James Calvin Davis

James Calvin Davis is the George Adams Ellis Professor of Liberal Arts and Religion at Middlebury College (VT), where he teaches ethics and Christian Studies.

His most recent book, just released in February 2021, is American Liturgy: Finding Theological Meaning in the Holy Days of US Culture (Cascade). In this book, Davis uses essays on (mostly) secular holidays to reflect on the insight progressive Christian faith can bring to American identity, as well as the wisdom American culture sometimes can shed on our responsibilities as Christians.

In his last book, Forbearance: A Theological Ethic for a Disagreeable Church (Eerdmans, 2017), Davis offered guidance for how Christians can see the challenge of navigating religious, moral, and political disagreement as an opportunity to practice virtue, and in doing so to model for the world a better way for living with difference.

A Reformed Christian theologian and an expert on the role of religion in American public life, Davis writes widely on the ways Christianity has contributed (positively and negatively) to a range of moral issues in the United States, throughout the nation's history and in our moment. In his writing, lecturing, and teaching, he insists that historical and theological perspectives can offer needed wisdom for a healthier public life in the U.S. today.

A graduate of the University of Virginia, an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA), and a life-long Steelers fan, Davis lives in rural Shoreham, Vermont, with his wife Elizabeth and their two sons.

Visit him at jamescalvindavis.com.