Jeney Park-Hearn, PhD
Assistant Professor of Practical Theology and Formation
Chair of Leadership and Praxis, Seminary Masters Programs
Jeney Park-Hearn serves as an assistant professor of practical theology and formation at Portland Seminary. Prior to her arrival as a full-time faculty member in 2022, she spent seven years as a lecturer and adjunct professor, and taught courses covering topics that included systemic care skills, pastoral care skills, family systems in ministry, and psychospiritual development.
Her ministry experiences include hospital chaplaincy, pastoral psychotherapy, congregational care, and English ministries in immigrant churches. As a practical theologian, her current research explores how the body participates in spirituality and how practical theology offers a way to imagine lived experience as a sign of spiritual formation. She has presented on various platforms (written and spoken) on topics that include self-care, mental health and the church, and vocation.
Dr. Park-Hearn is an ordained deacon in the United Methodist Church and is active in a local church in Seattle, where she lives with her husband, daughter, mini-Aussiedoodle, and where she explores Asian dessert options and nature treks.
Academic Background
PhD, Claremont School of Theology; MTS, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary; MDiv, Princeton Theological Seminary; BA, University of Michigan
Expertise & Research Interests
Pastoral care skills; family systems in ministry; psychospiritual development; relational spiritual formation and intersectional pastoral theology
Research Bibliography
Publications
-
Chapter in Explore: Vocational Discovery in Ministry, Kristina Lizardy-Hajbi and Matthew
Floding, editors (2022) -
Contributor for Wabash Blog Series: Creativity and Imagination (2022)
-
Podcast Guest Presenter
Centering: The Asian American Christian Podcast - Can Churches be Mental Health Spaces?
(November 2019) -
“Prayers of Lament: Making Space for Our Disenfranchised Grief,” in ChristianityNext, a
Journal of Innovative Space for Asian American Christianity (Winter 2017) -
Speaker at Asian American Christian Counseling Services Annual Symposium
(2015) -
Guest Lecture: University of Washington (2015)
-
Presenter at American Academy of Religion Western Region (2014)
-
Respondant at Third Asian American Equipping Symposium: Heaing of Memories-
Ministering to Asian American Families (2012)