Biography
An award winning preacher, scholar and social justice organizer, I am serving as the interim senior minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Church, Houston, Texas and as an African American Religious Studies Forum Affiliate with Rice University’s Center for Engaged Research and Collaborative Learning. I have a PhD in American Studies from Harvard University where I wrote a dissertation on the relationship between theology and populism. Dan McKanan and Mayra Rivera Rivera were my advisors, Lisa McGirr was my third reader, and Sylvester Johnson served as my outside reader.
In recent years I have offered sermons to some of the largest and best known Unitarian Universalist or liberal Protestant congregations in the United States, including: Unity Temple (Oak Park, IL), First Unitarian Church of Dallas, First Unitarian Church of Providence, and Harvard Memorial Church.
My research has been supported by the American Studies program of Harvard University, a Harvard Merit Term-Time Fellowship, a Frederick Kettner Scholarship from the Biosophical Institute, the Fund for Nurturing Unitarian Universalist Scholarship, multiple Joseph Sumner Smith Scholarships, the Joseph Gittler Fund for Religion and Ethics, the Institute for Anarchist Studies, the Unitarian Universalist Association, and the Center for American Political Studies. Prior to returning to academia I served as a parish minister for six years. I am a member of the American Academy of Religion, the American Historical Association, the American Studies Association, Collegium: Scholarship Serving Unitarian Universalism, the Unitarian Universalist History and Heritage Society, the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association, and the Working Class Studies Association. I am also the author of two religious education curriculums and close to three dozen published essays, articles, book chapters and poems. In the spring of 2019 I will be giving the Minns lectures on Unitarian Universalism and American Populism. My brother is the painter Jorin Bossen.