David DeCosse

David DeCosse serves as Director of Religious and Catholic Ethics and Campus Ethics Programs at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics and Adjunct Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Santa Clara University, where he has worked since 2002. His campus-wide initiatives span academic integrity, student government ethics, engineering ethics, environmental ethics, and the "hookup culture," including organizing a major conference on Pope Francis' Laudato Si encyclical.

He holds a doctorate in theological ethics from Boston College following undergraduate studies at Harvard College.

DeCosse's research centers on Catholic theology's intersection with democratic culture, specializing in social ethics, political theology, and conscience studies. His scholarship critically examines war ethics, freedom of speech in religious contexts (e.g., Danish cartoons controversy), Catholic sexual abuse crisis responses, and environmental ethics through Catholic social teaching. Recent work focuses on institutional applications of conscience in Catholic health care.

He manages the Ethics Center's research grant program and mentors undergraduate student fellows in applied ethics projects. Editorial leadership includes co-editing volumes on conscience in Catholicism and Catholic health care policy, stemming from Center-hosted conferences.