A complete list of student profiles, detailing primary and secondary concentrations and their research focus.
Born to Methodist parents in Accra, Ghana, Robert Ewusie Moses began attending a nearby Presbyterian church with friends as a teenager.
“I didn’t like to wait for my parents to drive me to our church, so I started going with my friends and was confirmed at the Presbyterian church,” says Moses, who attended a Catholic school. While still in high school, he moved to Detroit, Mich., where he was adopted by Baptist parents. He joined their church and was licensed as a preacher at the age of 18.
“I am a walking witness of ecumenicity,” Moses says. “At some point I was part of the Methodist and Presbyterian traditions, and now I am Baptist. I know God has a place for each of us. What breaks my heart is why we can’t work together and come around the same table.”
During his time at seminary, Moses has reflected on the unity and ecumenicity of the church. “What does it mean to be one holy catholic church as we recite in our creeds each Sunday morning?” he asks
“There are so many opportunities here to interact with other traditions. Even within our differences there’s a way we are able to affirm each other as children of God and to find a way to worship together. We are not all the same, but we can create a space where everyone can listen to each other and dialogue.” In his spiritual formation group, Moses met another Baptist, Lutherans, United Methodists, Episcopalians, and a Wesleyan.
“It was a blessing to be able to interact with these different denominations,” Moses says. “Even when our Lutheran leader led a simple prayer, I became curious: ‘Why is Luther saying this?’ It opens your eyes to the practices in each tradition.”
Hometowns: Accra, Ghana/Detroit, Mich. Education: B.S., Physics; Minors, Mathematics, Chemistry Howard University, Washington, D.C. M.Div., Duke Divinity School, Durham, N.C.
What attracted you to Duke’s Th.D.:
This program’s intention to bridge church and theology in a very intentional way was attractive. That, paired with strong academics and the space to ask questions of the church, to the church, from the church, was also appealing.
As an undergrad in engineering and economics, and later in business school and engineering school, I experienced firsthand the benefits of the flexibility to ask questions across disciplines.
Describe your research project:
My project is about mental illness. Why is that illness much harder for a congregation to address than a broken leg or a heart attack? I am working with American religious historians and theologians to explore Christian responses to mental illness. The appeal of the Th.D. is having one foot in academia and one foot in the church, and I hope to be able to continue to maintain that balance. I think the ability to learn and to gain new understandings is diminished in either of those places if there isn’t conversation.
What’s best about doing this at Duke?
After completing my M.Div., I could easily imagine spending four or five more years learning from and with Duke’s faculty. I watched the launch of the Th.D. program and knew there was incredible enthusiasm for, and strong conviction about, its importance for academia and for the church at large.
Hometown: Raleigh, N.C.
Education: B.S., Industrial Engineering; B.A., Economics Joint M.B.A./M.E.M., Marketing & Organizational Behavior, Northwestern University, Evanston, Ill. M.Div., Duke Divinity School, Durham, N.C.
Denomination: Moravian
What attracted you to Duke’s Th.D.?
Duke offered the resources and opportunity to address interdisciplinary concerns across departments, for example, to work in political theory in the university’s political science department. I liked that this program is actually concerned with theological study in a way that vitally connects it to the wider university.
Here I’m not labeled with a big theology and ethics sign over my head. We have different research interests, yet all come together to discuss our work in a colloquium. Our diverse interests are united by a concern to study Christianity as a lived religion.
My interests are in philosophical theology. I want to explore the modes of divine presence and absence that are implicit in the church’s sacramental life and trace out the implications for Christian social ethics. I want my academic work to impact the church and the academy, and to exemplify the way those two realms can be brought closer.
Exciting work is being done not just by senior faculty everyone knows like (Stanley) Hauerwas or (Richard) Hays, but by younger faculty such as J. Kameron Carter, whose work in race theory and theology is brilliant. He is opening doors for new research about the relationship between Christian confession and Western culture. Accessibility to faculty here is especially important to me. At a lot of institutions, faculty time is at a high premium, even for doctoral students.
Hometown: Nampa, Idaho Education: B.A., Philosophy Boise State University, Boise, Idaho M.Div., Masters Seminary, Sun Valley, Calif. S.T.M., Yale Divinity School, New Haven, Conn.
Denomination: Presbyterian Church U.S.A.
How do members of faith communities care for the mentally ill—the depressed, or psychotic, or addicted—in their midst?
What does the loss of agency, loss of control, even loss of self often associated with mental illness, mean for a Christian?
And, above all, how should these situations be narrated theologically?
“Christian responses to these questions vary dramatically,” says Dr. Warren Kinghorn, chief psychiatry resident at Duke University Medical Center, and a candidate for The Divinity School’s new doctoral program in theology. “It’s my conviction that the church has much work to do in order to make sense of the questions.”
Psychiatric and neurobiological research is important, but Christians trying to interpret the results of this research need more than scientific knowledge alone, says Kinghorn.
“This is profoundly theological work which requires intensive training in the language and practices of the church. Because of this, the Duke Th.D. program has been a perfect fit.”
Kinghorn hopes to work in a divinity school or medical center where through teaching and scholarship he will help form clergy and laity ministering to community members who are mentally ill, as well as mental health professionals who care for patients from diverse religious traditions.
Born: March 16, 1975, Greenville, S.C.
Education: Residency, Duke University Medical Center: Internal Medicine/ Psychiatry, 2003-05; Psychiatry, 2005-07; Chief Psychiatric Resident, 2006-07
M.D., Harvard Medical School, 2003
M.T.S., Duke Divinity School, 2002
B.S., Psychology, Furman University, 1997
Publications: “Professionalism in modern medicine: Does the emperor have any clothes?” Academic Medicine, January 2007
“‘You are dust:’ Ash Wednesday on a Psychiatic Ward,” The Christian Century, March 21, 2006
Experience: 2006-2007 – Chief psychiatric resident, Duke University Medical Center
2005-2007 – Residency, psychiatry, DUMC
2003-2005 – Residency, Internal Medicine/Psychiatry, DUMC
1998 – Summer Research Fellow, Division of Medical Ethics, Department of Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School
1996 – Duke Endowment Intern, Department of Chaplaincy Services, Presbyterian Hospital, Charlotte, N.C.
Denomination: Presbyterian Church (USA)
The interdisciplinary approach of Duke’s Th.D. gave it a distinct edge over traditional Ph.D. programs in religion for Melanie Dobson Hughes, who knew she wanted to study healing within the church.
“With this degree I can look at aspects of suffering, reconciliation and redemption through Scripture, the Tradition, and in the church’s practices,” she says.
“As an ordained United Methodist minister, I also was attracted to the program’s commitment to doing scholarly work that is integrated into the life of the church.”
While Hughes is open to teaching and a return to pastoral ministry, she and her husband, a fourth-year medical student, dream of establishing a retreat center in the North Carolina mountains.
“Our vision is to offer truly integrated, wholistic healthcare in a setting that honors people’s minds, bodies and spirits, as well as creation,” she says.
“I am focusing on courses that will help me reflect deeply on the nature and practices of healing.”
A registered yoga instructor, Hughes currently teaches classes in Durham as a way of practically embodying healing in her own life.
Born: April 13, 1975, Charlotte, N.C.
Education: M.Div. & Th.M., Duke Divinity School, 2001, 2002
B.A., Furman University, Greenville, S.C., 1997
Publications: “Being Real: The Practices of the Body of Christ,” Ministry at Large, Divinity magazine, Winter 2004
Experience: 2002-2006 – Associate Pastor, Dayspring United Methodist United Church, Tempe, Ariz.
2000-2001 – Student Pastor, Trinitatis Evangelical Lutheran Church, Bonn, Germany
1997-1998 – Teacher/Missionary, United Methodist Volunteers in Mission, Utila, Honduras
Denomination: Elder, United Methodist Church
After earning a Th.M. degree last May, the Rev. Craig Heilmann wanted to continue his studies at Duke before returning to ministry in New Zealand.
As a member of The Divinity School’s first class of doctor of theology students, he recognizes he’s been given a rare opportunity. His scholarship will focus on the practice of penance and confession, areas he studied for the master of theology degree. But the program will also feature hands-on experience.
“With its emphasis on practices in the Christian community, it is my hope that I will gain the knowledge and skills to engage real life problems in the context of a church community, so that I end up with a theology ‘with shoes on’ (or should I say sandals?),”quips Heilmann.
A bonus of the doctoral program, he adds, is the flexibility to take courses in areas of the university in addition to The Divinity School. Last semester, for example, he took a course on the French philosopher Foucault in Duke’s Program in Literature.
“In the end, those of us in this program receive encouragement from great faculty to pursue different areas of knowledge that might shed light upon Christian practices,” says Heilmann. “And that has the power to lead to the integrated life of individuals and communities.”
Born: Sept. 17, 1965, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
Education:
Th.M., Duke Divinity School, 2006 M.T.S., early Judaism & the New Testament, Regent College, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, 1990; Postgraduate Study, 1991
Grad.Dip.CS, early Judaism & the New Testament, Regent College, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, 1989
B.A., Multnomah College, Portland, Ore., 1988
Publications: Hogwarts or Hogwash: The Harry Potter Phenomenon & Your Child, LGHP Ltd., 2002.
“Harry Potter & The Lord of The Rings: A Study of Competing Worldviews,” Parenting with Confidence: Vol. 4, No. 2, April 2001.
Experience: 2003-2005 – Minister at large, Greenlane Christian Center, which with 3,000 members is Auckland, New Zealand’s largest independent church.
2000-2005 – Executive director, Family Matters Inc., a nonprofit dedicated to nurturing and serving the modern family.
1998-2000 – Founder and director of a publishing company.
1995-1999 – Senior lecturer in theology, Hillson College, Sydney, Australia.
Denomination: Ordained minister in a Free Church in New Zealand; previously an Anglican layperson.
A complete list of student profiles, detailing primary and secondary concentrations and their research focus.
