Keynote Speaker
Jeffrey P. Bishop, M.D., Ph.D., Director, Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics
Saint Louis University
Jeffrey Bishop holds the Tenet Endowed Chair in Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University, where he also directs the Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics. He is also Professor of Philosophy and his research explores the historical, political, and philosophical conditions that underpin contemporary medical and scientific practices and theories. His first book, The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying (University of Notre Dame Press), explores the care of the dying, from ICU to palliative care.
Saint Louis University
Jeffrey Bishop holds the Tenet Endowed Chair in Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University, where he also directs the Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics. He is also Professor of Philosophy and his research explores the historical, political, and philosophical conditions that underpin contemporary medical and scientific practices and theories. His first book, The Anticipatory Corpse: Medicine, Power, and the Care of the Dying (University of Notre Dame Press), explores the care of the dying, from ICU to palliative care.
Featured Speakers
Harold Koenig, MD, MHSc
Director, Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health
Duke University
Dr. Koenig completed his undergraduate education at Stanford University, his medical school training at the University of California at San Francisco, and his geriatric medicine, psychiatry, and biostatistics training at Duke University. He is board certified in general psychiatry, and formerly in family medicine, geriatric medicine, and geriatric psychiatry. He is on the faculty at Duke University Medical Center as Professor of Psychiatry and Associate Professor of Medicine. Dr. Koenig is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Medicine at King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and in the School of Public Health at Ningxia Medical University, Yinchuan, People’s Republic of China, where he teaches and conducts research. Dr. Koenig is the director of Duke’s Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health, and has published extensively in the fields of religion, spirituality and health, with over 500 scientific peer-reviewed publications and book chapters, and more than 40 books. His research on religion and health has been featured on many national and international TV news programs
including ABC’s World News Tonight, The Today Show, two episodes of Good Morning America, Dr. Oz Show, and NBC Nightly News) and hundreds of national and international radio programs and newspapers/magazines (including Reader's Digest, Parade Magazine, Newsweek, Time, and Guidepost). Dr. Koenig has given testimony before the U.S. Senate (1998) and U.S. House of Representatives (2008) concerning the benefits of religion and spirituality on public health. He is the recipient of the 2012 Oskar Pfister Award from the American Psychiatric Association and the 2013 Gary Collins Award from the American Association of Christian Counselors.
Director, Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health
Duke University
Dr. Koenig completed his undergraduate education at Stanford University, his medical school training at the University of California at San Francisco, and his geriatric medicine, psychiatry, and biostatistics training at Duke University. He is board certified in general psychiatry, and formerly in family medicine, geriatric medicine, and geriatric psychiatry. He is on the faculty at Duke University Medical Center as Professor of Psychiatry and Associate Professor of Medicine. Dr. Koenig is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Medicine at King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and in the School of Public Health at Ningxia Medical University, Yinchuan, People’s Republic of China, where he teaches and conducts research. Dr. Koenig is the director of Duke’s Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health, and has published extensively in the fields of religion, spirituality and health, with over 500 scientific peer-reviewed publications and book chapters, and more than 40 books. His research on religion and health has been featured on many national and international TV news programs
including ABC’s World News Tonight, The Today Show, two episodes of Good Morning America, Dr. Oz Show, and NBC Nightly News) and hundreds of national and international radio programs and newspapers/magazines (including Reader's Digest, Parade Magazine, Newsweek, Time, and Guidepost). Dr. Koenig has given testimony before the U.S. Senate (1998) and U.S. House of Representatives (2008) concerning the benefits of religion and spirituality on public health. He is the recipient of the 2012 Oskar Pfister Award from the American Psychiatric Association and the 2013 Gary Collins Award from the American Association of Christian Counselors.
Tyler VanderWeele, PhD
Professor of Epidemiology
Harvard School of Public Health
Tyler J. VanderWeele, Ph.D., is Professor of Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, faculty affiliate of the Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Science, and Director of the Program on Integrative Knowledge and Human Flourishing. He holds degrees from the University of Oxford, University of Pennsylvania, and Harvard University in mathematics, philosophy, theology, finance and applied economics, and biostatistics. His research concerns methodology for distinguishing between association and causation in observational research, and his empirical research spans psychiatric, perinatal, and social epidemiology; various fields within the social sciences; and the study of religion and health including both religion and population health and the role of religion and spirituality in end-of-life care. He has published over two hundred papers in peer-reviewed journals, is founder of the journal Epidemiologic Methods, and is author of the book Explanation in Causal Inference: Methods for Mediation and Interaction, published by Oxford University Press.
Professor of Epidemiology
Harvard School of Public Health
Tyler J. VanderWeele, Ph.D., is Professor of Epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, faculty affiliate of the Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Science, and Director of the Program on Integrative Knowledge and Human Flourishing. He holds degrees from the University of Oxford, University of Pennsylvania, and Harvard University in mathematics, philosophy, theology, finance and applied economics, and biostatistics. His research concerns methodology for distinguishing between association and causation in observational research, and his empirical research spans psychiatric, perinatal, and social epidemiology; various fields within the social sciences; and the study of religion and health including both religion and population health and the role of religion and spirituality in end-of-life care. He has published over two hundred papers in peer-reviewed journals, is founder of the journal Epidemiologic Methods, and is author of the book Explanation in Causal Inference: Methods for Mediation and Interaction, published by Oxford University Press.
Interreligious Speakers
Anne C. Klein/Rigzin Drolma, PhD
Professor of Religion, Rice University
(Buddhist) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Anne Carolyn Klein/Rigzin Drolma Ph.D., is Professor of Religious Studies at Rice University and a lama (trained teacher) in the Nyingma (Ancient) tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. She is co-founding director of the Dawn Mountain Center for Tibetan Buddhism in Houston. (www.dawnmountain.org).
Her scholarly publications center on Buddhist philosophy and meditation, especially theories of perception and being. In this context, “enchantment” is framed either as a form of ignorance or the dawn of wisdom. Distinguishing the two is crucial to the Buddhist vision of human development and healing. Her seven books include Knowledge and Liberation (translated into Russian and Chinese), Meeting the Great Bliss Queen; Buddhists, Feminists and the Art of the Self; Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse: A Story of Transmission; Unbounded Wholeness: Dzogchen, Bon and the Logic of the Nonconceptual (with Geshe Tenzin Wangyal RInpoche) , and most recently Strand of Jewels, her translation of a rarified work on Dzogchen by Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche.
Professor of Religion, Rice University
(Buddhist) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Anne Carolyn Klein/Rigzin Drolma Ph.D., is Professor of Religious Studies at Rice University and a lama (trained teacher) in the Nyingma (Ancient) tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. She is co-founding director of the Dawn Mountain Center for Tibetan Buddhism in Houston. (www.dawnmountain.org).
Her scholarly publications center on Buddhist philosophy and meditation, especially theories of perception and being. In this context, “enchantment” is framed either as a form of ignorance or the dawn of wisdom. Distinguishing the two is crucial to the Buddhist vision of human development and healing. Her seven books include Knowledge and Liberation (translated into Russian and Chinese), Meeting the Great Bliss Queen; Buddhists, Feminists and the Art of the Self; Heart Essence of the Vast Expanse: A Story of Transmission; Unbounded Wholeness: Dzogchen, Bon and the Logic of the Nonconceptual (with Geshe Tenzin Wangyal RInpoche) , and most recently Strand of Jewels, her translation of a rarified work on Dzogchen by Khetsun Sangpo Rinpoche.
Abraham Nussbaum, MD
CEdO, Denver Health
(Christian) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Abraham M. Nussbaum, MD, MTS is the Chief Education Officer at Denver Health and an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. As CEO, he supervises and provides strategic vision for the more than 2,000 learners in 40 health professions who annually rotate at Denver Health. As a clinician, Dr. Nussbaum sees patients and supervises trainees on the adult inpatient psychiatric units. In addition to his clinical teaching, he teaches the psychiatric interview to psychiatry residents and serves as the Associate Director of Medical Student Education at the University of Colorado. His teaching efforts were the foundation for his clinical textbooks, The Pocket Guide to the DSM-5 Diagnostic Exam, the DSM-5 Pocket Guide for Child and Adolescent and Mental Health, and the forthcoming DSM-5 Pocket Guide for Elder Mental Health. His research interests include the care of persons with schizophrenia, medical education, and the history of psychiatry. With the support of a grant from the University of Chicago’s Program on Medicine and Religion, he recently published a memoir, The Finest Traditions of My Calling: One Physician’s Search for the Renewal of Medicine. Dr. Nussbaum grew up in Colorado, received his bachelor’s degree (religion and English literature) from Swarthmore College, his medical degree from the University of North Carolina, and his master’s degree (theology and medicine) from Duke Divinity School. He completed his psychiatry residency at the University of North Carolina. He lives in Denver with his wife and three children. www.abrahamnussbaum.com
CEdO, Denver Health
(Christian) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Abraham M. Nussbaum, MD, MTS is the Chief Education Officer at Denver Health and an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. As CEO, he supervises and provides strategic vision for the more than 2,000 learners in 40 health professions who annually rotate at Denver Health. As a clinician, Dr. Nussbaum sees patients and supervises trainees on the adult inpatient psychiatric units. In addition to his clinical teaching, he teaches the psychiatric interview to psychiatry residents and serves as the Associate Director of Medical Student Education at the University of Colorado. His teaching efforts were the foundation for his clinical textbooks, The Pocket Guide to the DSM-5 Diagnostic Exam, the DSM-5 Pocket Guide for Child and Adolescent and Mental Health, and the forthcoming DSM-5 Pocket Guide for Elder Mental Health. His research interests include the care of persons with schizophrenia, medical education, and the history of psychiatry. With the support of a grant from the University of Chicago’s Program on Medicine and Religion, he recently published a memoir, The Finest Traditions of My Calling: One Physician’s Search for the Renewal of Medicine. Dr. Nussbaum grew up in Colorado, received his bachelor’s degree (religion and English literature) from Swarthmore College, his medical degree from the University of North Carolina, and his master’s degree (theology and medicine) from Duke Divinity School. He completed his psychiatry residency at the University of North Carolina. He lives in Denver with his wife and three children. www.abrahamnussbaum.com
Abdulaziz Sachedina, PhD
IIIT Chair in Islamic Studies, George Mason University
(Muslim) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Abdulaziz Sachedina, Ph.D., is Professor and IIIT Chair in Islamic Studies at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. Dr. Sachedina, who has studied in India, Iraq, Iran, and Canada, obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto. He has been conducting research and writing in the field of Islamic Law, Ethics, and Theology (Sunni and Shiite) for more than two decades. In the last ten years he has concentrated on social and political ethics, including Interfaith and Intrafaith Relations, Islamic Biomedical Ethics and Islam and Human Rights. Dr. Sachedina’s publications include: Islamic Messianism (State University of New York, 1980); Human Rights and the Conflicts of Culture, co-authored (University of South Carolina, 1988) The Just Ruler in Shiite Islam (Oxford University Press, 1988); The Prolegomena to the Qur’an (Oxford University Press, 1998), The Islamic Roots of Democratic Pluralism (Oxford University Press, 2002), Islamic Biomedical Ethics: Theory and Application (Oxford University Press, February 2009), Islam and the Challenge of Human Rights (Oxford University Press, September 2009), in addition to numerous articles in academic journals. He is an American citizen born in Tanzania.
IIIT Chair in Islamic Studies, George Mason University
(Muslim) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Abdulaziz Sachedina, Ph.D., is Professor and IIIT Chair in Islamic Studies at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. Dr. Sachedina, who has studied in India, Iraq, Iran, and Canada, obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto. He has been conducting research and writing in the field of Islamic Law, Ethics, and Theology (Sunni and Shiite) for more than two decades. In the last ten years he has concentrated on social and political ethics, including Interfaith and Intrafaith Relations, Islamic Biomedical Ethics and Islam and Human Rights. Dr. Sachedina’s publications include: Islamic Messianism (State University of New York, 1980); Human Rights and the Conflicts of Culture, co-authored (University of South Carolina, 1988) The Just Ruler in Shiite Islam (Oxford University Press, 1988); The Prolegomena to the Qur’an (Oxford University Press, 1998), The Islamic Roots of Democratic Pluralism (Oxford University Press, 2002), Islamic Biomedical Ethics: Theory and Application (Oxford University Press, February 2009), Islam and the Challenge of Human Rights (Oxford University Press, September 2009), in addition to numerous articles in academic journals. He is an American citizen born in Tanzania.
Laurie Zoloth, PhD
Professor of Religious Studies, Medical Humanities and Bioethics, Northwestern University
(Jewish) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Professor Zoloth is a Charles McCormick Deering Professor of Teaching Excellence. She has been the president of both the American Academy of Religion and of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities. Her research is in the area of bioethics; religion and science; feminist ethics, post-modern Jewish philosophy and Jewish ethics, especially the work of Emmanuel Levinas and Hannah Arendt and justice theory. She was the founding director of the Brady Program in Ethics and Civic Life in Weinberg College, a program which explored the connection between academic philosophy and the duties of citizenship; and she was the founding director of the Center for Bioethics, Science, and Society at Feinberg School of Medicine which addressed issues in emerging bioscience. She is a member of the faculties in Reproductive Medicine, Jewish Studies and Systems and Synthentic Biology. In 2014 she was elected a Life Member at Clare Hall, University of Cambridge. She is the President of the Northwestern Faculty Senate.
From 1995 to 2003 she was Professor of Ethics and Director of the Program in Jewish Studies at San Francisco State University. In her capacity as a scholar of religious studies, she was founding member of the Society for Scriptural Reasoning and of the Society for Jewish Ethics, serving on the founding board and as Vice-President in 2002. In her capacity as a clinical bioethicist, she help to create the National Kaiser Permanente Bioethics committees, and work for a decade at the East Bay Children’s Hospital. She has been a member of the NASA National Advisory Council, the nation's highest civilian advisory board for NASA for which she received the NASA Public Service Medal, the NASA Planetary Protection Advisory Committee. She was the founding chair of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Bioethics Advisory Board and served in that capacity for 7 years. She was on the Executive Committee of the International Society for Stem Cell Research as well as being on its founding Board. She has has served on numerous NIH committees, including the International DSMB for AIDs research, study and review committees, and a DSMB for Minority Research and has testified for NAS committees on stem cell research; mitochondrial research and synthentic biology. She has been an elected Fellow of the Hastings Center since 2002. She currently serves on the National Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC); on the NASA Flight IACUC and on the Harvard ESCRO for Stem Cell Research.
Professor of Religious Studies, Medical Humanities and Bioethics, Northwestern University
(Jewish) Plenary Speaker for Interreligious Panel
Professor Zoloth is a Charles McCormick Deering Professor of Teaching Excellence. She has been the president of both the American Academy of Religion and of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities. Her research is in the area of bioethics; religion and science; feminist ethics, post-modern Jewish philosophy and Jewish ethics, especially the work of Emmanuel Levinas and Hannah Arendt and justice theory. She was the founding director of the Brady Program in Ethics and Civic Life in Weinberg College, a program which explored the connection between academic philosophy and the duties of citizenship; and she was the founding director of the Center for Bioethics, Science, and Society at Feinberg School of Medicine which addressed issues in emerging bioscience. She is a member of the faculties in Reproductive Medicine, Jewish Studies and Systems and Synthentic Biology. In 2014 she was elected a Life Member at Clare Hall, University of Cambridge. She is the President of the Northwestern Faculty Senate.
From 1995 to 2003 she was Professor of Ethics and Director of the Program in Jewish Studies at San Francisco State University. In her capacity as a scholar of religious studies, she was founding member of the Society for Scriptural Reasoning and of the Society for Jewish Ethics, serving on the founding board and as Vice-President in 2002. In her capacity as a clinical bioethicist, she help to create the National Kaiser Permanente Bioethics committees, and work for a decade at the East Bay Children’s Hospital. She has been a member of the NASA National Advisory Council, the nation's highest civilian advisory board for NASA for which she received the NASA Public Service Medal, the NASA Planetary Protection Advisory Committee. She was the founding chair of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Bioethics Advisory Board and served in that capacity for 7 years. She was on the Executive Committee of the International Society for Stem Cell Research as well as being on its founding Board. She has has served on numerous NIH committees, including the International DSMB for AIDs research, study and review committees, and a DSMB for Minority Research and has testified for NAS committees on stem cell research; mitochondrial research and synthentic biology. She has been an elected Fellow of the Hastings Center since 2002. She currently serves on the National Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC); on the NASA Flight IACUC and on the Harvard ESCRO for Stem Cell Research.
