Robert Louis Wilken, an American historian and former Lutheran minister, died on June 7, 2026, at age 89.
Born in New Orleans in 1936, he became William R. Kenan Jr.
Professor of the History of Christianity emeritus at the University of Virginia, where he taught after appointments at the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Fordham University and the University of Notre Dame. Raised in a Lutheran family, he studied at Concordia College and Concordia Seminary before earning graduate degrees from the University of Chicago. Wilken’s work also extended to theology and religious studies, and he was known as Robert L. Wilken in scholarly circles.