Xiao Tang

Flora x. Tang is a Ph.D. candidate in theology and peace studies and hold a master's degree in theological studies from Harvard Divinity School and a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and theology from the University of Notre Dame. Flora researches in the fields of decolonial theology, theologies of trauma healing, gender and sexuality studies, and questions of land justice in the age of where environmental violence and ethnonationalist violence perpetuate large-scale human displacement and suffering.

Flora’s dissertation, “Multidirectional Pasts, Diasporic Futures: An Eschatology from the Middle,” constructs a theological framework of decolonial futures of intercommunal peacebuilding, solidarity, and land-sharing in North America. Turning to both diasporic traumas of displacement from homeland and Indigenous histories of settler-colonial displacement, the dissertation considers collective and mutual trauma healing from different forms of displacement might look like. Her dissertation builds upon existing works that analyze the violence of settler-colonialism and migration, and turns toward a constructive, future-oriented vision of decolonial peace and decolonial solidarity. Flora's other current research projects include an analysis of Catholic apologies and reparations for histories of anti-Indigenous violence, and an archival research project on the history of Indigenous Catholics who were forcibly removed from Potawatomi land in present-day Northern Indiana during the 1838 Potawatomi Trail of Death.

Flora has previously worked in Catholic and ecumenical ministry, hospital chaplaincy, and has directed undergraduate service-learning programs. As a Catholic theologian and lay minister, Flora frequently leads workshops, lectures, and conference keynotes at Catholic churches and organizations around the country on the topics of LGBTQ inclusion and racial justice. Her public-facing writings can also be found in the National Catholic Reporter, America Magazine, and New Ways Ministry. Her academic research has been published in Theological Studies and Political Theology Network.

Flora is the recipient of the Louisville Institute Dissertation Fellowship in 2024-2025, the Notebaert Premier Fellowship from 2020-2025, and the John and Judy Scully Fellowship from 2020-2026.