Research

I thoroughly enjoy the quest for knowledge and the discovery of new insights — sometimes expected, often surprising.

My graduate school classmates would often laugh at the “fortress of knowledge” I would build on the library table as I worked, gradually surrounding myself with stacked books on all sides as one source led to another, and that to another, until I could hardly be seen behind the scores of volumes. But I was there, head down, carefully inscribing quotes and page references onto endless index cards, building new structures of information in my eager, curious mind.

Topics of Research

  • Canon Law

    • procedural law

    • penal law

    • structures of governance

    • ecclesiology and ecclesiological expressions in law

  • Memory & Memoir

    • the limits of human memory

    • traumatized memory

    • strategies and craft in memoir writing

  • J.R.R. Tolkien

    • Tolkien’s Catholicism and its reflection in his writings

    * Tolkien’s wartime trauma and how it shaped his imagination

Past Research

If you are interested, some of my earlier writing from research can be found at the link below.

my profile at academia.edu