Dr Robert Heimburger

Overview

I am a Christian theologian of ethics and politics.

I have written on migration, ethics, and theology. My book, God and the ‘Illegal Alien’: United States Immigration Law and a Theology of Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2018), questions the circumstances that led so many to be deemed ‘illegal aliens’. The book explores U.S. legal history and responds with biblical and theological reflections on what it is to be an alien church, a nation, a humble guard of territory, and a recipient of mercy from neighbours. My latest article on migration, with Victor Carmona, examines Church of England and US Roman Catholic bishops’ teaching on migration in the era of Brexit and Trump.

I have also written on forgiveness after conflict among internally displaced persons. My research with Fe y Desplazamiento, the Faith and Displacement Project at the Seminario Bíblico de Colombia (FUSBC), includes, with Christopher M. Hays and Guillermo Mejía-Castillo, ‘Forgiveness and Politics: Reading Matthew 18:21-35 with Survivors of Armed Conflict in Colombia’ (HTS Theological Studies, 2019), as well as co-authored curricula used around Colombia to enable the wellbeing of those forced from home by conflict and other forces.

In my current research, I am asking what the Book of Acts has to say about ethics and politics today.

I am also involved in research on dementia care and theology among Gunadule communities in Panama and African Caribbean communities in Britain. I am collaborating with John Swinton and Jocabed Reina Solano Miselis in the AHRC-funded project, ‘“We Take Care of Our Own”’: A Theological Ethnographic Exploration of the Experience of Caregiving in the Context of Dementia Across Two Cultures’.

I am originally from Alabama, USA. I studied philosophy and music at Davidson College before teaching with Teach for America in the Bronx, New York, and completing an MST in Education at Pace University. I went on to study theology, completing a Masters of Divinity at Regent College in Vancouver, an MPhil in Christian Ethics at the University of Oxford, and a DPhil in Theology and Religion, also at Oxford. Before coming to Cardiff, I was Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Theological Ethics at the University of Aberdeen.

I am available to supervise PhD candidates alongside supervisors across various disciplines at Cardiff University and Cardiff Baptist College. I welcome enquiries about doctoral study on topics related to Christian ethics, theology, the Bible, law, and politics.