Kwok ’n’ Roll

Dr. Rita Nakashima Brock is a noted Asian American feminist theologian, activist, and world authority on moral injury. She was Senior Vice President for Moral Injury Recovery Programs at Volunteers of America. In this episode, she explains what moral injury is and the difference between moral injury and PTSD. She describes how moral injury affects her family, especially in her relationship with he...

Bishop Ian T. Douglas is the retired Bishop Diocesan of the Episcopal Church in Connecticut and the former Agnes Dun Professor of Mission and World Christianity at the Episcopal Divinity School. With Kwok Pui-lan, he has coedited Beyond Colonial Anglicanism (2001) and Living Postcolonial Anglicanism (2025). In this episode, he discusses the historical backgrounds of these two books. In the past tw...

Dr. Traci C. West is Professor Emerite of Christian Ethics and African American Studies at Drew University Theological School. She is known for her scholarship and activism around gender-based violence, particularly against Black women. In this episode, she uses the lens of gender-based violence to examine the moral compass of the U.S. society. She shows how public morality has shifted when sexual...

Dr. Cody J. Sanders is a queer Baptist minister, pastoral theologian, and Associate Professor of Congregational and Community Care Leadership at Luther Seminary in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Previously, he served as pastor of Old Cambridge Baptist Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In this episode, he responds to the taking away of trans rights and the Supreme Court decision not to reconsider the leg...

Julian Davis Reid is the founder of the ministry Notes of Rest®, which invites the weary into the rest of God practiced in the Bible and Black music. He is a musician, speaker, writer, and a Black artist-theologian of Chicago, who graduated from Candler School of Theology. In this episode, he discusses his upbringing in the church, immersed in both Black and classical music. He has studied and app...

Dr. Sharon A. Suh is a professor of Religious Studies at Seattle University, a practicing Buddhist, and a yoga teacher. In this episode, she shares why she edited the book Emergent Dharma, inviting Asian American Buddhist scholar-practitioners to share their practices. American Buddhist scholarship has focused on white Buddhist communities. This book intervenes by introducing the lives and practic...

The Right Revd Humberto Maiztegue Goncalves is the bishop of the Meridional Diocese of  in the southern region of Brazil and a professor of the Bible. The Episcopal Anglican Church of Brazil is a progressive church that ordains women to the priesthood and welcomes LGBTQ+ people. In this episode, the bishop introduces the history and mission of the church, the influences of liberation theology and...

Dr. Lisa Isherwood teaches at the University of Wales Trinity and Saint David, and she is a prolific writer and leader on queer theology, feminist theology, and body theology. She and Hugo Córdova Quero coedited the pioneering book The Dare Primer on Global Queer Theologies, with 21 contributors from around the world. In this episode, she shares how this volume came about and her forthcoming book...

Dr. Carlos Mendoza-Álvarez, a street theologian in Mexico City, has taught theology in the U.S., Brazil, and Mexico. He discusses how his decolonial theology is informed by the marginalized and the survivors of violence and oppression. As a novice of the Dominican Order, he visited  Chiapas in southern Mexico and learned about the indigenous peoples’ struggles, wisdom, and hope. His decolonial the...

Dr. Sharon D. Welch is a scholar and activist and a former Provost of the Unitarian Universalist’s Meadville Lombard Theological School in Chicago. A seasoned activist, she was involved in the women’s movement, peace movement, and direct activism for decades. She has worked with the Chicago League of Women Voters, the Social Enterprise Alliance, and the Community-Based Learning Collaborative, amon...

Dr. Vincent Lloyd is a professor of theology and religious studies at Villanova University. He researches and teaches about the philosophy of religion, religion and politics, and race. In this episode, he discusses his two forthcoming books: Political Theology Reimagined and What Is Political Theology? While political theology in the past has engaged with the works of Carl Schmitt, Giorgio Agamben...

Dr. Tina Pippin teaches the Bible and Religion at Agnes Scott College, a women’s college in Decatur, Georgia, USA, and she will be the president of the Society of Biblical Literature in 2026. In this episode, she discusses her new book The Actual Jesus, which investigates the portrayals of Jesus in films, novels, popular media, and AI. She recalls her training in biblical studies as a graduate stu...

Dr. Antonio Alonso is the Director of Catholic Studies at Candler School of Theology, Emory University. He composed the responsorial psalm for the first Mass Pope Francis celebrated in the U.S. in 2015. A Latin Grammy-nominated composer, he discusses the difference between composing liturgical music versus secular music. He began writing music as a teenager and is the author of over 200 published...

Dr. Keun-joo Christine Pae teaches religion and ethics, and women and gender studies at Denison University in Ohio. In this episode, she discusses transpacific imagination in theology and ethics, and her field research on spiritual activism in Korea. As a coeditor of Searching for the Future in the Past: Reclaiming Feminist Theological Visions, she explains why feminist theology continues to be a...

Dr. Anthony Reddie became the first professor of Black Theology at Oxford University in its nearly 900-year history. Born in the U.K. to immigrant parents from Jamaica, Reddie describes racism in the British church and society and how black theology developed in Britain since the 1990s. He argues that Black theology in the U.K. is inseparable from British colonial history and must adopt a postcolo...

Dr. Loida I. Martell is Vice President of Academic Affairs and Dean at Lexington Theological Seminary in Kentucky. She was trained in veterinary medicine before pursuing a career in theology. In this episode, she discusses the development of Latina theology and the challenges to theological education. As one of a handful Latina in leadership positions in theological education, she looks back at he...

Dr. Grace Ji-Sun Kim is a writer, theologian, and professor at Earlham School of Religion. This episode discusses her forthcoming book Earthbound: God at the Intersection of Climate and Justice. She shares her experience of participating in the World Council of Churches and ecumenical conversations on the environment and climate justice for many years. She was in Assisi, Italy when Pope Leo XIV wa...

Dr. Mona West, a leading queer biblical scholar and Metropolitan Community Church pastor, discusses how the Trump administration policies seek to drive a wedge in the LGBTQI+ community. Citing from the work of Judith Butler, she cautions that the LGBTQI+ community must learn to listen to and stand in solidarity with one another. She recalls the beginnings of queer biblical scholarship and her coed...

Dr. Russell Jeung, a professor of Asian American Studies at San Francisco State University, was a co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, which documents anti-Asian racist incidences during COVID-19 and beyond. In this episode, he discusses what prompted him to start Stop AAPI Hate. He combines his scholarship on Asian American studies with his long-time activism on behalf of the Asian American community. H...

Dr. Teresa L. Smallwood is a public theologian and Academic Dean at United Lutheran Seminary in Philadelphia. She discusses her book Public Theology and Violent Rhetoric Examined in a Queer Womanist Critical Ethnography. Before studying theology, Dr. Smallwood was a criminal defense lawyer for over two decades. She shares her reflections on the pushback against affirmative action and DEI programs,...

Dr. Kwok Pui Lan started her podcast Kwok ‘n’ Roll in February 2025 and produced 20 episodes. She teams up with SueAnn Shiah, a Taiwanese American songwriter, podcast producer, and filmmaker, to discuss what to consider if you want to start a podcast. They discuss the content and structure of the podcast, the editing and technical aspects, and distribution and promotion. No, you don’t need fancy e...

Dr. Joerg Rieger is a distinguished professor of theology and directs the Wendland-Cook Program in Religion and Justice at Vanderbilt University Divinity School. He revisited the book Christ and Empire, which he published 18 years ago, and discussed the concept of Capitalocene. He emphasized how capitalism has created not only economic inequity but also caused disastrous impacts on the climate and...

SueAnn Shiah, a Taiwanese American podcast producer and filmmaker, discusses the challenges of growing up as a queer person searching for a spiritual home. She is a seminarian preparing for ordination in the Presbyterian Church USA. She shares her vision of combining her career in music and ministry. She has produced the album “A Liturgy for the Perseverance of the Saints” to help people who strug...

Dr. Gina A. Zurlo teaches at Harvard Divinity School and has published the pioneering book Women in World Christianity using interdisciplinary, sociological, and historical approaches. She is also the author of Global Christianity and coauthor of World Christian Encyclopedia. In this episode, she talks about how she started doing quantitative analyses of world Christianity, a male-dominated field....

Dr. Roger Nam teaches the Hebrew Bible at Candler School of Theology, Emory University. He teaches a course on The Bible and Asia America for college and master students. He points out that biblical figures such as Adam and Eve, Abraham, Issac, Joseph, Esther, and Ruth have to migrate to foreign lands. The Bible addresses issues such as identity, community, trauma, and justice, issues that Asian A...