Dr. David Craig is a Faculty Investigator at the IU Center for Bioethics and current Professor of the Department of Religious Studies at Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis.

Dr. Craig received a bachelor’s degree in Politics from Oberlin College, followed by a master’s in Theological Studies at Harvard Divinity School and a Master’s and PhD in Religion from Princeton University. He completed the Arthur J. Ennis Teaching Fellowship at Villanova University before joining the Philanthropic and Religious Studies Departments at Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis.

Dr. Craig's research focuses on community health, healthcare ethics, and health equity in the context of religion and philanthropy. Recently, Dr. Craig has led community-engaged and public panels on the Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP), a health insurance program for low-income Indianan adults. As part of the Monon Collaborative (Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute), he leads an effort to develop Community Impact Hubs among Indianapolis congregations, bringing their local knowledge and health assets to improving health outcomes in underserved neighborhoods. Together with religious officials and healthcare workers, he explores healthcare’s status as a common good offered by society. Dr. Craig’s latest book, Health Care as a Social Good: Religious Values and American Democracy (Georgetown University Press, 2014) explores three popular moral languages of healthcare as a private benefit, private choice, and public right and argues that US healthcare has instead been organized as a social good. Drawing on interviews with hospital administrators and activists of varying religious and political persuasions toward the Affordable Care Act and health care reform, the book theorizes about the role of religious values and activism in establishing effective community health systems.

Selected Courses:

• IU School of Liberal Arts: P660/G751 - PHST Ethics and Philanthropy
• IU School of Liberal Arts, R384 - Religion, Ethics, and Health
• IU School of Liberal Arts, R386 - Consumption, Ethics, and the Good Life
• IU School of Liberal Arts, R393 - Comparative Religious Ethics

Selected Guest Lectures:

• "A New HIP Public?: Urban Congregations and the Healthy Indiana Plan", American Academy of Religion
• "What Type of Healthcare System Should the United States Adopt?", Institute of Freedom and Community, St. Olaf College
• "Mission Integrity Matters: A Consistent Approach on Catholic Health Care Values and Public Mandates”, Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology and Bioethics, Harvard Law School
• "Obamacare and American Values", John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics, Washington University
• "Possibilities and Limits of Charity Care", Catholic Health Assembly

Selected Publications:

• David M. Craig, Ivan Douglas Hicks, Andrew Green, Maria Meschi, Pamela Napier, Stephanie Patterson, George Armstrong, Fiona Schicho, Matthew Wilcox. Health Equity, Urban Congregations, and HIP. Public Report. Oct 2019.

• Craig, David. “Mission Integrity Matters: Balancing Catholic Health Care Values and Public Mandates.” Book chapter in Law, Religion, and Health in America, edited by Elizabeth Sepper and Holly Fernandez Lynch (Cambridge University Press, 2017) 125-38.
• Craig, David. Health Care as a Social Good: Religious Values and American Democracy. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. 2014.

Selected Grants:

Advancing Racial and Ethnic Equity in Health Care Access: COVID Pandemic Medicaid Changes (Co-I)

$395,000 from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, 2022-2025

Since COVID-19, the state of Indiana not only kept Medicaid members continuously enrolled since April 2020, but also suspended the premiums and copayments that members pay for the Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP) with additional federal funding, which provides coverage to low-income adults. As a result, HIP enrollment increased by 90% as of Jan. 2023 to over 800,000 people. Starting in April 2023, Medicaid rules return to normal. Based on a pre-pandemic community-engaged study of HIP, our research team knows that many people will struggle to navigate these rules, potentially leading to tens or hundreds of thousands of eligible people losing health benefits.

A Collaborative Community of Practice: Congregations and IU Health Addressing Social Impediments to Health Together (Co-I)

$99,625 from the IU Health Values Fund, 2021-2023

Service Activities:

• Member, All Hands on Deck Coalition, 2022-present
• Member, Equity Council, MDWise, 2022-present
• Book Reviewer, Political Theology, 2021
• President, Faculty Assembly for School of Liberal Arts, IU - Indianapolis, 2019 – 2020