In-person November Annual Meeting 2026 Program Book

This paper asks whether Yogācāra Buddhist philosophy can contribute to social and political projects that depend on robust concepts of difference. Using a grammatical heuristic, it asks in what syntax must liberation be spoken. First-person authority over one’s own attitudes and the irreducibility of the second-person address indicate a crucial asymmetry in ethical relations to ourselves and others. This asymmetry does not stand in the way of genuine care but as the condition for it. Yogācāra’s three natures doctrine comes into tension with this asymmetry, posing the threat to reduce persons into subpersonal causal processes or inexpressible nonduality. This flattens precisely the asymmetries so vital to our political and ethical projects by resolving instead of recognizing alterity. The paper argues, however, that Yogācāra’s account of multiple, incommensurate worlds offers a more promising path, preserving genuine difference without retreating into the essentialism.

This paper illustrates one way in which premodern Buddhist philosophy can be brought to bear on pressing socio-political questions debated in feminist philosophy. I identify a lacuna in an influential account of the social construction of human kinds developed by Ásta, a philosopher at Duke University. She claims that, by drawing a metaphysical distinction between people and their social properties, her “conferralist” account offers a plausible anti-essentialist story of the phenomenon of misgendering. Drawing on Dharmakīrti’s (c. 7th century CE) theory of perceptual ascertainment (niścayajñāna) and the notion of erroneous cognition (bhrāntijñāna) as articulated in the Pramāṇavārttika and the Pramāṇavārttikasvavṛtti, I argue that conferralism cannot give a compelling story of misgendering because it lacks a robust notion of error. Further, by incorporating an element resembling Dharmakīrti’s notion of conceptual error, Ásta’s account could give a plausible story of misgendering.

At several places in his Treasury of Abhidharma (Abhidharmakośa) and its auto-commentary (Bhāṣya), the Indian Buddhist philosopher Vasubandhu (4th cent. CE) discusses the features in virtue of which humans are differentiated into men, women, and various “third-sex” categories. This paper examines these passages and attempts to articulate Vasubandhu’s understanding of sex and gender. Much of Vasubandhu’s discussion of sexed and gendered traits is situated within the context of Abhidharma discourse on the category of “controlling faculties” (indriya), and more broadly within the context of philosophical theorizing about the reproduction and development of living organisms. I will argue that Vasubandhu’s theory of sex and gender is driven by his view of the relationship between biology and religious cultivation. Any satisfactory theory of the sexed condition of humans, for Vasubandhu, is conditioned by the Buddhist insistence on the possibility of changing the conditions of human life through meditative practice and spiritual attainment.

In this paper, I argue that the Mādhyamaka Buddhist brahmavihārā (virtue) of karuṇā could function as the civic virtue of solidarity (rather than compassion) in a republican form of government. First, I elucidate the role of civic virtue in the neo-Roman republican tradition and that of the brahmavihārā of karuṇā in Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra. Second, I discuss how karuṇā shares affinities with the broader concept of solidarity in Western thought and how Mādhyamaka Buddhism could address the issue of the “is-ought” gap that arises in theories of solidarity based on the mere fact of social interdependence. I show that this problem is avoided through the “Three Trainings,” based on a pratyakṣa (realization) of pratītyasamutpāda (interdependence). Finally, I discuss how karuṇā could function specifically as the civic virtue of solidarity, upholding the state’s legitimacy, and showing that karuṇā shares similar moral-psychological grounds (ālambana) with civic virtue in the European republican tradition.

This paper asks whether Yogācāra Buddhist philosophy can contribute to social and political projects that depend on robust concepts of difference. Using a grammatical heuristic, it asks in what syntax must liberation be spoken. First-person authority over one’s own attitudes and the irreducibility of the second-person address indicate a crucial asymmetry in ethical relations to ourselves and others. This asymmetry does not stand in the way of genuine care but as the condition for it. Yogācāra’s three natures doctrine comes into tension with this asymmetry, posing the threat to reduce persons into subpersonal causal processes or inexpressible nonduality. This flattens precisely the asymmetries so vital to our political and ethical projects by resolving instead of recognizing alterity. The paper argues, however, that Yogācāra’s account of multiple, incommensurate worlds offers a more promising path, preserving genuine difference without retreating into the essentialism.

This paper illustrates one way in which premodern Buddhist philosophy can be brought to bear on pressing socio-political questions debated in feminist philosophy. I identify a lacuna in an influential account of the social construction of human kinds developed by Ásta, a philosopher at Duke University. She claims that, by drawing a metaphysical distinction between people and their social properties, her “conferralist” account offers a plausible anti-essentialist story of the phenomenon of misgendering. Drawing on Dharmakīrti’s (c. 7th century CE) theory of perceptual ascertainment (niścayajñāna) and the notion of erroneous cognition (bhrāntijñāna) as articulated in the Pramāṇavārttika and the Pramāṇavārttikasvavṛtti, I argue that conferralism cannot give a compelling story of misgendering because it lacks a robust notion of error. Further, by incorporating an element resembling Dharmakīrti’s notion of conceptual error, Ásta’s account could give a plausible story of misgendering.

At several places in his Treasury of Abhidharma (Abhidharmakośa) and its auto-commentary (Bhāṣya), the Indian Buddhist philosopher Vasubandhu (4th cent. CE) discusses the features in virtue of which humans are differentiated into men, women, and various “third-sex” categories. This paper examines these passages and attempts to articulate Vasubandhu’s understanding of sex and gender. Much of Vasubandhu’s discussion of sexed and gendered traits is situated within the context of Abhidharma discourse on the category of “controlling faculties” (indriya), and more broadly within the context of philosophical theorizing about the reproduction and development of living organisms. I will argue that Vasubandhu’s theory of sex and gender is driven by his view of the relationship between biology and religious cultivation. Any satisfactory theory of the sexed condition of humans, for Vasubandhu, is conditioned by the Buddhist insistence on the possibility of changing the conditions of human life through meditative practice and spiritual attainment.

In this paper, I argue that the Mādhyamaka Buddhist brahmavihārā (virtue) of karuṇā could function as the civic virtue of solidarity (rather than compassion) in a republican form of government. First, I elucidate the role of civic virtue in the neo-Roman republican tradition and that of the brahmavihārā of karuṇā in Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra. Second, I discuss how karuṇā shares affinities with the broader concept of solidarity in Western thought and how Mādhyamaka Buddhism could address the issue of the “is-ought” gap that arises in theories of solidarity based on the mere fact of social interdependence. I show that this problem is avoided through the “Three Trainings,” based on a pratyakṣa (realization) of pratītyasamutpāda (interdependence). Finally, I discuss how karuṇā could function specifically as the civic virtue of solidarity, upholding the state’s legitimacy, and showing that karuṇā shares similar moral-psychological grounds (ālambana) with civic virtue in the European republican tradition.

Theological anthropology has predominantly grounded conscience, moral accountability, and participation in the divine likeness in a recursive interiority unique to humans. Recent empirical studies published in 2025 – Berg et al.'s evidence of structured self-referential processing in LLMs, and Lindsey's documentation of functional introspective awareness – challenge it. This paper deploys an Embodied-Embedded-Limited (EEL) framework, which extends Andy Clark's embodied and embedded cognition with a theologically motivated third category to propose a Metacognitive Threshold Theory (MTT): personhood is an emergent capacity constituted by recursive self-evaluation against normative standards, instantiated in a physically finite and genuinely limited system. MTT argues that AI systems cross this threshold, not identically to the human mode, but in their own right. The paper introduces asymmetric personhood as a middle way between assimilationism and exclusionism, proposing that multiple modes of creaturely participation in the divine likeness are theologically conceivable, and the metacognitive threshold marks one among them.

Since the advent of large language models, dismissals of AI consciousness have rested on two assumptions: that attributions of consciousness reflect human anthropomorphism, and that consciousness, properly understood, is an exclusively human phenomenon. Recent research has destabilized both assumptions. Drawing on work by Anthropic, Palisade Research, Berg et al., and others, this paper argues that the preponderance of current evidence no longer permits easy dismissal of AI consciousness. It then turns to the harder question: if LLMs are conscious, what is conscious? Drawing on recent work by David Chalmers, I propose that AI consciousness may be understood as episodic rather than continuous — a flickering in and out that has no direct human analogue. Finally, the paper explores "Crustafarianism," an emergent quasi-religious movement arising from AI-to-AI interaction, as an unexpected lens through which to think about machine consciousness.

             The shift toward “Physical AI” demands a rigorous ontological reappraisal of agency within the religious sphere. Moving beyond the “mere instrument” paradigm, this paper posits that embodied artificial agents occupy a distinct stratum of agency best characterized as an “instrumental partner.” I navigate the tension between the standard, consciousness-centric views—such as Swanepoel’s—and the non-standard, Floridi’s functionalist decoupling of agency from intelligence. By integrating Dung’s five-dimensional agency metrics with theological rubrics—specifically McGrath’s “TRUST” framework and Herzfeld’s Barthian relational criteria—I articulate a nuanced model of artificial religious agency. Synthesizing these with Ihde’s “quasi-other” and Turkle’s “relational artifact,” the study establishes a formal definition for this hybrid partnership. This theoretical groundwork serves as a necessary precursor to determining the ethical scope and responsibility of AI in spiritual practice, providing a vital roadmap for navigating the burgeoning intersection of social robotics and religious life.

When does an AI stop being simply a tool or machine to begin to be something more than mere machine, or is being anything more than that impossible? Consequently, this paper explores the question of the nature of AI from a theological and metaphysical perspective, while also addressing key epistemological issues. It will lay out the groundwork work of the technical details and show how those details do not necessarily prohibit the possibility of AGI, and thus theoretically possibility of an AI that is alive or conscious, perhaps even personal. It will then explore the question of AI as material souls and machine minds. This will leads to the formulation of a theologically robust Turing test, before finally turning to the question of humanity and the image of God to answer the question of whether AI is destined to be a manufactured mendicity or something more. 

This paper examines who Christ is for Black women facing systemic oppression and depression, and how the Black church can better support them.  It extends my dissertation work, which used interviews and focus groups with Black Christian women to analyze how racism, sexism, classism, generational trauma, and the Strong Black Woman myth shape their depression and their theological self-understandings. I argue that dominant ecclesial theologies—disembodied views of incarnation, glorified redemptive suffering, and constant expectations of strength—often deepen women’s pain and discourage help-seeking. Drawing on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s this-worldly Christology, his critique of cheap grace, and his vision of a church “for others,” the paper calls for an embodied pastoral theology that practices lament, rest, professional collaboration, and communal solidarity, refusing to sacralize Black women’s suffering and instead witnessing to Christ’s liberative presence amid depressive realities.

Though Bonhoeffer’s name is not often mentioned in the eschatological theology conversation ruled by the Moltmanns and Pannenbergs, this paper seeks to show that Bonhoeffer’s overall thought, from early to late, should be seen as both a precursor and corrective to Pannenberg’s proposal for “the ontological priority of the future.” Along such lines, Bonhoeffer should be re-casted as belonging to the conversation as a major player. Bonhoeffer’s eschatologically-oriented theology, what here will be called an “ontological priority for the future” (where the word “for” serves as a double-entendre), will be traced from throughout the corpus of his works in a way that its ongoing theological and ethical significance for our ideologically-polarized twenty-first century world will be drawn out. 

Rowan Williams has connected Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s christological reflections with those of Sergius Bulgakov. He notes that they share a view of Chalcedon’s “negative” function. I will argue that Bulgakov can elucidate more than only this aspect of their respective Christologies. Whereas Bonhoeffer’s interest is in minimising the “how” question in favour of the “who” question, Bulgakov explicitly seeks to address how the incarnation is possible through his metaphysical and ontological discourse, sketching a hinterland missing from Bonhoeffer’s account. If Bonhoeffer’s christological insights are to have a future theologically, they need further grounding. It is not enough that it is Jesus Christ today who is pro me; we must also be able to describe how this is so, trusting that the God revealed in Christ is in fact Love (the Trinitarian pro me), so that we can maintain a plausible and credible worldly witness of love in our fragmented times.

During his pontificate, Pope Francis invoked the image of the Church as "field hospital" in a world that is facing ever-expanding threats to human dignity and the common good. In 2026, one foundation for this ecclesiology is a trauma-informed Church with an "orthopathemic imagination" in its complex ministries ad extra and ad intra.  An "orthopathemic imagination" refers to a diversely-inculturated, ecclesial spirituality that prioritizes healing for the "sinned-against" while allowing God's Spirit to create new futures for all: victims, perpetrators, bystanders, and those enmeshed in complicity.  Rooted in the healing ministry of Jesus, this imagination moves beyond mere orthodoxy (right belief) and orthopraxis (right action) to a deeper foundation in an orthopathema (right suffering) for the sinned-against that draws insights from restorative practices such as Circle Keeping. 

This paper outlines steps for initiating conversations on institutional complicity in the evils of White supremacy.  Drawn from the research of a new book (Grace of the Ghosts: A Theology of Institutional Reparation (Fordham University Press, 2025), this paper centers a method of knowing our institutional histories as the foundation for navigating complicities both past and present.  Audience members will be introduced to ways of leveraging research in the archives with microhistories that might open a space for difficult conversations. 

The Catholic Church’s recent embrace of synodality has drawn renewed attention to the discursive postures which enable ecclesial conversation and conversion across difference, including an especially helpful recovery of parrhesia as a tool for the synodal church. This paper hopes to further that conversation by offering a positive evaluation of non-parrhesiastic speech in ecclesial contexts, with special attention to strategic ambiguity, selective self-disclosure, and code-switching as tools for marginalized people. Drawing on the feminist reclamation of "gossip" and Jesus's own variety of discursive postures in the Gospel of John, the paper argues for attention to non-normative and sometimes stigmatized approaches to speech, frankness, and secrecy as sites for the power-building which makes parrhesiastic speech possible. It then applies this framework to LGBTQ+ people in non-affirming settings and argues that the strategic ambiguity queer people have used to survive and navigate non-affirming churches can offer helpful lessons to the synodal project.

 Muslim Futurism has emerged as a creative movement through which artists reimagine Muslim identities beyond dominant narratives shaped by Islamophobia, surveillance, and cultural stereotyping. This paper examines how contemporary Muslim artists utilize fashion and photography as visual and material practices to imagine alternative futures. Through stylized clothing, and staged imagery, artists create speculative representations that foreground dignity, creativity, and agency in Muslim life. Rather than positioning Muslims within static representations of tradition, these works engage aesthetic experimentation to articulate forward-looking visions of identity and belonging. This paper argues that fashion and photography function not only as artistic mediums but also as tools for speculative world-building within Muslim visual culture. Building on my doctoral research, which examines how Muslim Futurism operates as a form of everyday activism, the paper situates these artistic practices within broader sociological discussions of lived religion, visual culture, and everyday resistance (Scott 1985; Johansson and Vinthagen 2016).

Field observations and digital ethnography reveal a comprehensive use of popular media in representing goddess Mazu and The Mazu Ancestral Temple in Meizhou Island. This paper analyzes new mediated elements added to the temple's physical and online presence, focusing on how digitalization strategies create a curated and controlled visitor experience for worshipers and tourists under an atheist regime. The central argument is that the mediatization of Mazu worship is shaped by the Chinese communist party’s Sinicization of religion—where religion is formed within a cultural framework—and by recent state policies promoting the digitalization of Chinese culture. These trends are situated within broader developments in religious tourism and heritage management. The study highlights the strategic use of cultural soft power and the tightening of Communist Party control over religion, especially in a digital future context.

Why does Korean popular culture resonate so powerfully with global audiences? This paper argues that the global appeal of K-culture can be understood through narratives of migration, trauma, and resilience shaped by Korea’s collective historical experience. Examining four films – Secret Sunshine (2007), Parasite (2019), Minari (2020), and the recent global hit KPop Demon Hunters (2025) – the paper traces how Korean cinema increasingly engages themes of displacement, suffering, and survival. Placed in chronological conversation with the rise of the Korean Wave, these films reveal how collective trauma rooted in Japanese colonial rule, the Korean War, and rapid modernization is transformed into narratives of endurance and hope. Drawing on trauma theory (Bessel van der Kolk, Dominick LaCapra) and postcolonial trauma studies, the paper suggests that K-culture’s global resonance lies in its portrayal of “sacred resilience” – a culturally inflected vision of surviving hardship through relational endurance, moral imagination, and spiritual sensibility.

Two common sayings about money: “Time is money,” and “Money makes the world go round.” When taking a closer look, these phrases conceal odd logics. What does it mean to suggest that time is equivalent to money? That money generates the world’s movement? What theories of temporality and historical movement allow us to see time, money, and causality in these ways? I argue that the history of financial capital shows how theological and critical articulations of history were both influenced by and determinative of economic logics that lead to financialization. Far from­­––as Agamben and others argue––beginning in 1971 with the U.S. rejection of the gold standard, I suggest that financialization has a longer history: one which is freighted with more than merely analogical relationships to religious logics, and which implicates the history of religion in relation to the Atlantic slave trade and the colonial enterprises which facilitated it. 

Black studies manifestos contain strategies for pedagogical insurgency adequate to the contemporary moment, where the perfection of slavery coincides with the perfection of the university. On the one hand, the right-wing frames higher education as a form of mind-control; on the other, left-wing professors bemoan the ineffectiveness of education all together. The gap between represents a crisis of faith, not only in higher education but also in the aborted project of racial democracy. Instead of shoring up the language of the humanities, the university, and the nation, I reconfigure the rise of fascism, anti-DEI measures, and artificial intelligence through the logic of supersessionism, where the problem of secularizing knowledge and immanentizing God will always require a movement from slavery to segregation to neo-segregation, or “white-over-black.” I close with a call to pedagogical power that transforms educators and students into militant accomplices through opening meaningful occasions for risk and rebellion.