Ki Joo “KC” Choi

KC Choi’s research and teaching interests include Protestant and Catholic ethics/moral theology, the thought of Jonathan Edwards, art theory and theological aesthetics, peace studies, critical race and ethnic studies, nonprofit ethics, and Asian American theology. His publications include the monograph Disciplined by Race: Theological Ethics and the Problem of Asian American Identity, the first sustained account of the radicalized contours of Asian American life by a theologian, published in 2019. He is also the author of Art and Moral Change (forthcoming), which challenges prevailing approaches to the relationship between aesthetics and ethics. He is coeditor of the volume Reimagining the Moral Life: On Lisa Sowle Cahill’s Contributions to Christian Ethics and is currently working on an Asian American political theology of freedom and nonviolence.

Choi is an active member of the Society of Christian Ethics, having served on the Board of Directors and as co-convener of the Asian/Asian American Working Group. He currently serves as coeditor of the Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics. He also served on the grants jury for the American Academy of Religion. His previous academic positions include serving as professor of theological ethics and chair of the Department of Religion at Seton Hall University. He has extensive experience with Middle States accreditation (mission and assessment), undergraduate core curriculum administration, interdisciplinary degree development, and academic policy governance. Choi received his B.A. and M.Div. from Yale and Ph.D. in theological ethics from Boston College.

Select Publications

• Art and Moral Change: A Reexamination (Georgetown University Press, forthcoming Spring 2024)
• “‘Neither Here nor There’ as Prophetic Witness: On Asian American Politics between Empires,” bookchapter in Transpacific Political Theology: Perspectives, Paradigms, Proposals, ed. Kwok Pui Lan (Baylor University Press, forthcoming Spring 2024)
• Ki Joo Choi, "Diversity or Option for the Poor?: Confronting the Contradictions Between our DEI Commitments and Enrollment Practices," Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics 43, no. 1 (Spring/Summer 2023): 1-9.
• “Asian American Christianity,” in Handbook of Contemporary Christianity in the U.S.: Historical, Cultural, Theological, and Ethical Explorations, Volume One, ed. Mark A. Lamport, 293-305 (Rowman & Littlefield, 2022).
• ‘“Interrupting the Violence of Racial Identities: Lessons from Asian American Experience, the Parable of the Good Samaritan, and the Principle of Truth Force,” Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics 42, no.1 (Spring/Summer 2022): 189-206.
• “Natural Law, Moral Reasoning, and Common Morality: Toward a Liberationist Paradigm,” in Reimagining the Moral Life: On Lisa Sowle Cahill’s Contributions to Christian Ethics, ed. Ki Joo Choi, Sarah Moses, and Andrea Vicini, S.J., 3-16 (Orbis, 2020).
• Reimagining the Moral Life: On Lisa Sowle Cahill’s Contributions to Christian Ethics, ed. with Sarah Moses and Andrea Vicini, S.J. (Orbis, 2020)
• “Beyond Codes: Values, Virtues, and Nonprofit Ethics,” with Roseanne M. Mirabella, in RoutledgeCompanion to Nonprofit Management, ed. Helmut Anheier and Stefan Toepler, 165-176 (Routledge, 2020).
• Disciplined by Race: Theological Ethics and the Problem of Asian American Identity (Cascade, 2019)
• “Asian American Christian Ethics: The State of the Discipline,” Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, 38, no. 2 (Winter 2018): 33-44.
• “The Priority of the Affections over the Emotions: Gustafson, Aquinas, and an Edwardsean Critique,” Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics,” 38, no. 1 (Summer 2018): 113-130.
• “Mutuality, Equality, and Participation: Practicing Critical Ethics in Philanthropy,” with Roseanne M. Mirabella, in Reframing Nonprofit Organizations: Democracy, Inclusion, and Social Change, ed.Angela M. Eikenberry, Roseanne M. Mirabella, and Billie Sandberg (Irvine, CA: Melvin & Leigh, November 2018): 53-65