Religious Studies Theology And The University

Explores the relationship between religious studies and theology and the place of each in the modern, secular university.

This book provides the first historical examination of the study of religion in Canada. While secular departments of religious studies would not emerge in Canada until the late 1960s, the teaching of religion under the guise of divinity, theology, the Bible, and moral philosophy has been omnipresent for much of the country’s history. The gradual transformation from the teaching of religious truths at denominational theological colleges to the non-denominational and secular study of religion at universities was a lengthy and complicated one. From Seminary to University examines this transformation against a much broader backdrop. It is not simply the history of individual departments scattered across the nation. Instead, the story reveals the many non-academic forces that made those departments possible, such as the creation of the United Church of Canada, the adoption of multiculturalism, and the introduction of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In recounting this transformation, From Seminary to University illuminates an important part of Canadian history.

A collection of essays by some of today's leading academics on the sometimes contentious relationship between religious studies and theology.

In this final volume in a national survey of the study of religion in Canada, Bowlby (Chair, Religious Studies, St. Mary's U., Nova Scotia) reviews the religious studies departments of the four Atlantic Provinces of Canada (Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and New Brunswick). The author begins with a brief history of the foundation of universities in the Atlantic region, then moves on to examine the curriculum, degree programs, and both the strengths and weaknesses of departments, acknowledging that religious studies programs are often at risk, and offers suggestions for future growth, or for some colleges, even survival. c. Book News Inc.

This 2005 book asks: how will theology and the religions be studied in higher education in the coming century?

If the secular university by definition is non-sectarian or non-denominational, then how can it accommodate a discipline like Christian theology? Doesn’t the traditional goal of theological study, which is to attain knowledge of the divine, fundamentally conflict with the main goal of secular academic study, which is to attain knowledge about ourselves and the world in which we live? So why should theology be admitted, or even care about being admitted, into secular academic life? And even if theology were admitted, what contribution to secular academic life could it make? Working from a Christian philosophical and theological perspective but also engaging a wide range of theologians, philosophers, and religious studies scholars, Christian Theology and the Secular University takes on these questions, arguing that Christian theology does belong in the secular university because it provides distinct resources that the secular university needs if it is going to fulfill what should be its main epistemic and educative ends. This book offers a fresh and unique perspective to scholars working in the disciplines of theology, philosophy, and religious studies, and to those in other academic disciplines who are interested in thinking critically and creatively about the place and nature of theological study within the secular university.

This text offers an introduction to the philosophy and practice of undergraduate research in religious studies and takes up several significant ongoing questions related to it.

This volume will show how various intellectual disciplines (most found within the modern university) can learn from theology and philosophy in primarily methodological and substantitive terms. It will explore the possible ways in which current presuppositions and practices of the displine might be challenged. It will also indicate the possibilities of both a "Christian Culture" in relation to that discipline or the way in which that discipline might look within a real or theoretical Christian university.