Barrett I. Duke, Jr., Ph.D.

Barrett Duke is Vice President for Research and Director of the Research Institute of The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the Southern Baptist Convention’s agency for “applied Christianity” (social and moral concerns). He has been with the agency since 1997.

Prior to coming to his position at the ERLC, Barrett served as founding pastor of the Cornerstone Baptist Church in Denver, Colorado, from 1984 to 1996. During this time, he led a small home Bible study group of 13 people to organize as a church of nearly 200. In addition, he led the congregation to purchase 8 acres of land and build a 22,000 square foot first phase church building in a rapidly growing suburb of Denver.

Barrett received a Bachelor of Arts degree, with a major in Bible (summa cum laude), in 1982 from the Criswell Center for Biblical Studies in Dallas, Texas. During his years at the Criswell Center for Biblical Studies, he served as Study Body Vice President and President. He received a Master of Arts degree, with honors, in Old Testament Studies in 1985 from the Denver Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary in Denver, Colorado. While at Denver Seminary, Barrett participated in a 3 week study tour of Israel at the Institute of Holy Land Studies in Jerusalem, Israel. In 1999, he received a Ph.D. in Religious and Theological Studies from the joint doctoral program of the Iliff School of Theology and the University of Denver in Denver, Colorado.

Barrett has served Southern Baptists in numerous ways. He was President of the Denver Association’s Pastor’s Conference from 1992 to 1993. He served on the Board of Trustees of the Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary in San Francisco, California from 1991 to 1996. Barrett also served on the Seminary Extension Task Force for Colorado, which established a permanent satellite school of the Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary in Denver, Colorado.

Barrett has worked with congressmen and government agencies on numerous legislative and public policy issues, including substance abuse, gambling and education. Barrett’s ministry has taken him to numerous churches around the country and to South Korea. He has spoken on the sanctity of human life, gambling, homosexuality, capital punishment, public education, separation of church and state, and other issues in numerous religious and civic settings. He has served as a guest expert on gambling issues on the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission’s national live radio program. Barrett taught Old Testament and Hebrew at the Denver Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary for four years, has been a guest lecturer in ethics at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky and the New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. He has also served as resident pastor and chapel speaker at Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary in San Francisco.

Since coming to the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, he has authored or revised five pamphlets addressing gambling and has edited numerous pamphlets on other ethical issues. His pamphlets on casino and lottery gambling have sold over 100,000 copies. His articles on gambling and the environment have appeared in the Commission’s publication, Light. He is the author of the article on capital punishment in the forthcoming Broadman Bible Dictionary. He is co-author with Dr. Richard Land of the chapter “Fatherhood in the Evangelical Tradition” in the volume The Faith Factor in Fatherhood, published in 1999. He is currently a translator for the new Broadman & Holman translation of the Old Testament.

Barrett grew up in New Orleans, Louisiana. He has been married to the former Denise Irene Young since 1982. They have 3 children: Grace, 14; Barrett, 13; and Robert, 9. They make their home in a suburb of Nashville, Tennessee.