I am honored to be on the ballot this year as a candidate for president of the Association for the Sociology of Religion. As a long-time ASR member and current Council member, I look forward to future years of service to this wonderfully supportive association. Join us in Philadelphia this August!

It was a pleasure to once again serve as a small group facilitator for this year’s Louisville Institute Winter Seminar. Having attended several times (as both participant and facilitator), I come away each time invigorated and inspired by all the great research happening on North American religion. Louisville Institute offers a number of grants including dissertation grants, project grants for researchers, sabbatical grants, first book grants for BIPOC scholars, and more. Most deadlines are in early Fall.

Wonderful to share a Zoom room with a group of thoughtful interlocutors regarding women in ministry. Grateful to engage in dialogue across difference, informed by social science, with an eye toward community and understanding.

Watch the recorded webinar here.

Thanks to the Gender Studies, Philosophy, Political Science, and Sociology/Anthropology Departments at Westmont College for the invitation to come to campus, converse with students and faculty, and deliver a campus lecture, “Deeper Thinking on Abortion.” We had a full house for the lecture! Great questions and an engaged and respectful conversation. Check out my report on Americans’ abortion attitudes as well as my pieces in the Wall Street Journal and Time Magazine, and more. To inquire about speaking availability, contact me.

Great to see findings from the National Abortion Attitudes Study (NAAS) featured once again in The Washington Post. Though comic representations, reporter Hannah Good weaves through complex questions of who has abortions and why — alongside Americans’ perceptions gleaned from our interview data. Check out the Washington Post article here…and stay tuned for the publication of our related journal article, coauthored with sociologists Sarah Cowan and Kendra Hutchens!

Wonderful to visit Mexico City for the first time to deliver a talk (“Territorialidad y Desterritorialización de la Ciudad y la Parroquia”) to a gathering of Catholic bishops, priests, and lay leaders from México and beyond. Urban parishes were in the spotlight, addressed from a variety of lenses and geographic vantage points. I enjoyed the opportunity to connect and update research conducted for my book, Parish and Place — with a central focus on “personal parishes” serving specific, non-territorial Catholic populations and purposes. My Spanish was rusty but the audience was forgiving — grateful for enriching conversations and prospects for future collaboration! Thanks especially to Carlos Cardinal Aguiar Retes, Archbishop of México, for the invitation, and hosts Dr. Jesus Antonio Serrano and the Seminario Conciliar de México.

The Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture (RAAC) just released the proceedings from its June 2022 gathering:

In June, many of the top scholars studying and teaching about religion in North America gathered in Indianapolis for the Seventh Biennial Conference on Religion and American Culture. Proceedings from the sessions are now available online! Topics include: White Christian Nationalism in the United States; Religio-Racial Nationalisms in Global Contexts; Refugees and New Immigrants in the United States; Resonance and the Good Life; Religious Practice in a Digital Culture; Digital Scholarship and Teaching; Reproductive Rights; and Religious Freedom in the Age of Pandemic.

Among this insightful set of conversation-starters is my own contribution drawing upon insights from the National Abortion Attitudes Study. Talking to ordinary Americans about abortion + religion reveals the limits of absolutes and imperative to broaden our categories.

Read the full proceedings here.

In midst of the changing legal landscape for abortion in the U.S., I appreciated the opportunity to reappear as a guest on Larry’s Rifkin’s podcast, America Trends. We talked through where things stand today and what can be learned from the comprehensive interview study my team conducted with ordinary Americans regarding how they think and feel about abortion.

Listen to the full episode here.

Thanks to the Association of Pittsburgh Priests for the invitation to share findings from the National Study of Abortion Attitudes, complicating narrow depictions of where Americans (and American Catholics) stand on this complex issue. We had a great (Zoom!) turnout and rich conversation that is sure to continue.