About
Theo Banks has served as University Chaplain and Professor of Theology at Alderson Broaddus since 2018. He leads weekly Tuesday-morning chapel services in Wilcox Chapel, coordinates AB's pastoral-care network, advises the Christian-Muslim Dialogue student organization, and teaches in the AB Theology & Ministry program.
Banks was born and raised in the AME Zion tradition in Birmingham, Alabama, and was ordained an American Baptist minister in 2002. He holds a Ph.D. in Theology from Duke Divinity School (2014), an M.Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary (2001), and a B.A. from Morehouse College (1998), where he was Phi Beta Kappa and an Andrew W. Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellow.
Before AB he served as Associate Pastor of Friendship-West Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas (2002–2007), as Assistant Professor of Theology at Atlanta's Interdenominational Theological Center (2007–2014), and as Director of the Center for African American Religion at Emory University's Candler School of Theology (2014–2018).
Education
- 2014Ph.D., Theology — Duke Divinity School. Dissertation: Mountain Sermons: African American Preaching in Appalachian Communities.
- 2001M.Div. (with honors) — Princeton Theological Seminary.
- 1998B.A., Religion & Philosophy (summa cum laude) — Morehouse College. Phi Beta Kappa. Mellon Mays Fellow.
Teaching
Rev. Banks teaches in the Theology & Ministry program and offers a popular Hilltop Core elective on the spiritual life.
- THE 215Introduction to the BibleA foundational two-semester sequence on the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. Required for all Theology majors; offered to the wider AB community as a Hilltop Core elective.
- THE 315African American Religious TraditionsA junior-level course on the history, theology, and continuing significance of African American religion from the antebellum period through the present.
- HC 350The Examined Life: Spiritual Practices Across TraditionsA Hilltop Core elective open to all AB students. Readings, conversation, and weekly contemplative practice exercises drawn from Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, and Indigenous traditions.
Scholarship & Pulpit Voice
Banks's scholarship sits at the intersection of African American religious history, Appalachian studies, and the practice of preaching. His 2021 book Mountain Sermons (Eerdmans), which began as his Duke dissertation, examines a century of African American preaching in Appalachian coal-camp churches — work that received the American Academy of Religion's Book Award for First Book in the History of Religions.
He is a frequent guest preacher at AME Zion, American Baptist, and ecumenical congregations across the eastern United States, and a contributing editor at The African American Lectionary. He is currently completing a second book — under contract with Eerdmans — on Black preaching and the labor movement in the southern coalfields.
Selected Publications & Presentations
- 2021Mountain Sermons: African American Preaching in Appalachian Communities. Eerdmans.
- 2018The Long Aisle: Black Worship and Spatial Theology. Westminster John Knox.
- 2024"Preaching the Coal Camp Church." The Christian Century, March.
- 2023"What Storer College Knew." The African American Lectionary.
- 2022Plenary, American Academy of Religion, "Place & Preaching: Reading the Pulpit From the Pew."
Honors & Service
- 2024AAR Book Award for First Book in History of Religions.
- 2022AB Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching.
- 2018Appointed AB University Chaplain.
- 2014Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship.
- 1998Morehouse College Phi Beta Kappa.
A university chapel is not a sanctuary in the sense that the world is dangerous and the chapel is safe. It is a sanctuary in the older sense: a place where you are required to put down whatever weapon you brought in with you. That includes certainty.— Rev. Dr. Theo M. Banks
Beyond the Classroom
Banks lives in Philippi with his wife Renée (a community-health nurse at Davis Memorial) and their two children. He is the AB Equestrian Center's informal Saturday-morning chaplain (he says he goes to talk to the horses), an avid jazz pianist, and the volunteer worship leader at a small AME Zion congregation in Fairmont.
He hosts a monthly "Chaplain's Table" dinner at his home for any AB student — no agenda, no sign-up, no theology required. The dinner has run continuously since fall 2018 and is locally famous for the cornbread.