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During this conversation, TMC associate director Brett McCarty, Th.D., will sit down with Travis Pickell, Ph.D., to discuss his recent book, Burdened Agency: Christian Theology and End-of-Life Ethics. Where death was once something that simply “happened” to us, advances in medicine now require us to make choices about how and when we die—and we often do so bereft of cultural or religious guidance. Pickell traces the roots of this “burdened agency” and proposes alternatives drawn from Christian theology and practice. McCarty and Pickell will explore what this account offers both to those facing death and to those who accompany them.
Brett McCarty, Th.D.
Assistant Research Professor of Theological Ethics; Associate Director of the Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative; Assistant Professor in Population Health Sciences, Duke School of Medicine
Professor McCarty is a theological ethicist whose work centers on questions of faithful action within healthcare. He is associate director of the Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative at Duke Divinity School, and he holds a joint appointment in the School of Medicine’s Department of Population Health Sciences. Professor McCarty is also a faculty fellow of the Kenan Institute for Ethics and a faculty associate of the Trent Center for Bioethics, Humanities & History of Medicine. His publications include essays in The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy, the Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, and the compilation Spirituality and Religion within the Practice of Medicine. His research and teaching interests occur at the intersections of bioethics, political theology, public health, and theological anthropology. His current research projects focus on competing conceptions of agency within the modern hospital, religious responses to the opioid crisis, and historical and contemporary connections between Christian bioethics and political theology.
Travis Pickell, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Theology and Ethics
Travis Pickell is Associate Professor of Theology and Ethics and Chair of the Department of Theology at George Fox University, where he also co-directs the Program for Leadership & Formation. He is also a current Public Life Fellow with the Center for Christianity and Public Life. His first book, Burdened Agency: Christian Theology and End-of-Life Ethics (University of Notre Dame Press, 2024), was a finalist for the Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion. His research has also appeared in journals including Studies in Christian Ethics, Christian Scholars' Review, and Christianity Today, and he serves as a research affiliate with Harvard's Human Flourishing Program.