The CCSN is pleased to announce that one of our community members, David Kenneth Enns, Liberty University successfully defended his dissertation on October 29th, 2026. We welcome the newly minted to the Academy. David is currently in job search mode.
Please join us is congratulating Dr. Enns! Dr. Enns is a pastor at GateWay Bible Church, Santa Cruz, CA, and scholar specializing in communication, digital engagement, and religious rhetoric. His research explores how religious worldviews interpret Christianese, the slang and jargon unique to Christian culture. He holds an MA in Christian Ministry and dual BM degrees in Theory/Composition and Music Management. With a background spanning entertainment, media, and theology, David brings a distinct perspective to communication, storytelling, and cultural engagement. He is passionate about bridging gaps in religious rhetoric and its impact on faith communication in digital and public spaces. Connect with David here (email) and here (website).
Dissertation Title: Evangelical Jargon as Terministic Screens: A Qualitative Content Analysis Toward a Lexicon of Christianese
Dissertation Abstract: This qualitative study investigates Christianese as a powerful yet understudied rhetorical system. This insider jargon of American Evangelicalism exhibits a significant dichotomy: the very words that build community also build walls, a challenge amplified in the open forum of digital communication. This research employs Burke’s (1966) theory of terministic screens as its primary lens to examine how Christianese selects, reflects, and deflects aspects of reality.
The methodology is a qualitative, corpus-based design. A curated corpus of 142 varied artifacts—including journals, sermons, blogs, podcasts, and popular media—was analyzed using content analysis (Krippendorff, 2018) and rhetorical cluster analysis (Angel & Bates, 2016). This process, guided by a structured inclusion/exclusion rubric, yielded a foundational lexicon of 566 headwords, each categorized using a seven-vector rhetorical taxonomy.
The findings reveal that Christianese is more a product of church culture than direct biblical quotation, constructed primarily through metaphor and semantic narrowing. Its dominant rhetorical functions are to create theological shorthand and aspirational identity markers. A central pragmatic paradox was identified: the dialect is overwhelmingly earnest in tone yet functionally ambiguous, with 80% of its phrases carrying a medium-to-high interpretive risk. This paradox wields Christianese as a double-edged sword: one edge deftly carves out a space of belonging for insiders, while the other inflicts a wound of alienation on outsiders. This study contributes to communication scholarship by extending Burke’s (1966) theory to religious discourse and proposes a new, layered model for rhetorical lexicography. Practically, this study fosters a communicative conscience, enabling faith leaders, educators, and content creators to craft their spiritual messages with greater intentionality and impact.