Rev. Dr. Catherine E. Williams is the Associate Professor of Preaching and Worship, and Director of Chapel Worship at Lancaster Theological Seminary, Lancaster, PA. She is an ordained Elder in the Greater New Jersey Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church. She earned her BMus. in Church Music from Rider University’s Westminster Choir College, her MDiv. from Palmer Theological Seminary, and her PhD in Homiletics from Princeton Theological Seminary.  

In her writings, Dr. Williams embraces her dual identities of musician and homiletician. Her article in the Yale Journal of Music and Religion, “Sermon and Song: A Musically Integrative Homiletic”, makes the claim for conjoined preaching and music as a homiletical method. She has published a chapter in the volume, The Future Shape of Christian Proclamation: What the Global South Can Teach Us About Preaching, edited by Cleophus LaRue and Luiz Nascimento (Cascade Books, 2020.) The chapter, titled “Trinidad & Tobago Preaching: The Gospel According to Calypso,” is the first sustained homiletical analysis of this Caribbean musical genre. Dr. Williams’ forthcoming book, Preaching and Music: Powerful Partners in Proclamation, will be released April 1 by Cascade Books. Dr. Williams currently is a member of both the Editorial Review Board of the Journal of Black Women and Religious Cultures and the Editorial Board of Homiletic, a peer-reviewed journal sponsored by the Academy of Homiletics. Dr. Williams lives with her husband Harran in Lancaster, PA.

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