Thursday, January 8

SCE Board Breakfast      Executive Lounge

SCE Board Meeting     Executive Lounge

Co-editor Search Committee     Georgia Room

Lutheran Ethicists      Federal A Room & Statler B Room

Preconference Session      Several Rooms

In the spirit of our presidential theme “Christianity, Politics, and Power: What Must We Do?”, this year we are hosting a one-day pre-conference focused on learning practical skills for organizing communities to work for justice in, from, and with other SCE members. The pre-conference is titled “Streams Become Rivers: Skills for Building Power Together.”  

The SCE is also coordinating a public ritual action to take place in the late afternoon after the close of the pre-conference sessions, but before the beginning of the annual conference. All SCE members and the public are invited to participate. There is no registration required to join in this action. More information is forthcoming.

Schedule:

9am – Welcome-Please gather in South America A

9:15 – 11:00 – Session 1 (Rooms Assigned as Session)

11:00 – Lunch (On one’s own)

12:15 – 2:15 – Session 2 (Same as Session 1)

2:30 – 3:30 – Panel with Organizational Reps

3:30 – 4:00 – Closing Session

4:20 – Meet in Lobby

4:30 – Ritual Action in Lafayette Square

Registration          Coat Check

Critical Realist Group         Continental

Initiating Communities of Generosity: A Christian Response to Food, Social Inequality, and Eating Disorders

Presenter:          Megan Heeder, University of Scranton

Respondent:      Barb Kozee, Boston College

Rethinking Self-Blame and Infertility: Social Sin and Systemic Bad Luck

Presenter:          Emma McDonald Kennedy, Villanova University

Respondent:      Conor Kelly, Marquette University

SCE Presidential Cabinet Meeting        Executive Lounge

Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics Editorial Board Meeting        Georgia Room  

Exhibit & Poster Hall Open        Congressional Room & Senate Room

CONCURRENT SESSION #1

Imago Dei as Incomprehensibilty:            Federal A Room

Promise in Tanner’s Account of Human Nature for Disability

Lisa Powell, St. Ambrose University

This paper engages Kathryn Tanner’s account of human nature in Christ the Key, where she interprets imago Dei as the plasticity of human nature. Tanner argues that humanity images God as incomprehensibility. Drawing from disability theology the paper demonstrates the value of Tanner’s creative proposal for its potential inclusion of a vast range of human body/minds and the insistence that the body is an essential aspect of humanity’s plasticity. Lastly, the paper considers whether freedom as malleability is limited to a uniquely human nature, as the various “inputs” Tanner mentions go both ways: from environment to human and vice versa.

Convener: Patrick Haley, Princeton Theological Seminary

Expanding Refuge:       Federal B Room

Refugees and Community Partners Designing for Belonging Together                                                                                                                   

Janelle Adams, Bethany College

Drawing on qualitative research with a faith-based community hub in the U.S. that works with newly arrived refugees, I investigate the ways that refugees and community partners design for belonging. By aligning their policies and programs with the principles of holistic safety, participation, and play, they expand the meaning of offering refuge. These community members rethink the pace and form of service provision in ways that unmask assumptions built into the “default” design, and they illustrate limitations of design emerging from human finitude and structural sin. Through this creative work, they dare to imagine belonging differently.

Convener: Federico Cinocca, Emmanuel College

Transnational Ethical Memory for Emanicipatory Decomcracy:         South America Room B

South Korea Diaspora Activists in Dialouge with Feminist Theo-Ethicists                                                                                                             

Seulbin Lee, Vanderbilt University

Democracy often involves a contestation over memory. Arising from an ethnographic analysis of Korean diaspora democracy activists, this paper argues that transnational and cross-cultural approaches to collective memories can help mobilize memories to facilitate spiritual liberation for emancipatory democracy. Religious and spiritual practices have guided these activists to engage their collective memories of their homeland to build solidarity with other racial and ethnic groups in the U.S. Putting their lived wisdom in dialogue with womanist and Asian American feminist theologies (Townes, Brown Douglas, & Pui-Lan), Christian social ethics and the church can learn to expand the ‘We-ness’ necessary for resistance to totalitarianism.

Convener: James Bretzke, John Carroll University

Pasts, Flourishing Futures:          South America Room A

Theological Ethics and the Work of Memory                                                                                                                                                                               

Panelists: Zachary Joseph Taylor, University of Chicago

    Ranana Dine, University of Chicago

                  Abraham Wu, University of Cambridge

Theological ethics has long been concerned with tensions related to remembering, forgetting, and forgiving past harms. Recognizing contributions from Paul Ricoeur, Miroslav Volf, Elie Wiesel, and Jonathan Tran, this interreligious panel explores how we might remember rightly and the conditions for flourishing vis-à-vis burdened pasts. Specifically, we draw on resources in Christian and Jewish ethics to consider contemporary questions related to the politics of memory, memory of the dead, and personal identity and memory loss. By drawing on classical and contemporary resources, we seek to foster constructive dialogue between times and traditions, illuminating memorable ways of life otherwise thought impossible. 

Convener: Jonathan Tran, Baylor University

Potentially Inappropriate:            Statler A Room

Biopolitics in Bioethics Mediation and Hope for Justice                                    

Andrea Thornton, Saint Louis University

This paper examines the historical movement in bioethics regarding the concept of “medical futility,” tracing it’s conceptual heritage to the now-preferred term “potentially inappropriate treatment." The new term fails to address the cause of requests for treatment; rather, it invites assessments of family behavior and requests, often unrelated to clinical matters, with the political power granted to clinicians. I propose that the discussion of hope and “false hope” is a better alternative to the discourse on medical futility because it seeks to identify the causes of requests for treatment, including restorative justice and resistance to abuse of power.

Convener: TBA

Recognizing Africa’s Silenced Victims of Cold War:         Statler B Room

Narrative Ethics, Human Dignity, and Restorative Justice 

Hilary Nwainya, St. Thomas University

Informed by Emmanuel Katongole’s narrative ethics and William Minter’s historical analysis, this paper argues that ethically reclaiming Africa’s silenced victims of Cold War geo-politics is essential for contemporary Christian social ethics. Amid rising nationalism, global populism, and ongoing violence in regions like Congo, Sudan, Ukraine, Gaza, and Venezuela, confronting historical silences becomes imperative. Integrating Catholic solidarity and subsidiarity, the paper contends that genuine reconciliation and restorative justice requires recognizing marginalized narratives, thus empowering Christian ethics to prophetically challenge oppressive power dynamics, advocate for human dignity, and meaningfully address today's urgent ethical question: "What must we do?"

Convener: Eileen Fagan, University of Mount Saint Vincent

Accompanying Trans* and Non-Binary Children        New York Room

Cristina Traina, Fordham University

Adult accompaniment of trans* and non-binary children must both honor their protagonism and protect their open futures. Guided by exegesis of Jesus’s healings in the gospels, I will argue that context matters: a trans*-and-non-binary accepting culture might suggest delaying irreversible physical changes as long as possible, but a strongly binary culture might suggest supporting such transformations earlier to forestall psychological damage and violent victimization. The paper will connect such prudential, contextual thinking to majority world views of interdependent agency. Finally, in this spirit, it will briefly critique the 2022 Swedish guidelines on treatment of children with gender dysphoria.

Convener: Emily Reimer-Barry, University of San Diego

Ethics by Algorithm? Practical Wisdom and the Limits of Virtuous AI        Ohio Room

Nicholas Ogle, Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary                                                  

Artificial intelligence is rapidly assuming control over human life in ways that demand ethical accountability. Yet how this accountability is to be ensured remains unclear. This paper draws on the Christian virtue ethics tradition to critique attempts to develop virtuous AI through computationaFl models of moral reasoning, arguing that they fail to capture the essence of practical wisdom. It then considers how AI might be integrated into human activities in a responsible manner, despite challenges like moral deskilling and automation bias. It concludes that human well-being is best safeguarded not by creating virtuous AI but by fostering its virtuous use.

Convener: Rebekah Miles, Southern Methodist University

Progressivist, Realist, and Augustinian Politics Amongst Unprecedented Perils           California Room

Frederick Simmons, Cambridge University

Artificial intelligence and anthropogenic climate change jeopardize the common Christian hope that God’s eschatological consummation of creation emerges through historical progress. Since Augustinianism conceives of that consummation as realized beyond history, its hope withstands such perils. Moreover, with its emphasis on the importance of politics and realizing ameliorative possibilities, Christian realism renders Augustinian hope a valuable ethical resource amidst historical decline. However, the invincibility of Augustinian hope can also condone the complacency that has discredited appeals to eschatology among many ethicists. To mitigate this potential antinomianism, Augustinians may follow Lutheran soteriology and order faith and hope to love and justice.

Convener: Gregory Lee, Wheaton College

The Justice of Repentance           Pan American

Joseph Lim, University of Notre Dame

In the wake of social evils like anti-Black racism, calls for corrective justice typically (and rightly) enjoin apologies and reparations. Yet they seldom consider the necessity of repentance for corrective justice. While theologians often situate repentance within divine-human relationships, I argue that it also corrects a distinct injustice characteristic of interhuman wrongdoing, namely, the wrongdoer’s flouting of the victim’s standing. I begin my argument with a Thomistic account of justice. Then, I distinguish corrective justice to its commutative and distributive counterparts, and analyze what makes something required for corrective justice. I conclude by theorizing why repentance is one such requirement.

Convener: Andrew Peterson, PC(USA)-Office of Public Witness