Gloria Dei received its premiere production at Gardner-Webb University in February 2008, directed by Scot Lahaie. The production was designed by Christopher Keene, with costumes by Stacie Worrell.

The play is set in a jail cell and courtroom in Pinellas Park County, Florida in 2006 — inspired by the Terri Schiavo court case, which played out from 1990 to 2005. A court order allows a brain-dead woman to die of starvation. She is poisoned before her body complies. A priest is accused of the crime. Is it murder or mercy killing? What follows is an unsparing courtroom drama about justice, conscience, and the right to live.