BSIR Leadership
Fellows are senior scholars of the Baptist academy engaging with and shaping the work of the Scholars. Fellows serve three-year terms, leading the group to connect within the larger Baptist academy. They review and select papers, lead in worship and academic sessions, and promote the work of the BSIR.
Dr. Scales has authored, co-authored, or co-edited ten books and over forty articles and chapters in the areas of faculty development, Christianity and social work (with an emphasis on early Baptist social workers and Woman’s Missionary Union) and history of Baptist women in higher education, including All That Fits a Woman: Training Southern Baptist Women for Charity and Mission, 1907-1926 (Mercer University Press, 2000) and Doing the Word: Southern Baptists’ Carver School of Church Social Work and its Predecessors, 1907-1997 (with Melody Maxwell, University of Tennessee Press, 2019). |
João’s research focuses primarily on the history of World Christianity, with a particular interest on the influence of US Protestantism on the Global South. He has presented and published his research broadly both in English and Portuguese and his academic articles were published by peer-reviewed journals such as The International Journal of Latin American Religions, The Journal of Reformed Theology, Perspectives in Religious Studies, and Baptist History and Heritage Journal. He is the author of the books Evangelicals and Liberation Revisited (Wipf and Stock, 2013), O Racismo na História Batista Brasileira (Novos Diálogos, 2020), and Migrational Religion: Context and Creativity in the Latinx Diaspora (Baylor University Press, 2021). João is also finalizing two additional manuscripts, The Global Mission of the Jim Crow South: Southern Baptist Missionaries, Theocultural Domination, and the Shaping of Baptist Identities in Latin America (Mercer University Press, forthcoming 2022) and Southern Missions, Christian Education, and Violence Across Borders (under consideration with University of Tennessee Press). |
Dr. Ward is the author of four books, most recently Peirce and Religion: Knowledge, Transformation, and the Reality of God (Lexington, 2018). He is the founding director of Young Scholars in the Baptist Academy and co-editor of two books from that program, The Scholarly Vocation and the Baptist Academy (Mercer, 2008) and Tradition and the Baptist Academy (Paternoster, 2011), along with several journal issues of collected papers. He is very pleased to be able to continue and extend this work as Director Emeritus of the International Baptist Scholars Roundtable. |
His research focuses on the doctrine of the Triune God, wisdom literature, the relations between theology, literature and late-modern philosophy, and ecumenical ecclesiology. Dr. Fiddes has authored eleven books and more than 115 articles and book chapters. His book The Creative Suffering of God is considered one of the major contributions to theology in the last decades of the 20th century. Dr. Fiddes recently published his first novel, a mystery exploring the mythology and symbolism of the unicorn: A Unicorn Dies: A Novel of Mystery and Ideas (Firedint: Oxford, 2018). |
Dr. Carter has authored, co-authored or edited four books and numerous peer reviewed articles in the areas of Baptist History, Missions History, biblical studies and preaching. Dr. Carter’s key focus in scholarship has been Baptist history and includes The Journal and Selected Letters of William Carey (Smyth & Helwys, 2000) and chapters in books like Baptists and Revivals: Papers from the Seventh International Conference on Baptist Studies (Mercer University Press, 2018), Witnesses to the Baptist Heritage (Mercer University Press, 2015), and Turning Points in Baptist History (Mercer University Press, 2008). Dr. Carter has also written outside his specific field of history, co-authoring Telling God’s Story: The Biblical Narrative from Beginning to End, 3rd ed. (B&H Academic, 2021) and Preaching God’s Word: A Hand’s-On Approach to Preparing, Developing, and Delivering the Sermon, 2nd ed. (Zondervan, 2018). |
A Jacksonville, Texas, native, Brad received a Bachelor of Arts in Religion from Baylor University. He earned his Master of Divinity and Doctor of Philosophy degrees from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. He pursued further study in Harvard University’s Management Development Program and in the Spanish language program at Academia Hispano Americano in Mexico. |
Many of Dr. Mathews’s publications apply BPC to Old Testament texts. Her Ph.D was published as Performing Habakkuk (Pickwick, 2012). She is currently finalising a manuscript entitled Prophets as Performers, to be published by Cascade Books, and is commencing on a reading of the Megilloth via BPC to be published in the Reading the Old Testament series by Smyth and Helwys. In addition, Dr. Mathews is working on a new edition of a volume she edited entitled God, by Degrees (Barton Books, 2014), a guide for new theological students. |
Although he grew up in a Christian home, Dr. Oladipo became a Christian through the Baptist Mission work in Nigeria and that missionary influence remains dominant in his life and work. Dr. Oladipo received his post-secondary education in the United States, starting from Wayland Baptist University with a B.A. degree in Theology. He attended Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, NC for the M.Div. degree, and proceeded immediately for the Master degree in Sacred Theology at Yale University Divinity School, where he was named the first Charles Forman Scholar in 1988. Dr. Oladipo earned the PhD degree in Theological Studies at Baylor University in 1993. He has written numerous articles and two books that explore the natural depth and character of Christianity in Africa. Dr. Oladipo was a member of the delegation to the 5th Parliament of World Religions at Melbourne, Australia in 2009, and he has served as a visiting scholar and professor in five continents. An active member in many professional organizations, he has received numerous leadership and service awards, including the Distinguished Alumni Leadership Award at Wayland Baptist University in 2016. He is fluent in six languages and has three children. |
In 1997 Professor Pillay became Foundation Professor and Head of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Otago University, New Zealand’s oldest University, based in Dunedin. In 1998, he was asked to serve as the first Head of Liberal Arts within that University. He has served in senior leadership roles at The University of South Africa and the Human Sciences Research Council in Pretoria and has lectured in several institutions abroad. Professor Pillay joined Liverpool Hope University College as Rector in 2003 and become Liverpool Hope University’s first Vice-Chancellor in 2005 when the institution was given full university status. Hope is the only university ecumenical foundation in Europe. It works with church communities and colleges around the world and has strong Baptist links, especially at doctoral degree level, with the Baptist ministers in Nigeria. Gerald and his family attended Northeast Valley Baptist Church during their time in Dunedin, New Zealand. In 2009, Professor Pillay was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant for Merseyside, assisting the Lord Lieutenant of Merseyside in carrying out her role as the Queen’s representative on Merseyside. In 2021 he appeared on the Queen’s Honours list when he was awarded an OBE for services to higher education. |
She holds BAs in Theology and in English from Lithuania Christian College (now LCC International University), Klaipėda, and an MTh and a PhD in Applied Theology from the University of Wales, which she earned at the International Baptist Theological Seminary in Prague, the Czech Republic. There she served as a course leader, lecturer and later as pro-Rector and Academic Dean. A musician and artist as well as a theologian, Dr. Toth writes and speaks on various aspects of ethics, spirituality, history, and theology of culture. Her most recent book is Singleness and Marriage after Christendom: Being and Doing Family (Wipf & Stock, 2021). |