Dr. David Craig is a Faculty Investigator at the IU Center for Bioethics, as well as current Professor and Chair 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:

• R383 Religion, Sex, and Money
• R384 Religion, Ethics, and Health
• R386 Consumption, Ethics, and the Good Life
• 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

Healthcare Reform and Public Values

Selected Publications:

• Craig, David. Health Care as a Social Good: Religious Values and American Democracy. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. 2014.
• 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. Everyone at the Table?: Religious Activism and Health Care Reform in Massachusetts. Journal of Religious Ethics, 2012; 40(2): 335-358.
• Craig, David. Religious Health Care as Community Benefit: Social Contract, Covenant, or Common Good. Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, 2008; 18(4): 301-30.

Selected Grants:

“The Intersection of Community and Health: Improving Indiana's Health through Precision Community Health”

• Role: Co-Investigator
• Dates: in progress
• Funder: IU Health Values Fund
• Description: The Monon Collaborative, Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CTSI), is learning with neighbors, community organizations and congregations about community health priorities and assets for more responsive efforts to improve health outcomes.

Healthy Indiana Plan

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.

Selected Grants:

2020 Charles R. Bantz Chancellor’s Community Fellowship Award: “A New HIP Public”

• Role: Co-Principal Investigator
• Dates: in progress
• Funder: IUPUI
• Description: To engage IUPUI students and diverse congregational partners to strengthen public interest in the Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP) and the shared responsibility of supporting continuous health coverage for better wellness and care for low-income residents.

“Health Equity, Urban Congregations and HIP”

• Role: Principal Investigator
• Dates: 2018 – 2019
• Funder: Indiana Minority Health Coalition
• Description: To learn with Indianapolis congregations about members' experiences with HIP to improve the program and examine the role of relationship-building and trust for better health and wellness.

“HIP: Health Equity, Responsibility and Community"

• Role: Co-Investigator
• Dates: 2019
• Funder: IU Consortium for the Study of Religion, Ethics and Society
• Description: 6-part public dialogue series on the Healthy Indiana Plan

• President, Faculty Assembly for School of Liberal Arts, IUPUI, 2019 – 2020

• Book Reviewer, Journal of Religion and Monash Bioethics Review, 2018 – 2019