Carolyn Bratnober (they./she) is the Public Services Librarian at the Burke Library at Union Theological Seminary in New York. She completed a Masters degree in Library & Information Science at the Pratt Institute, then a Master of Arts at Union Theological Seminary. Her library and archival work is informed by her research in gender and sexuality studies, (dis)ability studies, ethics and religious studies, along with digital-media and information-literacy studies. She coordinates research and access services for the Burke Library and across the Columbia University Libraries, and creates exhibits, user-engagement projects, and instruction-design initiatives. She has written for Religion Dispatches and recently collaborated on an Open Educational Resource (OER) with librarians at the State University of New York-Geneseo, an open online introductory textbook to LGBTQ Studies.
Gillian Frank, Ph.D. is a historian of sexuality and religion. He is the author of numerous academic articles on the histories of sexuality, gender and religion (which have appeared in venues like the Journal of the History of Sexuality, American Jewish History, and Gender and History) and public facing scholarship (which has been published by the Washington Post, Time, Jezebel and Slate). He is also co-editor of Devotions of Desire: Histories of Sexuality and Religion in the 20th Century United States (UNC Press: 2018). Frank is currently at work on a manuscript called A Sacred Choice: Liberal Religion and the Struggle for Abortion Before Roe v Wade (forthcoming UNC Press). You can listen to his podcast "Sexing History," which explores how the history of sexuality shapes our present, wherever you stream your shows.
Ahmad Greene-Hayes, Ph.D. (he/him) is Assistant Professor of African American Religious Studies at Harvard Divinity School. A social historian and critical theorist, Greene-Hayes’s research interests include critical Black Studies, Black Atlantic Religions in the Americas, and race, queerness, and sexuality in the context of African American and Caribbean religious histories. He is currently working on a book manuscript entitled, Underworld Work: Black Atlantic Religion-Making in Jim Crow New Orleans, which is under advance contract with the University of Chicago Press in the Class 200: New Studies in Religion series. His book examines the Black Atlantic religious cultures and sexual politics that emerged in New Orleans—a vibrant, American port city—amidst Jim Crow policing and the migration of African Americans, West Indians, and Central Americans to the region in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His work has been published in The Journal of Africana Religions and GLQ: A Journal of Gay and Lesbian Studies, among many others.
Timothy W. Jones, Ph.D. (he/they) is a historian of gender, sexuality and religion in modern Australia and the United Kingdom. Tim is Senior Lecturer in History at La Trobe University in Melbourne and is Vice President of the Australian Lesbian and Gay Archives. He was awarded a PhD from the University of Melbourne in 2007 and was Lecturer in History at the University of South Wales from 2008-2012. Tim’s first book is Sexual Politics in the Church of England, 1857-1957 (Oxford, 2013). He is also co-editor of Love and Romance in Britain, 1918-1970 (Palgrave, 2015), Material Religion in Modern Britain: The Spirit of Things (Palgrave, 2015), and Interdisciplinary Feminist Perspectives on Crimes of Clerical Child Sexual Abuse (Routledge, 2018), and was lead author of the report Preventing Harm, Promoting Justice: Responding to LGBT Conversion Therapy in Australia (2018). Tim is currently continuing research into LGBT conversion practices in Australia, working on a biography of Anglican historian and theologian of sexuality, D.S. Bailey, and writing up a monograph of the rise of the New Christian Right in Australia since the sexual revolution.
Drake Konow (he/him) is an independent scholar of American religious history whose work focuses on histories of religion, sexuality, social activism, and popular culture in the 20th and 21st centuries. His first major project centered on the protests of gay and lesbian Catholics in New York City during the AIDS epidemic. He is currently studying in a Ph.D. program at the University of Texas. He graduated with a Master’s of Religion from Yale Divinity School in 2014 and has an undergraduate degree in religious studies from Southern Methodist University. In addition to his independent scholarship, Drew works as the Director of Communications and LGBTQ Programs at the Religious Institute. There, he manages the organization’s LGBTQ programming work and supervises all strategic communications, media relations, and content development. His work at the Religious Institute also includes development-related projects, including both constituent- and grant-based fundraising. He has presented his scholarly and professional work at conferences and in faith communities across the country. In the future,
Suzanna Krivulskaya, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor of History at California State University San Marcos. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame in 2019. Her research explores the relationship between religion and sexuality in U.S. history. Suzanna's work has appeared in the Journal of American Studies, Current Research in Digital History, and the Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. She has also written for popular outlets like Religion Dispatches and The Revealer. Suzanna's first book, forthcoming from Oxford University Press, traces the history of sex scandals involving Protestant ministers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Nancy Krody (she/her) has been an activist with the UCC Coalition for LGBT Concerns for over 50 years and was the first co-coordinator with Bill Johnson. Through this time she has also been a leader in the UCC at the national, Conference and Association levels (past Moderator and currently registrar and treasurer of the Philadelphia Association). She is also a long-time elder and clerk of her local church, which is both UCC and Presbyterian. She has been involved in the ecumenical LGBTQ movement with WOW Conferences, the Rolling the Stone Away gathering and LGBTQ-RAN. She has also been active in many LGBTQ groups in the Philadelphia area. Professionally Nancy recently retired as the managing editor of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies at Temple University where she served since 1973. She brings editorial skills, some sense of history going way back, and a commitment to working with all genders despite being a "fesbian leminist" at heart.
Rev. Derrick McQueen, Ph.D. (he/him) is the pastor of St. James Presbyterian Church in Harlem, the oldest African American Presbyterian Church in New York City. He serves as the first, ordained, out African American pastor of a historic Black Church in the Presbyterian denomination. Derrick serves as Vice Chair of the board of directors of Auburn Theological Seminary, which equips bold and resilient leaders with the tools and resources needed for social justice movement in a multifaith world. He is also board chair of InterConnected Justice, which champions Pan-African solidarity in the African Diaspora. He has served as the chair of the LGBT Faith Leaders of African Descent in New York City. Rev. Dr. McQueen is the Associate Director for Community Partnerships at Columbia University Center on African American Religion Sexual Politics and Social Justice—better known as CARSS. The project brings together scholars, activists, clergy, and communities for healing in historic Black Church life culture. Rev. McQueen earned his Ph. D. in Homiletics and New Testament at Union Theological Seminary (New York). He also received an M. Div. in Worship and the Arts from Union; and a B.A. in Theater Arts from Drew University. Photo: Bob Gore Productions
Andrew C. Patty (he/him) earned a B.A. degree in History from Sewanee, an M.Div. from Duke Divinity School with Certificate in Gender and Sexuality in Theology and Ministry and is currently in the process of getting a Ph.D. in Educational History at The University of Kansas. His historical research focuses on sexuality and masculinity in religiously affiliated colleges and universities (particularly around gay/queer student movement groups). He is also currently "Pending Call" ordination status in the United Church of Christ, hopefully soon to be a minister in Kansas or Missouri. As a gay man, he has also been actively involved fighting for gay rights in organizations such as the Moral Monday Movement and HRC. Therefore, he sees himself very representative of the three types of persons involved with LGBT-RAN: Activists, Religious Leaders, and Scholars.
Elizabeth Pérez, Ph.D. (she/her) is associate professor of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is an ethnographer and historian of Afro-Diasporic traditions and LGBTQ religious experience. Her first monograph, Religion in the Kitchen: Cooking, Talking, and the Making of Black Atlantic Traditions (New York University Press, 2016), was awarded the 2017 Clifford Geertz Prize in the Anthropology of Religion by the Society for the Anthropology of Religion, and it received Honorable Mention for the Caribbean Studies Association’s 2019 Barbara T. Christian Literary Award. She has published widely in edited volumes and scholarly journals, including Feminist Anthropology and Material Religion.
Justin Sabia-Tanis, Ph.D. (he/him) earned his PhD from the Graduate Theological Union in Interdisciplinary Studies, focusing on sexuality, art, and religion. He earned a Master’s degree at Harvard University and a previous doctorate from San Francisco Theological Seminary. He currently is an assistant professor and director of the Social Transformation program at United Theological Seminary in the Twin Cities. Justin’s previous work includes advocacy for LGBT rights in national non-profit organizations. He was the Community Education and Outreach Manager at the National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) in Washington, D.C. and later served as the Director of Communications for Out & Equal Workplace Advocates. He is the author of Transgender: Ministry, Theology, and Communities of Faith, which was a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award in 2003, and is a contributor to the forthcoming Transgender: Four Views (Baker Academic Press, 2018). He has also contributed chapters to the Queer Bible Commentary and Take Back the Word: A Queer Reading of the Bible. An artist and photographer, Justin has had a lifelong passion for the arts.
Thelathia "Nikki" Young, Ph.D. is Associate Professor of Women's and Gender Studies and Religion at Bucknell University. She received her Ph.D. from Emory University, M.Div. and Th.M. from Candler School of Theology, and B.A. from UNC-Asheville. Her research focuses on the intersection of ethics, family, race, gender, and sexuality, and she is specifically interested in the impact of queerness on moral reasoning. Nikki serves on the Board of Directors in the Society for Christian Ethics. She is also a co-chair of the Queer Studies in Religion Group in the American Academy of Religion, and chair of the LGBTIQ Persons in the Profession Task Force in AAR. Her first monograph, Black Queer Ethics, Family, and Philosophical Imagination, was published in 2016 by Palgrave Macmillan. Nikki recently finished a collaborative book with Eric Barreto and Jake Myers called In Tongues of Mortals and Angels: A De-Constructive Theology of God-Talk in Acts and Paul.