2023 Asian American Theology Conference
Multiple Belongings in U.S. Christianities
Christian Faith and Asian Migration to the U.S.
April 28–29, 2023 • Hybrid Conference
The Center for Asian American Christianity & the Overseas Ministries Study Center
Register to Attend VirtuallyRegister to Attend in Person
2023 Asian American Theology Conference
Multiple Belongings in U.S. Christianities
Among world religions, Christianity is a uniquely translational religion. This is evident in the movement of the Christian faith across space and time and the spread of Christianity across the world to new communities. The missional orientation of the Christian message has its theological roots in God’s covenant with Israel that seeks inclusion of Gentiles. Migrational Christianity is one social embodiment of this theological truth. Migration is the movement of people across space and time. This conference examines the Christian faith within the ebb and flow of Asian migration to the US. How does Christian community create belonging for migrants experiencing dislocation, especially for those Asians in America?
This conference features scholars from different streams of Asian American Christianity to discuss how the Christian faith equips and empowers the surviving and thriving of Korean, Chinese, Indian, and Filipino religious communities in the US. We will also host a panel of pastors and students who share their testimonies and experiences of belonging as Asian American Christians. This conference seeks to advance the research about migration and religion from an Asian American Christian perspective as well as equip and empower church and community leaders with contextually relevant knowledge and resources.
Speakers
Gabriel J. Catanus is the Director of the Filipino American Ministry Initiative at Fuller Theological Seminary, where he teaches Christian ethics. He is also the founding and lead pastor of Garden City Covenant Church, a congregation serving immigrant families and young professionals. He has been a lead pastor for thirteen years and he received his PhD from Loyola University in Chicago where he lives with his wife and two children.
Dr. David C. Chao is director of the Center for Asian American Christianity at Princeton Theological Seminary. He teaches courses on Asian American theology, organizes academic programs in Asian American theology and ministry, and mentors Asian and Asian American students. His research and writing focus on Asian American theology, the uses of Christian doctrine for liberation, the convergence and divergence of Protestant and Catholic dogmatics, and the theology of Karl Barth. His first book, titled Concursus and Concept Use in Karl Barth’s Doctrine of Providence, is under contract with Routledge. He is grant co-author and project editor for the $300,000 translation grant awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities to the Karl Barth Translator’s Seminar. He is also developing a multi-volume project on Asian American theology. Chao is a graduate of Yale University (BA), Regent College (MDiv), and Princeton Theological Seminary (ThM, PhD). He is a member of the American Academy of Religion and the Association for Asian American Studies. Chao has a wide range of pastoral experience with Chinese American, Korean American, and Pan-Asian churches and ministries and is an active member of the Presbyterian Church (USA).
Soojin Chung is an assistant professor of practical theology and director of general education under the office of the provost at Azusa Pacific University. She is the author of Adopting for God: The Mission to Change America through Transnational Adoption (New York University Press, 2021) and has published articles and book chapters in various journals and edited volumes. She is the Associate Editor of the journal Missiology: An International Review and serves as the panelist of Humanities Initiatives of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). She is the principal investigator of the Hispanic Serving Institution Grant and Vocation Academy Grant funded by NEH and the Council of Independent Colleges.
Jane Hong is associate professor of history at Occidental College and the author of Opening the Gates to Asia: A Transpacific History of How America Repealed Asian Exclusion (University of North Carolina Press, 2019). A public-facing historian, she appears in the PBS docuseries Asian Americans (2020), has consulted for television programs including Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and has penned op-eds for the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. An active public speaker, Hong has shared her expertise with the Brookings Institution, Uber, and NPR’s The Takeaway, in addition to academic and faith-based venues. Her current book project, under contract with Oxford University Press, explores how post-1965 Asian migration has changed U.S. evangelical institutions and politics. Hong serves on the editorial board of the Journal of American History. She received her Ph.D. from Harvard and her B.A. from Yale.
Easten’s research focuses on lived theology, religious pluralism, and public life in the context of contemporary China. For his dissertation, he is examining how Chinese Christian identity is negotiated and expressed in everyday life via qualitative sociological methods. He intends to use this data to inform an interreligious public theology for the Chinese context.
Previously, Easten taught intercultural relations at American University’s School of International Service in Washington, D.C., and Anhui Normal University in Wuhu, Anhui Province, China. In addition to teaching, Easten has also provided training, lectures, and curriculum design in intercultural communication with a variety of faith communities and NGOs in the D.C. area and China, including the United Methodist General Commission on Race and Society, Mercy Corps, and local Chinese NGOs responding to the Sichuan earthquake that struck southwest China in 2008.
Some of his previous work includes projects in critical pedagogy and intercultural communication for global citizenship, community-based research methods for urban ministry, and curricular frameworks for integrating inter-religious dialogue and Christian ministry.
Shirley Lung is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs and an incoming Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminology at the University of Denver. She received her PhD in sociology from the Johns Hopkins University. Her current research is on transnational Taiwanese Protestant networks between the United States and Taiwan, focusing on the relationships among three Taiwanese-in-name church organizations. She studies Taiwanese ethnic identity formation within this transnational organizational field. Her work has been funded by the Global Religion Research Initiative at the University of Notre Dame, the Louisville Institute, and the Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs among others. She has published in Religions.
Dr. David Moe is Henry H. Rice Postdoctoral Associate in Southeast Asian Studies at Yale University. At Yale, he teaches some courses on “religion, conflict, and reconciliation in Southeast Asia,” and “colonialism, nationalism, and identity in Myanmar.” He is the author of one book, over 70 scholarly articles, and is currently working on a book project about the politics of Buddhist nationalism, ethnic conflict, and reconciliation in Southeast Asia. The goal of his scholarship is to engage with three different communities—grassroot church, academy, and public society. He is a public featured speaker about Myanmar at Yale, Harvard, Columbia, Brown, Stanford, Oxford, Cambridge, Boston University, Boston College, New York University, George Washington University, Eastern Kentucky University, Toronto, Australian National University, Whitley College, Hamburg, National University of Singapore, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Yonsei, Ewha, and some ecclesial and public settings. He is on the editorial team of four journals—International Journal of Public Theology; Journal of Southeast Asian Movement at Yale; Interreligious Studies and Intercultural Theology; and Asian American Theological Forum.
Dr. Allen Yeh is a Professor of Intercultural Studies and Missiology at Biola University. He has geographical specializations in Latin America and China. He serves on the Board of Trustees for the Foundation for Theological Education in Southeast Asia and the International Theological Seminary. He earned his B.A. from Yale, M.Div. from Gordon-Conwell, M.Th. from Edinburgh, and D.Phil. from Oxford. Allen has been to 64 countries on six continents, to study, do missions work, and experience the culture. He is joyfully married to Arianna Molloy, a professor in Biola's Communication Studies Department, and they have a four-year-old son, Asher.
Steering Committee
Dr. David C. Chao is director of the Center for Asian American Christianity at Princeton Theological Seminary. He teaches courses on Asian American theology, organizes academic programs in Asian American theology and ministry, and mentors Asian and Asian American students. His research and writing focus on Asian American theology, the uses of Christian doctrine for liberation, the convergence and divergence of Protestant and Catholic dogmatics, and the theology of Karl Barth. His first book, titled Concursus and Concept Use in Karl Barth’s Doctrine of Providence, is under contract with Routledge. He is grant co-author and project editor for the $300,000 translation grant awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities to the Karl Barth Translator’s Seminar. He is also developing a multi-volume project on Asian American theology. Chao is a graduate of Yale University (BA), Regent College (MDiv), and Princeton Theological Seminary (ThM, PhD). He is a member of the American Academy of Religion and the Association for Asian American Studies. Chao has a wide range of pastoral experience with Chinese American, Korean American, and Pan-Asian churches and ministries and is an active member of the Presbyterian Church (USA).
Easten’s research focuses on lived theology, religious pluralism, and public life in the context of contemporary China. For his dissertation, he is examining how Chinese Christian identity is negotiated and expressed in everyday life via qualitative sociological methods. He intends to use this data to inform an interreligious public theology for the Chinese context.
Previously, Easten taught intercultural relations at American University’s School of International Service in Washington, D.C., and Anhui Normal University in Wuhu, Anhui Province, China. In addition to teaching, Easten has also provided training, lectures, and curriculum design in intercultural communication with a variety of faith communities and NGOs in the D.C. area and China, including the United Methodist General Commission on Race and Society, Mercy Corps, and local Chinese NGOs responding to the Sichuan earthquake that struck southwest China in 2008.
Some of his previous work includes projects in critical pedagogy and intercultural communication for global citizenship, community-based research methods for urban ministry, and curricular frameworks for integrating inter-religious dialogue and Christian ministry.
Attend the Conference Virtually
Attend in Person at Princeton Theological Seminary
Location forthcoming.
We will be serving continental brunch and dinner on each day. The fee for meals is $25 per day.
Schedule
All times are Eastern Time
Friday, April 28, 2023
Time (ET)
Session
Presenter(s)
10:00–11:00AM
Continental Breakfast (in-person participants)
11:00–11:30AM
Opening Remarks (Dr. Chao)
Words of Welcome (President Walton)
Dr. David C. Chao
President Jonathan Walton
11:30AM–12:15PM
How Post-1965 Migration Changed U.S. Christianity
Dr. Jane Hong
12:15–12:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
12:30–1:15PM
The Hidden Stories of Burmese American Christianity: Understanding their Imagination of Ethnic and Religious Identities
Dr. David Moe
1:15–1:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
1:30–2:15PM
Multiple Un-Belongings: Filipino American Theology and the Problem of Home
Rev. Dr. Gabriel J. Catanus
2:15–2:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
2:30–3:15PM
America as the Far or Near Country: Challenges and Opportunities for Biblical Narratives Shaping Christian (and Asian American) Discipleship
Sarah Shin
3:15–3:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
3:30–4:15PM
Displacement, Migration, and Belonging Across China & America: Framing Asian American Discipleship Generationally
Dr. Easten Law
4:15–5:00PM
Panel Discussion
5:30–6:30PM
Dinner (in-person participants)
Saturday, April 29, 2023
Time (ET)
Session
Presenter(s)
10:30–11:30AM
Continental Breakfast and Panel Discussion with OMSC Partners: “Multiple Belongings in Asian Christianities“(in-person participants)
11:30AM–12:15PM
Plenary 6
Dr. David C. Chao
12:15–12:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
12:30–1:15PM
The First Taiwanese-in-Name Churches and Building Taiwanese Identities in Postwar America
Dr. Shirley Lung
1:15–1:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
1:30–2:15PM
Exiled Aliens: Korean American Christianity as the Basis of Liberation and Belonging
Dr. Soojin Chung
2:15–2:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
2:30–3:15PM
Plenary 9
Rev. Dr. Kamalesh Stephen
3:15–3:30PM
Social Lounge / Snack Break
3:30–4:15PM
Chinese vs. Chinese American: Beyond Left, Right, and Center
Dr. Allen Yeh
4:15–5:00PM
Panel Discussion
5:30–6:30PM
Dinner (in-person participants)
Center for Asian American Christianity
The newly expanded Center for Asian American Christianity at Princeton Theological Seminary comes at a critical time in the life of Asian America. Asian Americans are the fastest-growing racial-ethnic demographic in the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the persistence of anti-Asian racism. Moreover, minority and immigrant churches are poised to transform the face of Christianity in the United States in the next few decades. The Center for Asian American Christianity seeks to equip and empower the next generation of Asian American leaders for service in church, society, and academy.
Princeton Theological Seminary has been a leading voice in Asian American theology and ministry through the work of Professor Emeritus Sang Hyun Lee, the Center for Asian American Christianity, and the establishment of the Kyung-Chik Han Chair of Asian American Theology.