2020 Theology and Ethics Colloquium, "Ethics Beyond the Bedside"

March 11-13, 2020
Chase Park Plaza Royal Sonesta Hotel
St. Louis

The program begins at 1 p.m. on the 15th and adjourns at 11 am. on the 17th. An official agenda is forthcoming.

Diana Currie, MD is an obstetrics/gynecology specialist and a faculty member in the Providence St. Peter Family Medicine Residency Department in Olympia, Wash., where she helps train trans-competent primary care providers by integrating transgender medicine into the curriculum. She is also adjunct clinical faculty in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

Dr. Currie provides medical expertise in cross-sex hormone management for adults as well as puberty blockers and safe hormone management for youth. She founded The Lilly Clinic, a specialty clinic where she sees transgender patients with residents and medical students.

Dr. Currie earned her doctorate in medicine from Harvard Medical School, where she received an Albert Schweitzer Fellowship in pediatric and adolescent gynecology. Her longstanding interest in hormones began with her work in the endocrinology of puberty and encompasses reproductive and menopausal hormone management. With a background in hormones and pelvic reconstructive surgery, she began treating gender non-conforming and transgender patients in 2000 while working in Los Angeles.

Dr. Sharon Dunski Vermont is a general pediatrician at Mercy Hospital in St. Louis and a physician at the Washington University Transgender Center at St. Louis Children's Hospital. She is also the medical advisor for TransParent.

Dr. Dunski Vermont is a writer, mother of a transgender son, and transgender ally/advocate who frequently speaks to educators, medical professionals and families to educate them about transgender issues. Her goal is to change hearts and minds so that all people can be accepted for who they are.

Melissa Gaule is director of ethics and care management at Coastal Care Partners, a community-based organization dedicated to helping people age in place. Previously, she was a clinical ethicist at St. Joseph's/ Candler Hospital and the Nancy N. and J.C. Lewis Cancer & Research Pavilion in Savannah.

She has a master's degree in bioethics and society from King’s College London and has been certified by the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities as a health care ethics consultant. While living in London, she worked as a private bioethics consultant, providing advice to entities developing new biotechnologies and health services with respect to responsible science. Her research explores the concept of solidarity as a morally actionable principle in the context of health and social care.

Becket Gremmels, Ph.D., is system director of ethics for CHRISTUS Health based in Irving, Texas.  Prior to joining CHRISTUS in 2015, he was executive director of ethics for Saint Thomas Health in Nashville, Tenn., and Saint Vincent's Health Services in Birmingham, Ala.

He earned a Ph.D. in bioethics from the Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University.  He wrote his dissertation on the moral limits of gene therapy. 

Nathaniel Blanton Hibner, Ph.D. (c), is director of ethics for the Catholic Health Association of the United States. In this role, he provides research and suggested implementation of the church's moral tradition for CHA member organizations in areas of clinical and organizational ethics. Together with CHA's senior director of theology and ethics, Nathaniel creates educational and formational programming on moral theology and its relationship to current topics for the Catholic health ministry.

Prior to joining CHA in 2017, he attended the Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University, where he researched organizational ethics, bioethics and Catholic health care ethics. He also taught an undergraduate course on Foundations in Health Care Ethics. He is currently finishing his dissertation for the joint Ph.D. in health care ethics and moral theology at Saint Louis University. He earned a bachelor's degree in political science and theology and a master's degree in theological studies from Boston College. He also has a master's degree in health care ethics from Saint Louis University.

Dave Johnson is chief executive officer and founder of 4sight Health in Chicago. He launched 4sight Health in 2014 to advance market-based reform after a 25-year investment banking career in health care markets. The company operates at the intersection of health care economics, strategy and capital formation.

Mr. Johnson's expertise includes health policy, economics, statistics, behavioral finance, disruptive innovation, organizational change and complexity theory. He is the author of the recently-published Market vs. Medicine: America's Epic Fight for Better, Affordable Healthcare, and the weekly Market Corner Commentaries, distributed to a large and diverse readership. He is also author-in-residence at the Health Management Academy, the nation's leading convener of integrated health companies, and MATTER, the nation's largest health care incubator. McGraw Hill will publish his second book in the summer of 2019. He is an inaugural member of Harvard's Health Policy Leadership Council and collaborates with Cain Brothers, a pre-eminent health care investment bank.

Mr. Johnson earned a bachelor's degree in English Literature from Colgate University and a master's degree in public policy from Harvard University. He was a Peace Corps Volunteer in language arts in Liberia, West Africa, where he taught grammar, literature and math, coached a championship soccer team and survived a coup d'état.

Luke Timothy Johnson, Ph.D., is the Robert W. Woodruff Professor Emeritus of New Testament and Christian Origins at Candler School of Theology, Emory University. His research concerns the literary, moral and religious dimensions of the New Testament, including the Jewish and Greco-Roman contexts of early Christianity, Luke-Acts, the Pastoral Letters, and the Letter of James. 

A noted scholar and prolific author, Professor Johnson has written more than 30 books and more than 300 scholarly and popular articles, lectures, and reviews. His 1986 book, The Writings of the New Testament: An Interpretation, now in its third edition, is used as a textbook in seminaries and colleges around the world. He won the prestigious 2011 Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion for Among the Gentiles: Greco-Roman Religion and Christianity (2009), and first place in the Scripture category of the Catholic Press Association's 2012 book awards for Prophetic Jesus, Prophetic Church: The Challenge of Luke-Acts to Contemporary Christians (2011). A former Benedictine monk, Dr. Johnson is a highly sought lecturer, the recipient of numerous fellowships and awards, and a member of several editorial and advisory boards. 

He earned a bachelor's degree from Notre Dame Seminary, a master's degree from Indiana University, a master's degree in divinity from Saint Meinrad School of Theology, and a Ph.D. from Yale University.

Mark Repenshek, Ph.D., is executive director of ethics and mission for Hospital Sisters Health System (HSHS) – Eastern and Western Wisconsin Divisions. HSHS is a 15-hospital system operating in Wisconsin and Illinois. In addition, HSHS has partnerships with Door County Medical Center, Prevea Health (a multispecialty physician group/clinics), and Prevea360 Health Plan.

Prior to 2018, Mark served as the healthcare ethicist at Columbia St. Mary’s Health System and as director and senior director of ethics integration and education at Ascension for 18 years.

In addition to his current role, Mark serves as adjunct faculty at Loyola University Chicago — Stritch School of Medicine Neiswanger Institute for Bioethics. He has published articles in a variety of journals, including The Hastings Center Report, The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, Nursing Ethics, American Journal of Bioethics, HEC Forum, Health Progress and Health Care Ethics USA. He co-authored a book in its second edition titled, An Introduction to Healthcare Ethics: Theological Foundations, Contemporary Issues, and Controversial Cases, through Anselm Academic.

He earned a Ph.D. in health care ethics at the Center for Health Care Ethics at Saint Louis University in 2005 and a master’s degree in theological studies at St. Francis Seminary in Milwaukee in 1998. He has a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the University of Wisconsin.

Paul Scherz, Ph.D., Ph.D., is associate professor of moral theology and ethics at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. His research interests draw on his dual training in theology and molecular biology to examine the interrelationship among ethics, religion, science, technology, and medicine.

He received a Ph.D. in genetics from Harvard University and a Helen Hay Whitney Postdoctoral Fellowship to work at the University of California, San Francisco. After becoming interested in the ethical issues arising from his scientific research, he earned a Ph.D. in moral theology from the University of Notre Dame. He is a Visiting Faculty Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia, a Fellow at the Institute for Human Ecology at The Catholic University of America, and co-chair of the joint program in Catholic Clinical Ethics with Georgetown University's Pellegrino Center for Clinical Bioethics, The Catholic University of America and the Catholic Health Association of the United States. He has published widely on science, medicine, and theology, including in his forthcoming book, Science and Christian Ethics.

Lisa A. Smith is vice president, advocacy & public policy for The Catholic Health Association of the United States (CHA). She formerly served as senior director of government relations. Ms. Smith leads the organization's legislative advocacy efforts with Congress and the Administration and oversees the Association's membership advocacy activities. A Washington public policy analyst and lobbyist since 1991, Ms. Smith most recently served as director of health and welfare policy for Catholic Charities USA. She developed the organization's public policy agenda and served as the primary lobbyist on Medicaid and family welfare issues. She also served on the health and income security staff of the U.S. Senate Finance Committee under Senator Lloyd Bentsen. Ms. Smith holds a bachelor of science degree in economics from the University of Maryland and a master of public administration degree from The George Washington University in Washington D.C.

Paul Wadell, Ph.D., is professor of theology and religious studies at St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wisc. His research interests include the role of friendship in the Christian life, the importance of the virtues for personal and communal flourishing, and the theological and spiritual significance of calling or vocation.

He is the author of several books, including Friendship and the Moral Life; Becoming Friends: Worship, Justice and the Practice of Christian Friendship; and Happiness and the Christian Moral Life: An Introduction to Christian Ethics. He has published articles on Christian theology, ethics, and spirituality in both scholarly and popular journals and has given workshops and lectures both in the United States and abroad.

A native of Louisville, Kentucky, Dr. Wadell received his B.A. in English from Bellarmine University in Louisville, his M.Div. and M.A. degrees from Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, and his Ph.D. in Theology from the University of Notre Dame.