Meet Our Team

Joshua Erlien is a teacher, writer, community apologist, and a homeschool dad. He has served as the director for the UNC Charlotte Ratio Christi chapter since 2011. His experience with college students has clarified and focused his perspective on outreach and discipleship.

Joshua has worked with TEAM at Southern Evangelical Seminary speaking in a lecture tour in Italy, and conferences and panel Q & A forums locally. As a Community Apologist, Joshua speaks to churches, community groups, and families on apologetics issues with a focus on commending Jesus Christ through winsome conversation.

Joshua and his wife, Nita, have four children and reside in Charlotte. They are passionate about helping families and students thrive by passing on the faith to the next generation in an intellectually credible and compelling way.

Dan was born in Central Georgia and raised in the northwest Atlanta area. He graduated from Marietta High School in 1996, after which he married his High School sweetheart, Kathy, and enlisted in the United States Air Force. Together, Dan and Kathy have five children and have been a homeschooling family since 2009. The Ippolito family retired from active duty in 2014, and Dan entered Gospel ministry shortly thereafter. He holds seminary degrees in Religious Education and Apologetics from Liberty University and Southern Evangelical Seminary, respectively. He is projected to complete his Doctor of Ministry in Apologetics in Fall of 2018.

In addition to his role as Private and Homeschool Engagement Director with Engage 360 Ministries, Dan serves as the Director of Veritas Classical Schools, Dawson County, Georgia–alongside Kathy, who also serves as a teacher and Administrative Assistant. He also leads a Ratio Christi chapter at the University of North Georgia discipling and training college students. Dan is passionate about evangelism, apologetics, and classical education. It is both his calling and pleasure to equip the saints for the work of ministry and evangelism. (Mt 9:37-38, 28:18-20; Jn. 10:16; Acts 1:8; Rom 10:11-15; Eph. 4:12; Phlm. 6)

Christian currently serves as Regional Director of Finance & Operation for KIPP Charlotte where he manages all regional finance activities, HR, and technology work and ensures that the organization is in compliance with financial and government regulations. Prior to joining the team at KIPP Charlotte, Christian served as Operations Controller for Canteen, a Division of Compass Group North America where he was responsible for financial and operational oversight of multiple business lines in the group’s Mid-South division with annual revenues in excess of $175 million dollars. Prior to his role with Compass Group, from 2014-2016, Christian’s ministry work included serving at Southern Evangelical Seminary in various capacities, including Chief Operating Officer. More recently, in February 2017, Christian was appointed to the Board of Trustees at Southern Evangelical Seminary. Christian also previously served as Chief Financial Officer for Ratio Christi, an international campus alliance from 20152018

A veteran in the non-profit and for-profit arenas alike, Christian served as Chief Operating Officer of the National Children’s Oral Health Foundation from 2006-2014 where he was responsible for directing all aspects of daily operations, including finance, marketing, human resources, IT, and development. Before getting involved in non-profit management, Christian spent 15 years in the publishing industry where he managed a multi-state weekly publication in the financial sector.

Throughout his career, Christian has developed extensive management experience and has a significant track record of demonstrated successes in the areas of financial management, non-profit regulations, internal controls, and strategic planning. Mr. Drake has a passion for process improvement and looks forward to continuing to hone these skills through his various professional endeavors.

Tony Gurule is the Vice President of Radical Truth, a full-time missionary, speaker and trainer. He is also the host of Colliding Worldviews on the Aramaic Broadcasting Network’s Trinity Channel, and the host of Ratio Christi’s Truth Matters television show. Last but not least, Tony is a Community Apologist who informs and equips both adults and youth, especially in the areas of evangelism, apologetics, and Islam.

Chris was born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan, playing baseball, riding bikes, and going to the beach on the shores of Lake Michigan. He was raised in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and always believed in God. However, Chris suffered childhood trauma at age 13 when his mother was in a head-on collision which left her bodily mangled, mentally damaged, and the other driver – a mother of four – gone. While he never stopped believing in God, he certainly lived a life of running away from the pain. He gave the Lord the middle finger and lived a party life for about a decade. At age 22, the Holy Spirit performed a radical work of grace in Chris through the preaching of Pastor Glenn Shelton at Lakeshore Lutheran Church in Grand Haven. God’s presence in Chris’s life was now all-too real, and it was a dramatic experience.

Not all was peaches and cream though. Chris soon found out that deep skepticism against Christian belief came from many fronts – especially on the college campus. This hostility to the Christian faith inspired in Chris the desire to know why Christianity is true, and what evidences for it were available. And this wasn’t just to make him more equipped at sharing his faith. He had his own questions as well. Big questions. This led Chris to study apologetics and eventually earn a Master of Divinity with biblical languages. Years later he earned a Master’s degree in Philosophy.

Today, Chris is a chapter director with Ratio Christi, a campus apologetics ministry. He also teaches ethics at the local community college where he lives. He also helps educate his three children at home in the classical method, teaching Latin, Logic, History, Writing, Rhetoric, and more. He has been to Ethiopia six times, teaching philosophy and theology there, and serving with a non-profit child sponsorship ministry which helps widows and orphans affected by HIV. Chris is just as interested in enabling personal well-being in others he is in apologetics, philosophy, etc.

He is an avid student of music theory for guitar and aspires to someday be a shred god on his Fender Stratocaster. His hobbies are mountain biking, hiking, shredding on his Strat, and reading. His favorite book is The Lord of the Rings. He lives in Hickory, NC with his wife Monica and three daughters. Someday, he hopes to have a “real job.”