Tanya Riches is an honourary research fellow of the Edward Cadbury Centre, The University of Birmingham and Alphacrucis College. Her PhD research with Aboriginal Pentecostals was published in a 2019 monograph with Brill entitled Worship and Social Engagement in Urban Aboriginal-led Australian Pentecostal Congregations. It investigated the links between urban Aboriginal-led Pentecostal Christian congregations’ worship practices and social justice initiatives. She won the David Allan Hubbard Award from Fuller Theological Seminary for this study. Her MPhil at the Australian Catholic University explores the theological, musicological and business practices of Hillsong music. The co-edited volume entitled The Hillsong Movement Examined: You Call Me Out Upon the Waters (2017) intentionally drew together insider and outsider scholars to examine various aspects of Hillsong Church via ethnographic method. She has edited several special edition journals and authored or co-authored over ten articles and four chapters in scholarly volumes. Until 2022, Dr Tanya Riches was Senior Lecturer and MTh program coordinator at Hillsong College, a third-party provider of Alphacrucis College. Before that, she worked at the Centre for Disability Studies, The University of Sydney.

Areas of expertise: 1. Australian Pentecostalism 2. Contemporary Worship/Liturgy 3. Lived religious experience 4. Pentecostal Theology 

Although a relatively new researcher Titus brings to the CRA a wealth of cross-cultural knowledge and a depth of theological insight.  He pastors BethelLife Church, is an Adjunct faculty member at both Alphacrucis College and the Australian College of Ministry and currently Research Project Officer at Whitley College, having worked as a researcher at the Churches’ Commission for Migrants in Europe. In addition, Titus is also the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Action Research Centre Ltd which engages both researchers and industry partners in dialogue about social inclusion.

Areas of expertise: 1. Migration and labour mobility.  2. Social justice (inc. development).  3. New religious movements.  4. Social transformation.

With a PhD from Cambridge on the theology of joy, John has spent much of his professional life focused on developing best practice within the private (i.e. Christian) Higher Education sector.  In this capacity he has been Dean at Tabor Victoria (now Eastern College Australia), the Director of Learning and Teaching at the University of Divinity, and is currently employed as Academic Dean at Stirling Theological College.  John also founded the theological education stream at the ANZATS conferences and is an accredited expert with the Commonwealth’s Higher Education regulator, TEQSA.

Areas of expertise: 1. Theological education and policy.  2. Contemporary preaching and communication.

Wilma was the founding CEO of the Salvation Army’s Employment Plus.  This being one of Australia’s largest recruitment organisations.  Since then, Wilma has worked extensively with various welfare agencies, served on a range of government committees/forums, and briefly held the position of the CRA’s Director.  Wilma’s highly regarded PhD from Melbourne University investigated the nexus between Church and State with respect to welfare delivery being titled: Christian Mission or an Unholy Alliance?: The changing role of church-related organisations in welfare-to-work service delivery.

Areas of expertise: 1. The interplay between mission, market, and money.  2. Suicide prevention.  3. Domestic Violence.

Ruth is an Honorary Professor at Australian Catholic University (ACU) and holds honorary appointments at the University of Divinity, the ACBC National Centre for Pastoral Research and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Ruth has degrees in sociology, psychology and education, and from 2004 until 2013 was the director of ACU’s Quality of Life and Social Justice Research Centre. Since formally retiring in 2014, she has undertaken private research for several non-profit welfare agencies.

Areas of expertise: 1. Social justice, such as intellectual disability and social engagement.  2. Youth spirituality.  3. Sexual assault.  4. Natural disasters.