work, as well—first as an executive at UBS Investment Bank, a global financial institution where he advised international businesses and world leaders for 30 years, then as Chairman of Lazard International, starting in 2007, where he advises some of the world’s largest corporations and governments.
While believers once kept faith and work relatively separate, they are now increasingly intertwining, Costa says. In "God at Work," he contends that the workplace is “the coalface where faith is tested and sharpened by day-to-day encounters with the ambiguities and stresses of modern commerce.”
This philosophy has provided Costa with opportunities to address both the moral strengths and failings of capitalism: “The market economy remains a good servant but a bad master—it needs to operate within a wider moral context which sees all human beings, and all the world’s resources, as valuable, precisely because they matter to God.”
Costa also serves as chairman of Alpha International, which promotes the Alpha course—an introduction to the Christian faith that has been attended by 15 million people in 169 countries around the world. More than 200,000 people will attend an Alpha course this year in the U.S. alone.
Costa is scheduled to speak in the following cities. For more information, or to request an interview, contact Janine Longoria at 224-588-8526 or janinelongoria@alphausa.org.
Tuesday, October 19
Philadelphia, PA
Wednesday, October 20
Malvern, PA
McLean, VA
Thursday, October 21
New York, NY
Friday, October 22
Darien, CT