Erin
Raffety

Rev. Dr. Erin Raffety is a Practical Theologian who uses ethnographic methods to study Christian congregations and communities. Raffety is currently a Lecturer in the Princeton Writing Program where she teaches on disability justice and a Senior Research scholar at Princeton Theological Seminary where she conducts research with disabled people and communities. She is ordained as a Teaching Elder in the PC(USA), holds a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology from Princeton University, and is a proud parent of a daughter with multiple disabilities.

 

At Princeton Theological Seminary, Raffety serves as the Senior Researcher on the Crossroads Research grant and the Associate Research Scholar for the Institute for Youth Ministry. The Crossroads grant, an initiative funded through the Lilly Endowment Inc.’s Nurturing Children through Worship and Prayer initiative, centers immigrant congregations and congregations of color in shaping ministry with disabled children (2025-present). From 2020-2023, Raffety served as a Research Fellow at the Center of Theological Inquiry, where she built and studied a Minecraft video game for disabled Christians and their congregations, and conducted a study on worship access for Christians living with Long COVID and chronic illness. 

 

She is the recipient of numerous grants from the Calvin Institute for Christian Worship, the Lilly Endowment, Inc., the Louisville Institute, and the Templeton World Charity Foundation. She also served as the Thomas F. Staley Lecturer in Religion at Davidson College in 2026, was the recipient of the 2025 Alumni Service Award from Princeton Theological Seminary, as well as the recipient of the Reimagining Spirituality Leadership Award from the American Association on Intellectual and Development Disabilities in 2024.

 

She is the author of three books, one an edited volume with Justin Forbes on disability and youth ministry, entitled Cripping Youth Ministry (Eerdmans, 2026), a practical theology of disability ministry in the United States, From Inclusion to Justice (Baylor, 2022), and an ethnography of foster care in China, Families We Need (Rutgers, 2022). She is the author of numerous articles in scholarly journals such as Childhood, The Journal of Religion & Disability, Disability Studies Quarterly, and Theology Today.