Ph.D., Antioch University, 2025, Leadership and Change

This hermeneutic phenomenological study explores the leadership experiences of Black birth workers (BBWs), revealing critical insights into leadership dynamics within maternal healthcare. Through a theoretical framework integrating African feminism, Black feminism, and anti-racist feminism, the research examines how BBWs conceptualize and enact leadership through embodied, relational, and liberatory approaches. This study addresses a significant gap in leadership literature, particularly regarding generational knowledge and practices of BBWs, which remain understudied despite their vital role in Black maternal healthcare. This study reveals distinct leadership perspectives and methodologies through in-depth interviews with eight BBWs and a detailed interpretive analysis. The findings contribute to a more nuanced understanding of leadership in complex maternal healthcare settings and broaden conventional leadership models by centering the voices and practices of historically marginalized Black birth worker leaders (BBWLs). This dissertation is available in open access at (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD Center (https://etd.ohiolink.edu).

Ed.D., Antioch University, 2025, Education

My dissertation focuses on my thesis question: How might an NGO's grassroots efforts in urban Visakhapatnam, India, propagate living justly with animals we encounter and severely Othered humans, beyond attitudes of guardianship, mitigating universalized harms to nature and society? In a transdisciplinary approach examining grassroots programs, my phenomenological study breaks down an animal advocate's assertive practices of—inclusivity and decolonialized lived norms, which persistently transcend cultural antagonisms of caste, ability, gender, sex, class, and form/species—toward creating just pluriversal multispecies communities in Visakhapatnam. Universalized urbanization across the planet has driven irreversible socio-ecological transformation marked by record ecosystem decline. Sustaining the urban via historically patriarchal and colonialized human dominion over other animals and Earth's natural resources reveals our existential disconnect with nature, including our human nature. My analysis claims phenomenologically realized premises observing real actors materializing grassroots formations of interspecies coexistence—working through nexuses of the political, economic, cultural, and religious systems of harm—in efforts toward creating self-determined, just, multispecies communities in Visakhapatnam. This attempts to bridge this gap in scholarship from within the intensities of Visakhapatnam city in urban India. Undoing normative, essentially androcentric, harm that oppresses many and despoils nature is possible. How to wrest political power and demand change-making to address biodiversity loss, food and water insecurity, and unacceptable inequities for Othered humans and animals in urban geographies has been observed and analyzed. More communities and societies applying these phenomenological realizations can help build momentum, lending to many just worlds in one pluriversal world becoming the norm. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https:/ (open full item for complete abstract)

Ed.D., Antioch University, 2025, Education

This is a crucial time for a call to an awakened consciousness toward respectable, equitable, and expansive relationships and agency with the natural world. Indigenous philosophy and practices offer alternative visions for cultivating representations of language, narrative, and tradition that expand boundaries of modern Western thought and discourse. Key to many Indigenous traditions is fostering relationships of kin(ki), meaning kinship, within diverse ecological landscapes and place, while engaging respectfully with the non-human world. These alternative ways of consciousness and agency can be vital means of supporting healthy biodiversity and conservation, amid spiritual practices. In this dissertation, I propose and outline elements, or principles, rooted in Indigenous and ancient wisdom traditions that can help give shape, context, and praxis within the modern landscape of environmental education. I describe how current dualistic binaries and discourse can limit human awareness or participation within such alternative forms of kin(ki) kinship, relationality, and agency with the non-human world. Further, I explore alternative forms of narrative, teaching, and praxis around kin(ki) kinship, the non-human world, and land relationality that are specifically passed down to younger generations and the manner in which this may be done. In conclusion, I present a focal point of reflective observations from informal, immersive experiences integrating place-specific cultural-sacred practices of land and place, biodiversity, and conservation (the Monpa People, Bhutan). I demonstrate how these practices are passed down to future generations. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD Center (https://etd.ohiolink.edu).

Ed.D., Antioch University, 2025, Education

This dissertation examines the roles, challenges, and contributions of a Black Gay father, a demographic largely absent from academic discourse. While literature explores themes of the church, LGBTQ+ identities, and social justice, there remains a critical gap addressing the lived experiences of a Black Gay father. This study fills that void by elevating narratives as community activists, family leaders, and clergy members, acknowledging their transformative impact within familial and societal structures. The methodology used is the Scholarly Personal Narrative (SPN). It allows for in-depth, reflective engagement with personal experiences in conversation with scholars while situating them within broader sociocultural, theological, and justice discourses. SPN is particularly suited for this research as it foregrounds lived experience, making visible perspectives often excluded from traditional methodologies. This study is grounded in social justice leadership, liberation theology, transformative learning theory, and lived experience scholarship. It offers a critical framework for analyzing how Black Gay fathers navigate identity, faith, and leadership while advocating for justice. This narrative reveals that Black Gay fathers are essential architects of justice-oriented leadership. Through thematic reflection and critical incident analysis, their experiences challenge traditional notions of fatherhood, faith, and activism, demonstrating resilience and the ability to forge inclusive spaces for future generations. The study further underscores the systemic erasure of Black Gay fathers in academia, religious institutions, and policy, highlighting the need for intentional recognition and reform. The implications of this research extend beyond individual experience; it calls for deeper academic inquiry, institutional accountability, and greater visibility, particularly within theological seminaries and culturally responsive education programs. It serves as a foundation fo (open full item for complete abstract)

Ed.D., Antioch University, 2025, Education

This mixed-methods study explores the concept of Pedagogical Instinct (PI) in Waldorf education by examining its relationship to the teacher's sense of self-efficacy and professional development. Connected to Rudolf Steiner's educational philosophy, PI refers to the intuitive and adaptive capacity of teachers to respond to students' individual needs, integrating technical skills, relational awareness, and ego development. Quantitative data from 168 survey respondents were analyzed to assess relationships between self-efficacy, PI, teacher training, and demographic variables. Qualitative data from 65 respondents to 9 open-ended questions provided insights into the lived experiences of Waldorf teachers in relation to PI. Findings revealed a strong correlation between PI and self-efficacy, with higher levels of both associated with completion of Waldorf teacher training and longer teaching experience. However, it was not possible to fully discriminate between effects of training versus length of experience. Three key components of PI emerged: (1) mastery of technical skills, including pedagogy and curriculum; (2) relational awareness, enabling responsiveness to students; and (3) ego development, fostering equanimity and presence. The study highlights gaps in current Waldorf teacher training programs, particularly in preparing educators for classroom management, differentiation, and parent engagement. While Waldorf training emphasizes personal growth and anthroposophical study, practical skills and real-world application require greater emphasis. The findings support integrating experiential learning, mentorship, and professional development tailored to individual teacher needs. Transformational learning theory and ego development principles provide a framework for fostering PI through reflective practices and sustained support. Professional development structures that prioritize collaboration, mentoring, and inner work can further enhance teacher growth. This study (open full item for complete abstract)

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2025, Leadership and Change

The transformation to the curriculum taught in chaplain training in Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) will now address the spiritual needs of a more diverse, nonreligious, and interfaith population in the United States. Historically rooted in religious frameworks, CPE curricula are evolving to incorporate non-religious spiritual care interventions and promote research literacy among chaplains. This dissertation study uses descriptive analysis to present a study surveying CPE educators across over 300 U.S. based CPE centers to explore teaching practices and adaptation strategies. Findings reveal that integrating evidence-based methods and interdisciplinary collaboration is key to addressing inclusivity and professional competency in chaplaincy. By examining quantitative and qualitative data, this research emphasizes the need for adaptive and inclusive approaches to meet modern spiritual care demands. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD Center (https://etd.ohiolink.edu).

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2025, Media and Communication

The thesis interrogates socio-religio-political marginalization by analyzing the hijab ban imposed by Udupi Pre-University College authorities in Udupi, Karnataka, India. The Karnataka State High Court upheld the ban, ruling that the hijab was not an essential religious practice under Indian constitutional law. This ruling, along with Indian Supreme Court's later split verdict, fueled national and international debates on secularism, religious freedom, and women's rights. As the first study to extend Co-Cultural Theory to Indian contexts, the thesis investigates how judicial rulings, activist responses, media framings, and school-level implementation of the ban reinforce exclusionary narratives. Interviews with schoolteachers, analyzed through a methodological approach using Critical Discourse Analysis, highlight the ban's chilling effect on student agency, forcing self-censorship, alienation, or withdrawal from education. Analysis of Indian teachers' perspectives reveals negotiations of assimilation (removing the hijab), accommodation (institutional negotiations), and resistance (legal action, protests) as strategies adopted by affected individuals. Findings reveal the Karnataka hijab ban is a mechanism of institutionalized Islamophobia and gendered exclusion, where state policies, legal rulings, media narratives, and educational institutions converge to regulate Muslim women's visibility and autonomy. Analysis of Karnataka State High Court and Indian Supreme Court rulings reveals that secularism is strategically reinterpreted to justify religious restrictions, redefining minority identity as incompatible with national values. Analysis of activist responses, including petitions and open letters, exposes how legal contestations and feminist resistance challenge state-imposed exclusions. Media discourse analysis identifies dominant framings that construct hijabi women as either oppressed victims needing rescue or security threats, reinforcing Islamophobic stereotyp (open full item for complete abstract)

Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, 2025, German/History (dual)

Martin Luther has taken on different forms as he has been appropriated by his followers and political powers differently over time. The Reformation Day Celebrations starting in 1617, with the most recent occurring in 2017, illustrate how the political powers wished to portray Luther at that specific time and demonstrate that time's values and priorities. This study analyzes three common themes throughout the Reformation Day celebrations and how they have varied. The three themes trace the image of Luther as a divisive theological pathfinder, as the archetypal German, and as an example of modernity. The thesis contrasts these understandings with Friedrich Nietzsche's interpretation of Luther's legacy during a pivotal point in German history. While Nietzsche initially seems to follow the common understanding of Luther as a pathfinder and archetypal German, he becomes highly critical of Luther and the narratives surrounding him in his later writings. The view of Luther as a divisive theological pathfinder, as the unifying German, and as a modern man is reversed in different ways again during the 2017 Reformation Day celebration in response to the political misappropriation of Luther in the 1917 centennial and its disastrous echoes in Nazi Germany.

Master of Fine Arts (MFA), Bowling Green State University, 2025, Creative Writing/Poetry

Cornhusk Doll with Face is a poetry collection that explores themes of landscape, womanhood, and remembering the dead. Though its subject matter varies, the collection's focus on evocative imagery and fable-like narrative remains consistent. Each poem seeks to find greater human truths in places you would least expect to see them: barns, highways, trees, or windows. The heart of this project is the intersection between humanity and the natural world, with fear being the most investigated common denominator. Every order of life on Earth will experience some form of fear. It has the power to protect or paralyze. This body of work attempts to navigate an artist's wrestling with metaphors and manifestations of fear while not letting the beauty surrounding it go unnoticed.

Doctor of Ministry , Ashland University, 2025, Doctor of Ministry Program

The purpose of this project was to impact the ability of select pastoral caregivers from Barker Road Methodist Church, Singapore, to recognize and respond to spiritual warfare attacks through an eight-session course on spiritual warfare. The design of the project included the administration of pre-test and post-test questionnaires, along with the completion of daily spiritual exercises. The results of the course revealed that participants improved their understanding about biblical teachings regarding spiritual warfare, that the healing of inner wounds is necessary to setting people free from emotional and spiritual distress, and had increased confidence in dealing with demonic attacks.

Psy. D., Antioch University, 2025, Antioch Seattle: Clinical Psychology

This dissertation presents a comprehensive analysis of the current research on scrupulosity, a subtype of obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) characterized by intrusive thoughts and compulsive behaviors related to religious and moral concerns. The dissertation identifies key similarities and differences from OCD, and directs focus to thematically related yet unsubstantiated theoretical work in psychology that helps elucidate the core features and etiological factors of scrupulosity as differentiated from other OCD subtypes. The study addresses the critical dearth of research on scrupulosity, aiming to fill significant gaps in the literature regarding its historical context, varied presentation and prevalence in different cultural contexts, and potentially effective treatment approaches to address better the needs of a significant number of people worldwide. Beginning with an exploration of historical conceptualizations from the 2nd through the early 21st centuries, the dissertation traces the recognition of scrupulosity and recommendations for treatment across various cultural traditions and major world religions including Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Christianity, from both Protestant and Catholic sources, as well as non-religious belief systems. It highlights notable historical figures who exhibited scrupulous behaviors contextualizing them with a modern psychological lens. As the leading theologians of their faiths, they often ironically v advised its treatment from their own experience as the most influential theologians of each of their faiths. These historical writings still have wisdom to impart today. The history of scrupulosity is, in many ways, a history of religion across time and culture, as well as of the birth and first 150 years of psychology itself. Key schools of psychological thought are explored for relevance to developing contemporary evidence-based treatments. Due to few qualitative or quantitative studies on scrupulosity compared t (open full item for complete abstract)

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2024, Leadership and Change

The dissertation examined African American women with chieftaincy titles in Yoruba culture and how they exercised their leadership in both Yorubaland and America. It explored their leadership, authority, and training. The presence of African American women with chieftaincy titles is increasing in the American landscape. The methodology was qualitative using narrative inquiry and portraiture from Sarah Lawrence-Lightfoot and Jessica Hoffman Davis (1997) with five African American women. My research included observations in Nigerian, pre-Osun festival, the Osun festival, and post-Osun festival. Observations also included three women Nigerian Chiefs. The research questions answered their qualifications to lead, their sense of knowing as leaders, and their commitment to the Yoruba people and tradition. This study identified the historical and cultural patterns necessary to understand, adapt, and implement training for future women leaders in the Isese/Ifa/Orisa tradition in America and for those learning Yoruba culture and customs in their chieftaincies. The data findings are contextualized in the narratives to provide an overall portrait of African American women leaders in the Yoruba culture and Isese/Ifa/Orisa tradition in the United States, primary community of Atlanta, Georgia. African American women lead from their sense of and proven skill strength either academically or vocationally. African American Chiefs do not need permission in the healing of their community. From the findings, this study proposed the theory of Motherism, which can be the basis for shared dialogue and understanding across the board for various affinity groups in the diaspora and Yorubaland. African American women do not have to disregard the historical v leadership work of African American women who have been trail blazers to be Yoruba women leaders in America. African American women continue the struggle for voice and equality despite the culture or religious norms o (open full item for complete abstract)

Ed.D., Antioch University, 2024, Education

This dissertation engages the spiritually-inspired methodology of organic inquiry to investigate how teachers practice self-healing in order to become available to students. Self-healing is a vital part of freeing up the teacher's perceptive capacities to more deeply and fully attend to the needs of students. Self-healing work includes a variety of practices and modalities, including spiritual ones, in order to work through trauma, adversity, dis-ease, stress, and one-sidedness. Research shows that self-healing, especially in regards to mindfulness and meditation, equips teachers to confront compassion fatigue, secondary trauma, burnout, illness, and more. There is also ample evidence that training one's attention to see as fully as possible, rather than seeing through narrow or biased lenses, plays an important role in learning and in health and healthy relationships. This research is situated within the emergent biopsychosocial-spiritual framework of health, which recognizes the interconnectedness of body, soul, and spirit in human beings, and within the salutogenic paradigm. This study's contribution to the field begins with stories gathered from teacher's lived experiences through open-ended questionnaires and interviews. In addition, it proposes new axiological considerations for teacher training, credentialing, and professional development that are sourced in expanded models of health and balance, both at the collective and individual levels. Finally, it offers original practices for experimenting with self-healing. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD Center (https://etd.ohiolink.edu).

Doctor of Psychology (Psy.D.), Xavier University, 2025, Psychology

LGB+ individuals may tolerate prejudice from religious/spiritual (R/S) institutions in hopes of deriving some potential benefits or comfort from these institutions. When LGB+ individuals encounter sexual prejudice in R/S settings, they may experience difficulty developing and maintaining a healthy sexual and R/S identity. Additionally, if LGB+ individuals internalize the negative messages about their sexual identity from R/S sources, they may experience significant discord and distress further challenging their ability to develop a healthy sexual and R/S identity. Consequently, the purpose of the current study was to examine if unsupportive R/S experiences predict greater identity self-discrepancies (i.e., actual-ideal and actual-ought) among LGB+ individuals who have heightened internalized homonegativity. Two hundred LGB+ individuals ages 18–76 completed measures to assess the conflict or comfort they derive from R/S sources, the discrepancies between their actual, ideal, and ought sexual and R/S identities, and their levels of internalized homonegativity. Results revealed that the more LGB+ individuals experienced religion/spirituality as a source of conflict, the greater their actual-ideal self-discrepancy. Additionally, the more LGB+ individuals experienced religion/spirituality as a source of comfort, the smaller their actual-ideal and actual-ought self-discrepancies—with these associations particularly strong when LGB+ individuals internalized negative messages about their sexual identity. Thus, especially for LGB+ individuals who have internalized negative messages about their sexual identity, experiencing religion/spirituality as a source of comfort may help reduce identity challenges (and work toward identity integration).

Master of Arts (M.A.), University of Dayton, 2024, English

This paper brings together Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway (1925), Graham Greene's The End of the Affair (1951), and Muriel Spark's The Driver's Seat (1970) to explore the landscape of secular modernity and femininity in twentieth-century Britain, ultimately illuminating the ways that modernity is haunted by persistent presence. Robert Orsi writes in his 2016 book History and Presence that modernity is characterized by a spiritual absence (a vacuum in which spiritual presence, God or otherwise, cannot be accessed), leaving the modern subject isolated and alienated. Three female characters in these novels — Miss Kilman, Sarah Miles, and Lise — experience this absence in various ways. Through Miss Kilman's story, Woolf's novel illustrates how absence is institutionally enforced in public society. Despite Woolf's identity as a secular author, Mrs. Dalloway demonstrates surprisingly spiritual themes. Catholic convert Greene later uses Sarah Miles' controversial journey towards faith and eventual sainthood to attempt to enforce presence. However, the varied critical reception of The End of the Affair revealed that its secular, modern readership was yet ready to accept such a blatant account of presence active in public. By the time Muriel Spark pens her biting and satirical novella in 1970, presence has disappeared entirely; Lise can only articulate that she is seeking “the lack of an absence.” I argue that The Driver's Seat becomes an experiment in what a world devoid of presence would look like; when society has so structurally and institutionally limited the modern subject's access to presence, she can only seek to escape absence, which underscores how women's “liberation” actually manifests itself in a secular world. This paper concludes with an examination of the modern novel as a sacred space within which readers can encounter presence.

Undergraduate Honors Program, Malone University, 2025, Honors Thesis

This study aims to gain a better understanding of the experiences of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) Christians and their experiences within Protestant evangelical contexts. Throughout nine interviews, this study gained insight into the process by which participants formed their identity, supportive and unsupportive experiences within family systems and faith communities, and explored implications for both faith communities and relationships. This study notes the importance of policy transparency, creating inclusive spaces, using inclusive language, and advocating for LGB communities in a public manner—however that looks in one's specific faith context. This research highlights specific ways in which readers can support LGB people when they disclose their identity to individuals in their lives. Finally, for individuals and faith communities looking to create more hospitable spaces for LGB individuals, the results of this study point towards maintaining a posture of humility and open-mindedness as LGB individuals share their stories and their experiences within faith communities.

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2024, Leadership and Change

In higher education, the focus on student success often takes center stage in research and the professor-as-teacher practice. While numerous empirical studies concentrate on the growth and development of undergraduate students, this dissertation delves into professors' relational and felt experiences in positive teaching-learning relationships. Four terminal-degreed professors from four different schools and three different disciplines–education, humanities, and leadership–engaged in photography and were then interviewed. Participants reflected on their photographs and their experiences in a teaching-learning relationship with their students. The present study aimed to illuminate the unspoken language of connection by utilizing interpretive phenomenology and photovoice to uncover professors' relational and felt experiences and how these moments energize and rejuvenate them. Research revealed two overarching themes: generativity and seeing students' humanity; and five group experiential themes: foundational influences, relational proximity, intentional presence, assessment as a learning conversation, and feeling aligned. The theoretical foundation of this dissertation weaved together a diverse array of theories and concepts, including relational cultural theory (RCT), somatics, and embodiment. The insight from the literature combined with the findings from this study offer understanding in how professor-student relationships in higher education can be places of mutual empowerment, empathy, and mattering. By grounding the research framework in human interaction's relational and fluid, alive, and pulsating bodies, this dissertation contributes to a more humanized and inclusive understanding of the intricate relationships that shape higher education. This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD Center (https://etd.ohiolink.edu).

Ph.D., Antioch University, 2024, Leadership and Change

In today's mainline Protestant churches, young women clergy navigate a precarious leadership space. While women's ordination is well-established in American Protestantism (Burnett, 2017), Gen-X/Millennial clergy women find themselves at the crosshairs of conflicting gender narratives and unsustainable expectations of what it means to be both a woman and an ordained pastoral leader. Through the use of feminist constructivist grounded theory methodology, this study explored the lived experiences of Gen-X/Millennial clergy women who have left active ministry or a specific pastoral position due to concerns over their own interpersonal boundaries and psychological safety. Through dimensional analysis of in-depth interviews with 20 clergy women representing eight mainline Protestant denominations, this study identified the co-core dimensions of experiencing feminized servanthood as dehumanizing and experiencing feminized servanthood as abusive. The social processes within these co-core dimensions severely compromised the clergy women's physical and psychological safety and informed their decisions to leave their respective ministry contexts. Extending from these co-core dimensions were five primary dimensions: 1) developing a sense of call; 2) differentiating self from system; 3) exposing vs. protecting toxic leaders and harmful systems; 4) nail in the coffin; and 5) reconstituting self. As a result of these findings, this study presents five theoretical propositions that address 1) the shadow side of servant leadership in the context of feminized servanthood; 2) reclaiming Gen-X/Millennial women's leadership strengths; 3) perceptions of self-differentiated women leaders as a “dissident daughter” and an “emasculating disruptor”; 4) gendered scapegoating and the disappearance of Gen-X/Millennial clergy women; and 5) reconstituting self beyond “reckoning” and “resilience.” This dissertation is available in open access at AURA (https://aura.antioch.edu) and OhioLINK ETD cent (open full item for complete abstract)

Doctor of Philosophy, Miami University, 2024, Educational Leadership

The experiences of Black women staff were at the forefront of this study as a way to create space for Black women by a Black woman. The experiences of staff and more specifically staff a color are often an afterthought (Cho & Brassfield, 2022) which has created some cultures of toxicity (Steele, 2018) and expected niceness (Liera, 2020). Black women in entry to mid-level positions are often in more service-focused roles which comes with institutional expectations for emotional labor that is not compensated (Scott, 2017). The purpose of this qualitative study was to center the experiences of Black women staff in entry to mid-level unclassified (salaried) positions located in Ohio. As a population that has and continues to be oppressed and marginalized, this study centered thematic narratives with a transformative worldview (Creswell & Creswell, 2018). Analysis was conducted through a Quilted Analysis (Anandarajan & Hill, 2019) by the different layers of the quilt correlating with the problem and interwoven experiences (backing), the individual quilt squares (batting), and the visualization and story of the findings (top). A total of 16 semi-structured virtual interviews were conducted to understand the experiences of Black women staff, specifically what their experiences have been while working at a predominantly white institution in Ohio, what healing and coping has looked like for them, and how they conceptualize strength. The backing of the quilt had six identified themes, (death & loss, boundaries, loneliness, coping, healing, and strength). Through thematic narratives, themes for each of the participants were identified and shared. Guided by Strong Black Womanhood (Donovan & West, 2016; Scott, 2017) (SBW), the centering of the experiences of participants along with their conceptualizations of strength allowed for space (Gunn, 2022) for naming. Through this theoretical application of Womanism (Walker, 1983), the literature, methodology, analysis, and f (open full item for complete abstract)

PHD, Kent State University, 2024, College of Education, Health and Human Services / School of Foundations, Leadership and Administration

Since the inception of Christianity, Christians have struggled to know how to interact with surrounding cultures, what aspects of life to pass on to the next generation, and how to disciple the next generation in faith in Christ. This project is an ontological investigation into Christ-centered education, making the case to move beyond the pre-critical, and critical to embrace an affirmative post-critical pedagogy. Having been grounded in the faith and grace of the evangel (Chapter I) and approaching epistemology with Christian humility (Chapter II), the Christ-centered educator embodies both critical pedagogy and affirmative pedagogy (Chapter III), based on six biblical principles that undergird Christ-centered education: 1. worship, 2. wisdom, 3. love, 4. faithfulness to the Bible, 5. in community fellowship, as 6. responsible stewards (Chapter IV). Christ-centered educators should be affirmed in these principles by their community (of other Christ-centered educators, administration, and by local Christ-centered churches and families) as they are called to live out the evangel in their classrooms and churches, flourishing as disciples of Jesus and as teachers (Chapter V). This is the ontological embodiment of Christ-centered pedagogy expressed in an affirmative, post-critical pedagogy.