Faculty and Staff

Dorothy Rogers, chair, received a PhD from Boston University. Her research interests include: women in the history of philosophy, faith-state issues in America, and the theoretical foundations of public/political altruism. She teaches courses including: Religion and Ethics, Politics, and Law in America; Philosophy of Religion; and Women and Religion. Her publications include: “Birthmothers and Maternal Identity,” (in Coming to Life: Philosophies of Pregnancy, Childbirth and Mothering, by LaChance and Lundquist; Fordham, 2012), “The Other Philosophy Club: America’s First Academic Women Philosophers,” (in Hypatia, 2009), and America’s First Women Philosophers: Transplanting Hegel (Continuum, 2005).

Maureen Corbeski is the program assistant for the Department of Religion. She received a BS from the University of Caldwell.

Mark Clatterbuck, associate professor, received a PhD in Religion and Culture from The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C. His primary research area is the Native North American encounter with Christianity. He teaches courses including Native American Religions, Religious Experience, Interreligious Encounters, Christian Liberation Theologies, and Introduction to Religion. His latest book project is Crow Jesus: First-Person Narratives of Native American Religious Belonging published by the University of Oklahoma Press (2017). He is also the author of Demons, Saints, & Patriots: Catholic Visions of Native America (1902-1962) published by Marquette University Press (2009).

Yasir Ibrahim, associate professor, received a PhD in Islamic Studies from Princeton University. His research interests include the study of modern religious reform, Islamic ethics and legal theory, and Qur’anic studies. He teaches courses including: Islamic Religious Traditions; Introduction to the Qur’an; Islam in the Contemporary World; Jihad, Just War and the Prospect of Peace; and Islamic Ethics and Law. His publications include articles in the journals Studia Islamica, Journal of Islamic Studies, Journal of Ecumenical Studies, and The Journal of the Middle East and Africa.

John Soboslai, assistant professor, received a PhD from the University of California, Santa Barbara. His research interests include: comparative study of religious violence and the relationship between religion and the state in an increasingly interconnected global society. He teaches courses such as: Death, Dying, and the Afterlife; Religion and Culture; and Religion and Politics. He recently co-authored the book God in the Tumult of the Global Square with Mark Juergensmeyer and Dinah Griego and published by the University of California Press (2015).

Kate E. Temoney, assistant professor, received a PhD from Florida State University. Her research interests include human rights, genocide, the just war tradition, Buddhist applied ethics, and the problem of evil. She teaches courses such as: Religious Perspectives on the Holocaust, Religious Ethics, and African Religions. Her recent publications include: “‘Those Who Have the Sin…Go to this Side’: Genocide, Religion, and Genocide and Religion” in The Routledge History of Genocide, 2015; “The 1994 Rwandan Genocide: The Religion/Genocide Nexus, Sexual Violence, and the Future of Genocide Studies” in Genocide Studies and Prevention, 2016, and “Religion and Genocide Nexuses: Bosnia as Case Study” in Religions, 2017. She is also a co-founder of the Genocide Education and Prevention Project (GEAPP).

David Benfield, Ph.D., Brown University. Dr. Benfield taught at Montclair State University from 1972 to 2015 courses on knowledge, belief, and truth; ethics in/and cyberspace, and philosophy of religion. He published articles in Kant-Studien, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research and Philosophical Studies and did research on the Wason Task (and why the “right” answer isn’t really right), the analysis of fictional objects, and the new public atheism.  Dr. Benfield is now active in Montclair State University Emeritus and Retirement networks.

Stephen Johnson, Ph.D., M.Phil., Yale University; M.A., Marquette University; B.A., Spring Hill College.  Dr. Johnson taught in the Department of Religion from 1972 until 2015, specializing in religion in America, religion and psychology, and religion and myth.  He was active in the Mid-Atlantic Region of the American Academy of Religion, holding leadership positions in the organization for many years.  He is now enjoying retirement while he spends time with his family.

Michael Kogan, Ph.D., Columbia University. Dr. Kogan taught at Montclair State University from 1973 to 2015.  He taught courses on Jewish and Christian religious texts, Kierkegaard, Heidegger and T. S. Eliot.  Dr. Kogan is now active in education and community work in Charleston, South Carolina.