Peng Yin

Peng Yin is a scholar of comparative religious ethics, Chinese Christianity, and religion and sexuality. His first book, Persisting in the Good: Thomas Aquinas and Early Chinese Ethics, explores the intelligibility of moral language across religious traditions. He is currently working on a second book project tracing shifting conceptions of “nature” and “law” from Thomas Aquinas to Richard Hooker, Montesquieu, and early modern Chinese reformers. Tentatively entitled The Mutations of Natural Law, the volume examines the political consequences of Thomistic natural law across the Pacific.

His articles on method in comparative theology and comparative religious ethics, Confucian ethics, James Baldwin, and Confucian and Christian historiography of homoeroticism have appeared or are forthcoming in Modern Theology, Journal of Religious Ethics, Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, and GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies.

At the University, Yin serves as Core Faculty in the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program and as Affiliated Faculty in the Department of Classical Studies, Global Medieval Studies, and the Center for the Study of Asia.

Publications

Persisting in the Good: Thomas Aquinas and Early Chinese Ethics. Oxford University Press, 2026.

“Remember Confucian Homoeroticism.” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, forthcoming.

“The Question of Political Legitimacy in Chinese Political Theology.” In Political Theology in the Asia Pacific, edited by Kwok Pui-Lan. Baylor University Press, 2024.

“James Baldwin as a Preface for Christian Ethics.” Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics 44, no. 1, 2024.

“The Ignatian Tradition and the Intellectual Virtues of the Comparative Theologian.” In The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Comparative Theology: A Festschrift in Honor of Francis X. Clooney, SJ, edited by Axel Takacs and Joseph Kimmel. Wiley Blackwell, 2023.

“Matteo Ricci’s Legacy for Comparative Theology.” Modern Theology 41, no. 3 (July 2022).

“Virtue and Hierarchy in Early Confucian Ethics.” Journal of Religious Ethics 49, no. 4 (December 2021).

“Chinese Protestantism and the Prospect of a Public Religion.” In Brill Handbook for Contemporary Global Christianity, edited by Stephen Hunt. Brill, 2015.

Public Scholarship

“Persisting in the Good.” Yale Chinese Theology Podcast.

“Chinese Political Theology.” For the Life of the World Podcast, Yale Center for Faith and Culture, 2024.

“The Love of Learning and Desire for God.” Focus, 2024.

“Waiting for God’s Own Time.” The Future of God: Reflections, Yale Divinity School, Spring 2023.

Recent Academic Presentations

“The Limits of Love in John Wu’s Jurisprudence.” Changing Discourse on “Love” in Chinese Christianity: Engaging Western Perspectives International Workshop, Yale University, 2026.

“The Uses of Comparative Religious Ethics.” Comparative Religious Ethics Unit, American Academy of Religion, 2025.

“‘One Nation under…?’ Nationalisms of the Religions of the World.” Comparative Religious Ethics Unit and Schleiermacher Unit, American Academy of Religion, 2024.

“Beyond Theodicy: Spiritual Exercises in Moral Tragedy.” Ethics Unit, American Academy of Religion, 2024.

“Transpacific Political Theology: Perspectives and Methods.” Liberation Theologies Unit, American Academy of Religion, 2023.

“Christianity: The Chinese Way.” McDonald Faith and Global Engagement Distinguished Lecture Series, The University of Hong Kong, 2023.

“Christianity and Queerness: Affinities and Their Political Implications.” Gender Studies, School of Humanities, Faculty of Arts, The University of Hong Kong, 2023.

“The Religious Origins of the New Cold War Discourse.” China and the World: Historical Interactions Series, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, 2023.

“The Prospect of Chinese Political Theology.” Bartlett Lecture, Yale Divinity School, 2023.

“Queer Unlearning: Queer Theology as Apophatic Theology.” Christian Systematic Theology Unit, Gay Men and Religion Unit, and Queer Studies in Religion Unit, Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion, 2022.

“On Ricci, Epictetus, and Comparative Theology.” Seminar on Matteo Ricci’s Cultural Translation of Stoicism in Ming China, Campion Hall, University of Oxford, 2022.

“The Intellectual Virtues of a Comparative Theologian.” International Symposium of Jesuit Studies, Boston College, 2022.