Donyelle McCray

Donyelle McCray serves as Associate Professor of Homiletics at Yale Divinity School where her scholarship focuses on the history and spirituality of preaching. In addition to studying the continuing influence of biblical preachers like John the Baptist, Mary, and the Apostle Paul, Professor McCray explores the spiritual practices that lead preachers to use less conventional preaching methods such as quilting, dancing, and literature. Her two forthcoming books include The Introverted Preacher: Insights & Strategies (Westminster John Knox), and an examination of the preaching and spirituality of Rev. Dr. Pauli Murray. She is the author of The Censored Pulpit: Julian of Norwich as Preacher (2019), A Surprising God: Advent Meditations for a New World, co-authored with Thomas G. Long (Westminster John Knox, 2021), and a volume on sermon genre, Is it a Sermon?: Art, Activism, and Genre Fluidity in African American Preaching (Fall 2024).

Before becoming a homiletics professor, Professor McCray served as an attorney focusing on wills, trusts, and estates. This work raised existential questions that led her to seminary and then into ministry as a hospice chaplain.  Human finitude and compassion remain central theological concerns in her scholarship.    

Read more

• Is it a sermon? Donyelle McCray on blurry line between sacred and profane

• Leading scholars join Yale Divinity School faculty

• “Black Feminist Triptych” (article in Homiletic) (link is external)

​Books

The Censored Pulpit: Julian of Norwich as Preacher (link is external) (Lexington Books/Fortress Academic Press, 2019)