Lane Center Staff
Erin Brigham
DIRECTOR
Erin Brigham is the director of the Joan and Ralph Lane Center for Catholic Social Thought and the Ignatian Tradition and teaches in the department of theology and religious studies. Passionate about theological research, her most recent books include Church as Field Hospital: Toward an Ecclesiology of Sanctuary (2022) and Women Engaging the Catholic Social Tradition: Solidarity Toward the Common Good (2022), co-edited with Mary Johnson. She is currently studying the impact of the pandemic on faith and religious practices. She grew up near the beautiful Rocky Mountains of Western Montana and now lives in San Francisco with her family.
Mark Miller
FACulty fellow for ignation formation
Mark Miller is associate professor of systematic (philosophical) theology. His mother came from the Philippines, his father from Maine, and they met in the middle as students at USF in the 1960s. His specialty is human development and redemption, particularly our ongoing, communal conversion to greater knowledge, love, and service of God and all things. His PhD dissertation is entitled, "Why the Passion?: Bernard Lonergan on the Cross as Communication." His undergraduate degree concentrated on Humanities in International Affairs.
Professor Miller has taught at Ateneo de Zamboanga, University of Asia and the Pacific, Boston College, Georgetown University, Santa Clara, and Seton Hall (as inaugural Toth/Lonergan Endowed Visiting Chair), as well as at Mt. Calvary Elementary School in Forestville, MD and Bishop Gorman High School in Las Vegas, NV. At USF he teaches in Catholic Studies, Philippine Studies, and the St. Ignatius Institute. He helps coach the USF Taekwondo Club/Team.
Evelyn Rodriguez
Faculty Director for Synodal Leadership and Mission Co-Responsibility
Evelyn I. Rodriguez is a second-generation Pinay, who was born in Honolulu, raised in San Diego, and is now a Professor for the University of San Francisco's Department of Sociology. She also is a faculty member in Critical Diversity Studies, Asian American Studies, and the Maria Elena Yuchengco Philippine Studies Program. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude from UC San Diego as a Sociology major/Ethnic Studies minor; and received her MA and PhD from UC Berkeley's Sociology program. She has taught Asian and Pacific Islanders in U.S. Society, People of Mixed Descent, U.S. Immigration and Settlement, and Community Organizing, as well as Research Methods, Thesis Workshop, and for the USF Honors College.
Mark Graves
Visiting Scholar for AI, Faith, and Ethics
Mark Graves has fifteen years experience in developing software, informatics, and data science solutions for healthcare and the pharmaceutical industry. After earning his Ph.D. in computer science (artificial intelligence), he completed fellowships in genomics, moral psychology, and moral theology. He has held teaching or research positions at eight institutions of higher learning and published over eighty technical and scholarly works in computer science, biology, psychology, and theology, including three books. His current research focuses on understanding and modeling human morality, including ethical approaches to data science and machine learning, and philosophical and psychological foundations for constructing moral AI. In addition to his teaching and scholarship at USF, he is Research Fellow & Director at AI and Faith, a non-profit network focused on engaging world religions in the ethical challenges of AI.
Kimberly Carfore
Faculty Fellow for Integral Ecology
Kimberly Carfore is an adjunct professor of environmental studies and theology and religious studies. Her research interests include gendered experiences of divinity and embodied theology, nature spiritualities, ancestral skills, and wilderness experience.