Category: Humanities & the University

In his 1990 apostolic constitution on Christian education, John Paul II insisted that the university is ex corde ecclesiaeâ??from the heart of the Church. He spoke of the Catholic university, of course, but the vision challenges every Christian university. In Ex Corde Ecclesiae, John Paul wrote: â??With every other university [the Christian university] shares that gaudium de veritate, so precious to Saint Augustine, which is the joy of searching for, discovering and communicating truth in every field of knowledge. [Such] a universityâ??s privileged task is to unite existentially by intellectual effort two orders of reality that too frequently tend to be placed in opposition as though they were antithetical: the search for truth, and the certainty of already knowing the fount of truth.â??

There areâ??or there should beâ??different kinds of universities. At least that is the case if there is no such thing as a university pure and simple. A decision must be made, and constantly remade, to be a particular kind of university. It is sometimes said that a Christian university has a â??dual identity,â?? one by virtue of being a university and another by virtue of being Christian. I suggest that is seriously mistaken, since it assumes that the term university is neutral or self-explanatory. Every university is, whether by careful deliberation or by accident, a university of a particular kind.

The Christian university requires a structured form of conversation, both affirmative and critical, with a particular community of Christian faith. In the absence of such accountabilityâ??an accountability that is not imposed but freely soughtâ??the Christian university will most likely succumb to the institutional and ideological dynamics of other kinds of universities. It is not enough that there be a department of theology or a vibrant student chaplaincy. Indeed, as James Burtchaellâ??s demonstrates in The Dying of the Light: The Disengagement of Colleges and Universities from Their Christian Churches, the schools that ended up in repudiating their Christian founding began by assigning the responsibility to be Christian to theology departments and the chapel. The result was that they lost their connection with â??the Churchâ??s heart for learningâ?? and, along with it, the responsibility of inviting students to enter on the high adventure of the Christian intellectual traditionâ??a tradition ever so much richer than the reductionist Enlightenment embraced by schools that claim to be universities pure and simple.

Richard John Neuhaus A University of a Particular Kind

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

1. We, the Catholic Bishops of Scotland, greet you in the name of the risen Christ. As we continue to celebrate the mystery of Easter, we renew our hope in Jesus Christ as the source of our salvation.

2. Elections to the Scottish Parliament and to Local Authorities are approaching. Each of us is called to make practical political choices for the sake of the common good of the people of Scotland. These choices should be made in conformity with our faith in Christ.

3. The Bishops recognise that many people in politics work conscientiously to achieve good, and we commend them to you. At the same time we cannot fail to notice a conflict of values in society. This conflict of values is reflected in the political sphere in policies, social legislation and regulations which are seriously at odds with the insights and values of our Christian faith and of other faiths.

4. The Bishops remain deeply concerned about legislation which allows abortion, embryo experimentation, easy divorce and civil partnerships. We have always campaigned against poverty, deprivation and injustice. We have raised our voices against a new generation of nuclear weapons. We foresee with apprehension a campaign to legalise euthanasia. We find ourselves having to counter criticism of the very existence of Catholic schools, in large part prompted by an agenda which aims to remove religion from the public sphere.

5. As well as these serious matters, Government has advanced proposals which imply a stealthy and unjust attack on the freedom of religion itself and on the rights of conscience. Earlier this year new regulations were enacted at Westminster which could prevent Catholic adoption agencies from carrying out their work according to the Catholic and Christian vision of family life. Last year, in the face of widespread opposition, the Scottish Parliament extended the right to adopt to unmarried and same sex couples. These dubious innovations are detrimental not just to the good of the Catholic community but to the common good of humanity as a whole. They deserve to be challenged at the ballot box.

6. The coming elections give us an opportunity to vote wisely and to choose the best political representatives for our communities. Many of those standing share our Christian values. There are signs of a desire for an authentic Christian voice in politics serving the common good of people of all faiths and none.

7. Your Bishops urge you to use your vote to support the candidates who offer the best chance of bringing the voice of a truly human and Christian civilisation to the decision-making chambers of our country. We invite you to look beyond the superficially attractive and fashionable to recognise those policies and values which are most in tune with the dignity of the human person and with the common good of our society.

8. To help you vote, we attach with this letter a number of questions you may wish to consider yourself and put to your election candidates.

9. Our faith is in the risen Christ. We are all to witness to Him even in our political choices, in the hope that we can make his love for all men and women more effective in our country!

May God bless you all.

Yours devotedly in Christ,

Scottish Catholic Media Office Catholic Bishops urge voters to challenge attacks on Christian values “at the ballot box”

The Scottish Catholic Media Office provides a service to the press and media, offering them information and guidance on the activities of the Church in Scotland. The Office is responsible to the Bishops’ Conference of Scotland through its National Communications Commission, whose President is Bishop Joseph Devine.

“The Church cannot fail to be ever more deeply involved in the burgeoning world of communications. There must be an active and imaginative engagement of the media by the Church.” Pope John Paul II

Notice that this statement begins with a doxology. This is the only way an announcement or document of the Christian Church can begin. Let’s pick up some of these good habits, shall we?

Now I want to see an English, Anglican (and Catholic) Media Office. It would look like the Anglican Communion Office but will present the views of the Church of England, in the closest possible association with the Roman Catholic Church of England and Wales, to the nation, its government and media. It will be more than a news service (press statements of church news). It will set out the proposals of the Christian Church for the public policy of this nation. Its pronouncements should be shorter versions of the speeches of our remarkable Archbishop of Canterbury, but they will be issued by the bishops of the Church of England as a whole, wherever possible together with the Conference of the Roman Catholic bishops.

Can you fix that for me?

The first of The Scripture and Hermeneutics Seminar consultations took place in Cheltenham in April 1998. The theme for this meeting was the crisis in biblical interpretation and the sort of answers to it being proposed by advocates of speech act theory such as Anthony Thiselton, Nicholas Wolterstorff and Kevin Vanhoozer, all of whom were present. We were not agreed at this consultation whether speech act theory has the resources to take biblical interpretation forward, but it became clear that any attempt to renew biblical interpretation in the academy would require a process with multiple consultations to address the key areas we thought required attention.

Thus was born The Scripture and Hermeneutics Seminar, a ten year project based in Theology and Religious Studies at The University of Gloucestershire, where it is headed up by Craig Bartholomew. The Seminar is a partnership project between British and Foreign Bible Society and The University of Gloucestershire. Its ambitious aim is to facilitate a renewal of biblical interpretation in the academy that will help reopen the Book for our cultures.

The Seminar is thus academic. It recognises the fundamental importance of opening the Book at all levels in our cultures but the Seminar itself is an academic initiative, aimed firstly at biblical interpretation in the academy. The Seminar is interdisciplinary. Meir Sternberg rightly notes that biblical studies is at the intersection of the humanities, and The Seminar is based on the understanding that at this intersection interdisciplinary insight is required if biblical studies is to be saved from some of its isolation and fragmentation, and for new ways forward to be forged. It has been a delight at our consultations to find philosophers rubbing shoulders with educationalists and theologians, and missiologists working with literary scholars to renew biblical interpretation.

The Seminar is Christian. Modernity has marginalised faith in the great public areas of culture but this is a travesty of a Christian perspective in which faith relates to the whole of life. The Seminar is ecumenical and has a wide range of Christian perspectives represented within it. However, it is a rule of The Seminar that faith is not to be excluded from the consultative process that forms the heart of The Seminar. We have been asked about Jewish and other faiths being involved, and we are keen that such dialogue should emerge. However, we have judged it important to keep The Seminar’s Christian character intact at this stage so that the interdisciplinary and faith dynamics have time to be nurtured.

The Seminar is communal. The modern academy is deeply individualistic. But we recognise that a renewal of biblical interpretation will require communal work. And a great aspect of The Seminar is the emerging sense of community amongst Christian scholars of diverse disciplines.

Background: The Ethos of SAHS

Aquinas is the cornerstone of Catholic thought, not just for his doctrine, but for his fidelity and prayer; for his constant and humble attitude of inclusion instead of exclusionâ??always open both to the truths coming from the faith and to those coming from every other thinker and tradition. He did not create a philosophical or theological systemâ??from which eventually some truth, either natural or supernatural, would have been ruled out; rather, he was always ready to welcome new philosophical insights, and to see the constant need for finding harmony between them and the depositum fidei. Thomism is not just one out of many Christian traditions of thought; it is the only safe home where every sincere Christian intellectual can find comfortable refuge and establish the constructive dialogue with other thinkers which leads to the truth.

Aquinas is the model of Catholic thinkers also because he was an authentic citizen of his time: the Medieval Renaissance. He traveled all around the XIII-century world [Europe] more than most of his contemporaries. He gave refined and remarkable answers to the most difficult political, legal and ethical issues debated in his culture. Due to his exceptional problem-solving capacity, he was asked to accomplish (or give advise for) difficult political missions and legal tasks; he was even executor of a will. Indeed, his knowledge of law and politics matched his knowledge of theology and philosophy. Today, in a culture that has lost unity of knowledge and is far from being universal; in a society that has to face the new challenges of relativism and nihilism, on the one hand, and of globalization, on the other, Aquinasâ??s life and thought set the right direction for a revival of truth in ethics and metaphysics.

After Aquinas, his spirit has lived over the centuries through other exceptional people who not only studied what he wrote, but incarnated his same love for God and for â??the world and its values;â?? people with the same â??courage of the truth,â?? â??freedom of spirit in confronting new problems,â?? and â??the intellectual honesty of those who allow Christianity to be contaminated neither by secular philosophy nor by a prejudiced rejection of it;â?? people who pass as well â??into the history of Christian thoughtâ?? as pioneers of the new paths of â??philosophy and universal cultureâ?? (Fides et Ratio, 43) and who keep Aquinas alive for the generations to come. These people connect the past to the future by leaving behind them, not just their priceless writings, but also many good students and young scholars trained in fidelity to the Church, intellectual freedom, open mindedness, and respect for diversity: â??by their fruits you will know themâ?? (Matthew 7:20). In our recent history, we can think of Cornelio Fabro, Etienne Gilson, Jacques Maritain, and Ralph McInerny. These â??Thomistsâ?? have always had greater love for the tradition than for themselves: they have looked to each other, respected each other, worked with each other. Thomistic tradition cannot do without these authentic Thomists, and should stick to them if it wants to go on steadily through the centuries.

Thomas International

Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology of Oxford

The Queen has been pleased to approve that The Reverend Professor Nigel Biggar MA PhD be appointed a Canon of Christ Church and Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology in the University of Oxford from 1 October 2007,in succession to the Reverend Professor Oliver O’Donovan MA DPhil FBA.

The Reverend Professor Nigel Biggar, aged 51, is currently Professor of Theology in the School of Religions and Theology at Trinity College of the University of Dublin, and he is also a Fellow of that college.

Professor Biggar was ordained to the priesthood in 1991, having studied history at Worcester College, Oxford, and theology at Regent College, Vancouver and the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. From 1985 to 1991 he was Research Fellow and Librarian of Latimer House, Oxford; and from 1987 to 1994 he was a part-time Lecturer in Christian Ethics at Wycliffe Hall. He was made Chaplain of Oriel College, Oxford in 1990, and then Fellow in 1993. In 1999 he was appointed Professor of Theology in the University of Leeds. He took up his current post in 2004. From 1999 to 2004 he was Lecturer at the Leeds Parish Church, and since 2004 he has been a Canon of Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin.

Professor Biggar’s many publications include (as editor) Cities of Gods: Faith, Politics and Pluralism in Judaism, Christianity and Islam; a monograph on the ethics of the twentieth century theologian Karl Barth; Good Life: Reflections on What We Value Today; (as editor and contributor) Burying the Past: Making Peace and Doing Justice after Civil Conflict; and most recently, Aiming to Kill, a book on the ethics of suicide and euthanasia.

His current research interests include the doctrine of justified war, the politics of forgiveness, the ethics of (separatist) nationalism and empire, the contribution of religion to public deliberation in a liberal society, the public responsibility of the media, and the bearing of theology on ethics.

This is very good news. My prognostications of last year turn out to have been unjustified. Hooray!

We can still, I think, register disquiet that so little is done by collaboration among Catholics themselves in settings where there is taken for granted a Catholic liturgical and spiritual ambience, and a general consensus about the elements which should enter into a Catholic systematics – a suitable philosophical preamble, linked in some way to the ontological concerns that are central for Catholic thought; the Scriptures regarded as an inspired body of literature; the monuments of Tradition that Catholic theologians have customarily consulted in their scanning of Scripture; the rôle of the magisterium in the making of doctrine and the refraction of its teaching in the lives of the faithful.

There should be in England a Catholic faculty for theology and its ancillary and related disciplines, a faculty serving the mission of the entire Church (not least of the episcopate), contextualised in a setting of liturgical and spiritual effort (it would be ideal to have a contemplative monastery, whether of women or of men, using the paradigm Latin liturgy of the Western Church, at its heart), and articulating a theological doctrine which the Church herself would not disown.

Karl Rahner asked that the theology of the next century be at once missionary and mystagogical. To render what Catholic theologians and scholars have already achieved since the Second Vatican Council even more fruitful for the Church in England in the next century some setting more conducive to such mission and mystagogy-in a word, some more ecclesial setting should be provided. This will not of course guarantee that people will write great theology; but it will provide, insofar as human ingenuity under grace can, the conditions in which a more comprehensive Catholic theology could optimally be produced.

Aidan Nichols OP Catholic Theology in Britain: the Scene since Vatican II part I & part II

The vocation to the Theologian to reflect, to study, to teach, and to write is placed within the mission of the Church, as one of service to it. Examining the British context for theological work, the document discusses Government policy in higher education in relation to the often vulnerable and difficult entrustment of the theologian to truth.

The vocation of the theologian is brought more sharply into focus through a reflection on the situation of the universities in England and Wales. Catholic involvement in Higher Education institutions and Universities is discussed in the context of their participation in the secular system. Both as institutions and individual theologians, we must engage with whatever understanding of education underlies Government policy; and in our own context the proliferation of university places, the diversity of the types of courses and institutions associated with university work, and the tendency to emphasise the role of universities in terms of building economic strength, are forces with which we have to reckon. The paper addresses philosophical and theological concerns about the role and purpose of the university in human social life. Central to this is the question of what truth has become in a postmodern context, and what the Church’s response can unfold.

We consider the Catholic theological voice as it emerges in our context. In particular, the place of the lay theologian, and to the most commonly ecumenical, ‘lay’, or secular contexts in which Catholic theologians of all states of life are working. The setting of the secular university is challenging and rigorous, often isolating when Christian theologians seek to respond as part of the Church’s missio ad Gentes. Spiritual formation, and the fostering of communion is imperative, in cooperation with the Church’s pastors and those called to form and teach the people of God. We therefore discuss the character of pedagogy and its disciplines in relation to secular and Christian practice.

Summary of Proposals

1. The calling of a colloquium to debate the discussion proposed in this document, under the direction of the Committee for Theology of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales.

2. As part of this colloquium, the setting out of specific proposals to strengthen the collaboration between the Bishops and theologians at national and local level. These should concentrate, not on activism – the setting up of committees and so forth – but on the means by which loving and fruitful bonds, rooted in the life of the Church and its prayer, should be founded and nurtured between those called to teach and study and those whose task it is to ensure the proper education and formation of the People of God.

3. A discussion of the means by which lay theologians in particular may be formed, and nourished in their formation.

4. That there be initiated a continuing dialogue between the Bishops, the Catholic Theological Association of Great Britain and other interested groups around the issues of the Church’s missio ad gentes as it takes place in the universities and other institutes of higher education.

5. The bonds between those who teach theology in our seminaries and Catholic theologians who teach in universities should be strengthened.

6. A discussion of the concrete means by which the Church may contribute to the discussion of the meaning of education in national life, through publications, and contributions to national forums.

The Vocation and Formation of Theologians and the Teaching Office of the Bishop in the British Context – A Discussion Sponsored by the Society of St. Catherine of Siena (large PDF)

I have just had a look around the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and the Family in Melbourne

Here is the curriculum for the Masters in Sacred Theology

The Human Person
Being, Knowing and Choosing
Philosophical Foundations of Bioethics
St Thomas for the 21st Century
Nature and Method of Theology
Biblical Theology of Marriage and the Family
Marriage in the Catholic Tradition
Theology of the Family as the Domestic Church
Theology of the Body
Theological Anthropology
Vatican II, John Paul II and Recent Catholic Thought
New Evangelization in Post-Modern Culture
Themes in Systematic Theology
Foundations of Christian Moral Life
Virtues, Norms and Happiness
Theology and Practice of Natural Family Planning
Social Science of Marriage and the Family
Psychology and Pastoral Care of the Family
Politics of Marriage, Family and Life
Educating in Sexuality, Marriage, Family and Life
Authority and Freedom

Being, Knowing, Choosing? Authority and Freedom? Redemption of Sexuality? Happiness?

Wow. I’m off to Oz to get my education started at last.

One clear realization to emerge from â?¦ Christianity and the Soul of the University â?¦ is that Protestants may actually have a more difficult time maintaining a meaningfully Christian university than Catholics. As Daniel Williams, a religion professor at Baylor, explains, â??antitraditionalist and antidogmatic perspectives are built into the Protestant religious ethos,â?? and an emphasis on private judgment and personal experience â??as an arbiter of ultimate meaningâ?? render articulable institutional boundaries elusive. This skepticism of tradition and community can leave Protestants rudderless on issues not addressed explicitly by Scripture, which may help explain why Protestant schools that do achieve a robust religious identity tend to rely on rigid codes of conduct.

Judging by the contributorsâ?? frequent invocations of John Paul IIâ??s Ex Corde Ecclesiae as a helpful statement of the Christian universityâ??s mission, Protestants may have realized that Catholics have some insight on how to weave the Gospel into the fabric of a community. But Catholics also stand to learn from Protestants, who can bring a fresh focus on the simplicity and centrality of the Christian story. In this regard Steven Harmon, a theology professor at Campbell University, urges academics to reclaim the story â??as the first-order foundation of Christian intellectual communityâ?? in order to provide â??common ground on which faculty from multiple denominational traditions and theological perspectives may stand together while making their own distinctive contributions to the second-order argument that the integration of faith and learning entails.â??

Perhaps the bookâ??s most helpful contribution is its identification of essential qualities that will mark an intellectual community founded on the truth claims of Jesus Christ. Three in particular stand out.

First, the Christian virtue of hospitality, according to Aurelie Hagstrom, a theology professor at Providence College, â??reflects a radically different and compelling alternative to tolerance.â?? While tolerance is a â??false sort of engagementâ?? given its tendency â??to trivialize what is most important to us,â?? hospitality demands â??a personal, authentic encounter that is self-emptying and open even to those with whom we have deep philosophical, theological, and political disagreements.â?? Under this view, the universityâ??s sponsoring religious community acts as host, and community members from other religious traditions are welcomed as guests. In todayâ??s hyper-egalitarian campus environment, attaching the â??guestâ?? label to non-Christians will smack of paternalism, but the host-guest paradigm may be inescapable if the Christian story is to have a privileged role as a shaper of the institution and its mission.

Second, if the personal engagement contemplated by hospitality is to be authentic, conflict must be embracedâ??even facilitatedâ??at a Christian university. Steven Harmon insists that Christian identity is hindered by a fear, â??not of communal theological reflection per se, but rather of the intellectual conflict arising from this much-needed conversation.â?? Borrowing from the work of the noted philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, Harmon reminds us that a vital tradition will embody continuing conflict, and that a tradition without conflict is a dead or dying one. This can help reframe our orientation. Passionate debates over the implications of a universityâ??s Christian heritage are too often taken as signals that the heritage is in jeopardy; instead, they may be signs of life.

Third, if the Christian story is to be at the center of the communityâ??s identity, Christian worship must be at the center of the communityâ??s life. Several contributors point out the feebleness of any Christian community that lacks a shared worship experience. Especially for a faculty that purports to be more than the sum of its parts, a regular opportunity to participate in worship together is an essential ingredient. A Christian intellectual community must build up more than the intellect.

Robert K. Vischer Review of Douglas Henry & Michael Beatty (eds) Christianity and the Soul of the University: Faith as a Foundation for Intellectual Community

And see also John Sommerville The Decline of the Secular University: Why the Academy Needs Religion