This presentation explores two distinct—and often opposing—approaches within public health: Population Health Management (PHM) and Health Through Community (HTC). Dr. Karl Johnson, Assistant Professor in the Department of Public Health Leadership and Practice at UNC Chapel Hill, will highlight key characteristics that differentiate these models and illustrate the contrast through practical examples. Drawing on the core values of public health and the unique challenges of our current historical moment, the presentation will make a case for shifting from PHM toward HTC. This episode aired on March 20, 2026.

What does beauty have to do with suffering? And what do both have to do with the practice of medicine? In this TMC seminar, theologian Dr. Natalie Carnes and family physician Dr. Brewer Eberly sit down for a rich conversation about beauty — one of the Christian names for God — and why beauty and suffering are so deeply intertwined in the Christian story. Together they explore what this togetherness means for how we love, attend, and care in medicine. This episode aired on February 20, 2026.

Providing care among the poor and marginalized has always required tenacity and perseverance. Failures, discouragement, and even despair are commonplace. In this seminar, Rick Donlon, MD and Susan Post, DMin, MBA explore the normal course of faithful and sacrificial Christian discipleship and the means of grace available for long-term faithfulness from their work with Christian Community Health Fellowship (CCHF), a national network of Christians and Christian health centers that serve those experiencing poverty in the U.S. This episode aired on February 6, 2026.

The nursing profession been shaped by Christian nurses while also having an influence on nurses. This seminar with Anne Biro, RN, PhD, President of Nurses Christian Fellowship International (NCFI), provides a brief overview of major influences on the development of the nursing profession. Impacts on nursing by Christian nurses past and present will be highlighted, including a discussion of ways that have helped Christian nurses in different parts of the world integrate a biblical worldview into their nursing work. This episode aired on October 24, 2025.

An in-depth interview with Dr. Harold Koenig, a world-leading scholar on the intersection of faith and health. Dr. Koenig reflects on his distinguished career in medicine, psychiatry, and geriatric care, sharing insights from decades of research on the relationship between spirituality and well-being. He and interviewer Dr. Warren Kinghorn discuss how Koenig's Christian faith has shaped his professional vocation, from clinical practice to global scholarship. With nearly 650 peer-reviewed publications, 66 books, and international recognition as the top-ranked researcher in spirituality and health, Dr. Koenig brings a rare combination of academic rigor, clinical expertise, and personal conviction to this important conversation. This episode aired on September 26, 2025.

Dr. Sunita Puri has seen firsthand how the spiritual dimensions of life and death shape how people think about what matters most—and what doesn't—as they face their mortality. Concepts of dignity, suffering, and mercy are largely absent from conversations with people who are seriously ill, yet they are the heartbeat of decisions about living and dying well. Drawing on her experiences as a palliative care physician and her writing about life and medicine in the eleventh hour, Dr. Puri, in conversation with Farr Curlin, invite us to consider how these ideas influence our lives and how they might shape one's wishes for life's end. This episode aired on November 14, 2025.

This seminar, which originally aired on April 4, 2025, explores common epistemological frameworks underpinning global health initiatives in the Global South. These frameworks raise ethical concerns, as they often sustain research, education, and medical delivery that generate conflicts with local realities shaped by distinct worldviews. Drawing from liberation theology, which emphasizes the preferential option for the poor and the liberation of marginalized communities from systemic oppression, the presentation highlights the need for an "epistemic liberation" built in a process from below. This involves challenging dominant Western paradigms and embracing locally rooted knowledge systems. The presentation raises the question of whether such an epistemic liberation is necessary for global health initiatives to truly promote health in a way that empowers and fosters the independence of local communities. Alexandre A. Martins is a Brazilian theologian and bioethicist, serving as an associate professor in the Department of Theology and the College of Nursing at Marquette University in Wisconsin. His research focuses on bioethics and global health from a liberating perspective, specializing in healthcare ethics and social ethics, particularly in public health, global health, community-based approaches, and Catholic social teaching. His scholarship spans diverse areas, with his most recent books including Christology and Global Ethics: Encountering the Poor in a Pluralist Reality (Paulist Press, 2023) and A Prophet to the People: Paul Farmer’s Witness and Theological Ethics (Pickwick Press, 2023), co-edited with Jannie W. Block and M. Therese Lysaught. He is currently working on the project, Bioethics from a New Lens: Foundations, Liberation, and Global Public Health, and serving as president of the Brazilian Society of Moral Theology.

"Faith-Based Safety Net Care and Advancing Health Equity" with Ngozi Ezike, MD by Duke Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative

In this TMC Seminar, live-streamed October 6, 2023 from TMC's annual conference Practice & Presence, Dr. Devah Stahl is interviewed by Dr. Warren Kinghorn, Co-Director of the Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative at Duke Divinity School. Devan Stahl is an Associate Professor of Bioethics and Religion at Baylor University and Adjunct Associate Professor in the Department of Education, Innovation, and Technology at the Baylor College of Medicine. She received her Ph.D. in Health Care Ethics from St. Louis University and her M.Div. from Vanderbilt University. She specializes in disability theology, bioethics, and the visual arts within medicine. Dr. Stahl also volunteers clinical ethicist consultant for the Supportive and Palliative Care Team at Baylor, Scott, and White Hillcrest and has trained as a hospital chaplain. She is the author of, Disability’s Challenge to Theology: Genes, Eugenics, and the Metaphysics of Modern Medicine (Notre Dame Press), which develops a Christian response to genetic technologies using the insights of disability scholars. Dr. Stahl also hosts the popular podcast Bioethics for the People, which explores the work of bioethicists for a general audience.

On the night of December 1, 1950, a 24-year-old Army veteran named Maltheus Avery died following a car accident, after having been turned away from Duke Hospital because of his race. Physician and TMC alumnus, Dr. Jeff Baker, discusses the podcast he co-hosted about the incident, and how he was struck by the prominence of Christian themes that arose in the project. Listeners can access the podcast at unhealed.duke.edu as well as on Apple and Spotify platforms. This episode aired on January 23, 2026.

In the profession of medicine and the current world where demands on our attention are many and constant. John Hardt, Vice Dean of Professional Formation and Associate Professor of Bioethics at Loyola University of Chicago, is the co-director of the Physician's Vocation Program. The program teaches on virtue, character, and calling in medicine, reflecting on religious themes in medicine through the practices of St. Ignatius. In this TMC seminar, Dr. Hardt discusses the program, which serves as a training ground for attending to God’s love for us and his presence in our lives. In so doing, it works to seed the practice of medicine with physicians who have a deep sense of purpose, a joyful spirit, and a commitment to the practice of medicine as an act of service, compassion, and healing.