Julia Kelto Lillis

Julia Kelto Lillis is the Associate Professor of Early Church History at Union Theological Seminary. Her primary research interests concern ancient constructions of social difference, especially in areas we today call gender and sexuality, and the ways they are discussed in early Christian texts. Her teaching areas span multiple periods of Christians’ history and literature, ancient genders and sexualities, early Christian theologians and saints, and diverse ancient perspectives on the body, healing, and disabilities.

Dr. Kelto Lillis’s first book, Virgin Territory: Configuring Female Virginity in Early Christianity (University of California Press, 2022), examines diverse social and theological ideas about virginity in antiquity and exposes misconceptions about women’s bodies today. She received the Best First Book Prize from the North American Patristics Society for this monograph, as well as the American Historical Association’s Prize in History Prior to CE 1000. One of her articles, “Paradox in Partu: Verifying Virginity in the Protevangelium of James” (Journal of Early Christian Studies, 2016) was awarded the American Society of Church History’s Jane Dempsey Douglass prize as an outstanding contribution to the historical study of women in Christianity. Her next book, supported by an ACLS Fellowship in 2026-27, explores notions of genderless personhood that some early Christians imagined for heavenly or earthly human life. She has served on the governing board of the international academic working group ReMeDHe (pronounced “remedy”: Religion, Medicine, Disability, Health, and Healing in late antiquity) and participates as a presenter and organizer in several academic conferences. As of Summer 2026, she is Co-Director of ReMeDHe.

Dr. Kelto Lillis has taught in numerous faith communities and in schools of all sizes. In 2024, she received an Educational Resource Prize from the LGBTQ Religious Archives Network for materials from the course “Genders and Sexualities of Early Christians.” Prior to joining the Union faculty, she taught in the Department of Religion at Luther College and the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia. Her teaching at Duke University and Duke Divinity School during her doctoral studies earned a Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. She is passionate about making ancient texts and contexts accessible to present-day audiences and sees thinkers of past periods as stimulating conversation partners for present-day concerns with identity, health, social justice, and religious and theological boundaries and intersections.

Dr. Kelto Lillis and her two-denomination family are active members of a hybrid worship community in New York City. At home and attending church from home, she practices faith through music and builds fellowship in new modalities. In professional circles and teaching, she works to create community and extend access through virtual spaces for scholars, staff, and students.