Dr. Yucheng Bai

Dr. Yucheng Bai was born in Nanjing, China, and went through a thoroughly secular public education in China. In high school he began to develop doubts of the atheist worldview in which he was raised, and he began to explore religious history on his own. When he came to the United States as an international student, he encountered Jesus through the witness of campus ministries and became a Christian at the age of 20. Afterwards he continued to pursue graduate studies in church history. His research interests are Chinese and American church histories, political theology, Christianity and democracy etc. He and his wife are preparing to plant a church in North Carolina. Outside of work, he enjoys cooking and traveling.

• Education:
  • Ph.D. in World Christianity Track, Minor in American Christianity, Duke University, 2025.
  • M.T.S, Duke Divinity School, 2018.
  • M.A. in East Asian Language and Culture (focus in Modern Chinese History), Columbia University, 2016.
  • B.A. in Global Studies, University of Arizona, 2014.
• Ph.D. Dissertation
  • American City on a Chinese Hill: American Fundamentalism in Contemporary Chinese Christianity
• Publications:
  • Monograph:
    • Glory and Burden (ReFrame Ministries, 2025)
  • Articles:
    • “American City on a Chinese Hill: Fundamentalist Calvinism and American Exceptionalism in Chinese Christianity.” Church History (accepted; forthcoming 2026).
    • “United by Fear: The Rise of Trumpism among First Generation Chinese Christian Immigrants.” AmerAsia 48.1 (2022): 58-73.
    • “One Foot Above Liberalism: Wang Yi’s Search for Civil Society.” In Christian Social Activism and Rule of Law in Chinese Societies, edited by Fenggang Yang and Christopher White, 267–88. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2021.
    • “God’s Model Citizen: The Citizenship Education Movement of the YMCA and Its Political Legacy.” Studies in World Christianity 26.1 (2019): 42-62.