This presentation by Dr. Jessica ChenFeng, PhD, LMFT, titled "A Long Faithfulness Across Generations: Rupture & Repair in Asian American Families," was recorded on April 10, 2026. The lecture was part of the 2026 conference "Our Flourishing, Our Faith: Navigating Rupture and Repair in Asian American Christian Communities," presented by the Center for Asian American Christianity at Princeton Theological Seminary and the Rosemead School of Psychology at Biola University. You can learn more about this conference here: https://ourflourishing.org/.
Family rupture in Asian American contexts is shaped by immigration narratives, cultural scripts, and intergenerational silence that can sometimes fuel disconnect and distance. This plenary explores the sources of familial rupture and offers a multi-layered framework for repair that integrates intrapersonal reflection, neurobiological regulation, and relational attunement while honoring generational distinctions and Asian American relational ethics. The conversation will be grounded in the reality that repair is sanctification work—a decades-long journey across seasons of life that finds its sustaining hope not in resolution but in Christ who came to give us fullness of life.
Jessica ChenFeng, PhD, LMFT is an associate professor of marriage and family therapy and DMFT program chair at Fuller Theological Seminary, and an associate editor for Family Process journal. She has been a practicing MFT for almost 20 years and consults with academic, healthcare and church organizations to improve the well-being of people within their communities. Her research and clinical work center around social contextual intersections of race, gender, generation, trauma, and spirituality. She is the director of the Asian American Well-being Collaboratory and co-author of Finding Your Voice as a Beginning Marriage and Family Therapist and co-editor of Asian American Identities, Relationships, and Post-Migration Legacies.
Time Stamps:
00:00 Speaker Introduction
01:58 Jessica Opening Reflection
02:42 First Client and Calling
09:05 A New Moment for the Asian American Church
12:12 Presentation Framework
12:58 Theological Reflections: Sanctification as a Long Faithfulness
16:46 Case Study
20:17 Relational Systems Framework
27:31 Shame and Therapy Pathways
31:51 Common Asian American Family Ruptures
34:55 Understanding Rupture
39:56 Postures of Repair
43:07 The Work of Repair
44:59 Repair with Parents, Spouse, and Kids
49:44 A Long Faithfulness Closing
Photo by Hannah Busing on Unsplash
