Messiah College

Messiah College is a nationally ranked, private Christian college with a student body of 3,375 undergraduate and graduate students. Our scenic 471-acre suburban campus is located in central Pennsylvania, just 12 miles from the state capital of Harrisburg. The College was founded in 1909 by the Brethren in Christ Church. Today, the College’s faith base is broadly evangelical and includes students and employees from a variety of denominations and Christian faith traditions.

Growth in the student body and in facilities accompanied the growth in the academic program. Contributing to the increase in numbers of students was the College’s policy, declared in its earliest official statements, of welcoming non-Brethren in Christ people as members of the student body. From a first-year total of 12 students, the student body has grown to nearly 2,800 undergraduate students, representing more than 60 denominations. Facilities have also increased from one building—Old Main—to a campus of 471 acres, offering students a breadth of well equipped, high-quality academic, cocurricular, and residential facilities.

Other significant developments have occurred within the last 30 years. In 1965, Upland College, a Brethren in Christ school in California, merged with Messiah College. Three years later, Messiah College opened its Philadelphia Campus in collaboration with Temple University, the first cooperative arrangement in the United States between a church-related college and a nonsectarian university. In 1983, the College became the senior educational partner with Daystar Institute (now Daystar University) in Nairobi, Kenya. Messiah College played a leading role in the founding of the Christian College Consortium in 1971, and later, the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities. In 1972 the legal ties between the College and the Brethren in Christ Church were replaced with a covenant relationship in which legal ownership of the College was placed with a self-perpetuating Board of Trustees.