Jack Conrad is Director of Spiritual Care for LeBonheur Children’s Hospital after thirty-five years in business, holding offices of President and Vice President of Operations for corporations including Siemens, Bristol Myers Squib, 3M, among others. He is a Board Certified Chaplain with the National Association of Catholic Chaplains, an Ordained Deacon in the Roman Catholic Church, and has served in parishes and taught at the Diocesan level for over 25 years with an emphasis on Social Justice.
Conrad holds degrees from the University of California Santa Barbara in Mathematics and Economics, a Masters in Business Administration from Pepperdine University, and a Masters in Religion from Memphis Theological Seminary. He also has a Certificate in Pediatric Bioethics from Children’s Mercy Hospital. He has served as Chair of the Ethics Committee at Germantown Methodist Hospital, and at LeBonheur Children’s Hospital for over 10 years.
Conrad chose MTS because of its Master of Arts in Religion degree. He also valued MTS’s relationship with Methodist Healthcare, where he was earning Clinical Pastoral Education. Many of his colleagues at Methodist recommended Memphis Theological Seminary, having earned degrees there themselves.
While at MTS, Conrad loved the wonderful diversity of students and professors from different Christian traditions and backgrounds. As he put it, “For a Catholic, it was like stepping into a whole new world.” His experiences at MTS broadened his viewpoints and helped him to understand ministry in different contexts, particularly the predominantly black population of Memphis, the community in which he serves. He also appreciated the coursework on liturgy, offering him insight on how other Christian traditions worship, preach, celebrate, and believe.
He has written two books: one on his experiences as a Hospice Chaplain called Living Before Dying – Reflections of a Hospice Chaplain and a novel with his Grandkids called A Toy Box. He has also been published in several Chaplain publications and has an article published in Perspectives in Biology and Medicine in 2017 entitled, “A Safer Place.”
Conrad continues to celebrate his time at MTS. He reflected: “The environment was richly challenging and spiritually formative, met with professors who engaged with their students both in and beyond the classroom.”
