- Education: Willamette University, B.A., Religious Studies, French, The University of Chicago Divinity School, M.Div, The University of Chicago Divinity School, Ph.D., Religious Ethics.
After completing his undergraduate studies at Willamette University, Michael took an adventurous spirit, a desire to better listen and understand, a camera, and bag full of anti-malarials on the road, spending twelve months on a Watson Fellowship traveling and researching across the African continent, including substantial time in East Africa. During that year, he met with priests, nuns, lay people, theologians, professors, bishops, and even Masai market men as he tried to better understand how people reconcile their identities as Africans and their identities as Catholics. Upon completing his year of travel and research, Michael became a high school educator in France, teaching oral English skills to the French students at Lycée Albert Camus in Nantes, France. In 2008 Michael led the inaugural Global Awareness in Action Rwanda trip, thrilled by the chance to open up this country to his students. He spent three following years studying his masters, pushing him to deeper reflection on ethics in daily life, sending him to study religious pluralism in India, and granting him the chance to serve as a chaplain extern at the UIC Medical Center. Michael reunited with the Putney team in 2011, leading Global Awareness in Action Rwanda once more. Michael is fluent in French, and orally proficient in Kiswahili.
