Canadian Theological Society Annual Meeting

"Theology: With or Without Boundaries?"

University of Toronto, 26-28 May 2002

Sunday, 26 May

9:30 am, Emmanuel College 319

Welcome and Announcements by Cynthia Crysdale, President

9:45 am, Emmanuel College 319

Panel: "Metaphors, Modernity and Method in Theology:

A Conversation with the Work of George P. Schner, S.J."

Chair--Eric Beresford, Anglican Church of Canada; Panelists--Jane Barter Moulaison, Emmanuel College; Loraine McKenzie Shepherd, University of Winnipeg; Patrick Patterson, Wycliffe College; and Philip Ziegler, Princeton University

In two final programmatic essays--"Metaphors for Theology" in J. Webster and G. P. Schner, eds., Theology After Liberalism (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 3-51 and "Waiting for Godot: Scripture, Tradition and Church at Century's End," Toronto Journal of Theology 17:1 (2001), pp. 33-54--George Schner sets out a description and analysis of the methodological possibilities for theology at the twilight of high-modernity. Schner finds in Kant, Schleiermacher, Hegel, and Kierkegaard the paradigmatic options, the categorical frameworks, for contemporary Christian theology. A rigorous reading of these constitutive sources of modernity exposes the extent to which Christian theology has permitted itself to be variously proscribed within their parochial, even procrustean, cast. That exposure provides, in turn, the occasion for the provocative proposal with which both essays conclude: that theology risk "tripping the bounds" bequeathed to it by this legacy, appropriate a variant set of methods and metaphors, and so make itself available once again to those tasks which befall it from the freedom, mystery and novelty of the gospel. This session will aim to engage the gathered Society in a focused discussion of the course, commitments and cataracts of theological method at the present time. It will do so by means of a sustained conversation with these two texts. Members of the Society will be encouraged to have prepared the texts prior to the session. Following the presentation of four brief responses (of less than ten minutes each) to the insights and arguments of these essays by four panelists, an open seminar session will be moderated in which questions and contentions surrounding Schner's proposals will be discussed.

11:15 am

Break

11:30 am, Emmanuel College 319

"Breaking Barriers and Building Boundaries:

Christian Jewish Relations in the Writings of Leo Baeck"

Dow Marmur, University of St. Michael's College

Leo Baeck is one of the most significant Jewish thinkers of the 20th century. His response to Harnack's The Essence of Christianity as The Essence of Judaism made him an important exponent of Judaism and interpreter of Christianity early in his career. As a liberal rabbi he broke many barriers between Christianity and Judaism, but as an exponent of Judaism he also sought to establish firm boundaries between them. At times this turned him into a sharp critic of Christianity. The pattern set by Baeck is reflected in much of what has been written and said by Jews on the subject since. The paper, which I hope can be presented as a regular or a special paper, will attempt to assess Baeck's contribution to Jewish-Christian relations and his influence on those who followed him. The fact that he was the acknowledged leader of German Jewry during most of the Nazi era and survived the concentration camp of Theresienstadt to continue his writing and teaching in Britain and the United States, will be acknowledged as a relevant dimension of the discussion.

12:30 pm

Lunch

2:00 pm, Emmanuel College 319

"On the Boundary: Paul Tillich and Mikhail Bakhtin"

Peter Slater, Trinity College

Tillich's autobiographical essay was entitled "On the Boundary" but arguably he belonged in the middle of most movements of his time--religious socialism, depth psychology, dialectical theology, religion and culture, interreligious dialogue. By contrast with Barth, he was a both-and thinker practising Christian apologetics for the twentieth century. He called himself a belief-ful realist. Mikhail Bakhtin was Tillich's contemporary but, due to his banishment during the Stalinist era, his dialogical aesthetics and mostly implicit Russian Orthodox theology only became well known in the west at the end of the century. He anticipated the later Wittgenstein on linguistic meaning as use in context and rejected Buber's Neo-Kantian dichotomy between description and evaluation. For Bakhtin, all boundaries are permeable, including those between persons and things. Mind-body dualism is an abstraction but ineradicable differences between the orientations of self and other result in perspectival realism. This paper will compare and contrast their responses to Marxism, philosophies of language, appeal to aesthetic values, and positions on faith and culture.

3:00 pm, Emmanuel College 319

"Sole Journey: Gender, Identity and Dialectic"

Cora Twohig-Moengangongo, Niagara University

I had a dream. A child of about nine years has long been held captive and in one deliberate movement the child reaches down, pulls apart her moccasin/shoe and discovers, sewn into its sole, an ancient design that she recognizes instantly as her stolen inheritance, marking her true identity and confirming her freedom. From long ago we are programmed to know and to know truth. This is our existential constitution. Intentionality analysis is Bernard Lonergan's exquisite invitation to appropriate a dynamic structure that is human inquiring intelligence for correct understanding, true judging, moral deciding and loving existence. Feminist consciousness is a contemporary historical expression of women's self-determination. Theological foundations as Lonergan's explication of a four-fold conversion dynamic provide categories explaining authentic consciousness. Meanings in contemporary feminisms are explored through Lonergan's categories. Feminist consciousness is born of and lives within conflict: psychic, social, cultural and religious. Lonergan's notion of dialectic, based on the dynamic operations of consciousness, deals with conflict as constitutive of historical process unfolding in dialectically related processes toward or away from integrity. This work proposes that feminist consciousness is constitutive of integral or distorted dialectical functioning, for women, society and culture and will map the direction of this work, taking an excursus into one dialectical process, that within a person, to gesture toward meaning and value for the sole journey.

3:45 pm

Break

4:00 pm, Emmanuel College 319

Canadian Theological Society Presidential Address

"Crossing Boundaries: Virtue or Vice for the 21st century?"

Cynthia Crysdale, Catholic University of America

5:00 pm

Dinner

8:00 pm, Emmanuel College 001

Joint Session with CSSR, CSBS, and CSCH

"The Reshaping of North American Islam"

Yvonne Haddad, Centre for Muslim-Christian Understanding, Georgetown University

9:30 pm, Alumni Hall, Victoria College

Reception

Monday, 27 May

8:30-12:00 am, Victoria College 211

Board Meeting, Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion

9:00 am, Emmanuel College 319

"Plantinga on Warranted Christian Belief and the Internal Instigation of the Holy Spirit"

James Horne

Plantinga depicts warranted (rational) Christian belief as "self-authenticating," appearing (like beliefs of sense perception) in properly functioning persons under suitable conditions, and important one being "the internal instigation of the Holy Spirit" (IIHS). Defending such beliefs from Freudian and Marxian reductionists, postmodern critics, pluralists, and others, he repeatedly appeals to "a means of knowledge they don't have" (Warranted Christian Belief, Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 451). For Plantinga, IIHS is not an extraordinary visionary or mystical experience, but rather (on the "Aquinas/Calvin model"), happens to a person in normal consciousness encountering Scripture and the Church's inspired teachings. Plantinga's argument is successful, but vulnerable to the pluralist objection that, with certain substitutions, it can warrant a number of other religious beliefs. Aware of this charge, Plantinga develops an exclusivist response that ultimately involves appeal to IIHS. My critical comments are mixed, finally suggesting that if a modification of mine were added his argument could provide the beginning of a synthesis of pluralism and exclusivism.

10:00 am

Break

10:15 am, Emmanuel College 319"'Religious Experience' in Lonergan's Project"

Gordon Rixon, Regis College

The paper is a continuation of my research into the significance and role of mysticism for the development of Bernard Lonergan's intellectual project, especially the emergence of his methodologically grounded approach to theological reflection. Building on my previous archival research, I further clarify Lonergan's discussion of "religious experience" by contrasting Lonergan's appropriation of Ignatian spirituality with that of Karl Rahner, especially as presented in Philip Endean's recent Karl Rahner and Ignatian Spirituality (Oxford University Press, 2001). I propose that Lonergan's location of "religious experience" as an activity within deliberative consciousness addresses many of the critical issues which Endean raises regarding the foundational status assigned to the religious experience of consolation without previous cause in the Rahnerian corpus.

11:00 am, Emmanuel College 319

Student Essay: Presenter TBA

12:00 pm

• Lunch

• Annual Meeting, Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion, Victoria College 115

1:30 pm, Emmanuel College 319

Panel: "Movements of the Spirit: New Identities, Solidarities, and Hope for the World"

Panelists--Lee Cormie, University of St. Michael's College; Heather Eaton, St. Paul University; and Cristina Vanin, St. Jerome's University

The fragmenting of identities, weakening boundaries of community, relativizing of traditions, erosion of established authorities, crises in long-established ethical frameworks, growing political cynicism and paralysis--all have received great attention in recent years, especially in the discourse of post modernity. And developments in knowledges, technologies, global communications, immigration and refugee flows are helping to erode old forms of order. At the same time, though, the irruptions of "new" voices and movements "from below" and all those in solidarity with them have been forging new axes of identity, bonds of solidarity, and forms of collaboration in practice. In the process they are re-inscribing the boundaries of and connections between personal and social, private and public, local and global, civilization and nature, religion and economy, church and world, ethics and politics. Thus these are new actors, neither inside nor outside of familiar boundaries. This panel witnesses to particular expressions of these developments--in feminist, ecology, and jubilee movements--and probes points of convergence and intersection among them as concrete expressions of the Spirit of hope for a new beginning in history. We will engage in very short presentations, structured conversations, and open conversations.

3:00 pm

Break

3:15 pm, Emmanuel College 319

"Irenaeus, Derrida, and Hospitality: On the Eschatological Overcoming of Violence"

Hans Boersma, Religious Studies Department, Trinity Western University

God's hospitality or welcome of human beings into eternal life can be approached either by means of Western (kataphatic) or Eastern (apophatic) strategies. The former tend to result in a continuation of time and space-and hence limited or bounded existence-in eternity. I explore Derrida's understanding of "pure hospitality," a hospitality without boundaries, which contains some interesting points of comparison with apophatic theology. In an attempt to underwrite a meaningful concept of hospitality, I then appeal to Irenaeus' eschatology, which exhibits a fruitful tension between kataphatic and apophatic elements. On the one hand, the bishop's millenarian opposition to Gnosticism implies the continuation of the substance of creation in the eternal Kingdom. On the other hand, Irenaeus' emphasis on deification and visio Dei suggests a future of "pure hospitality" and openness. I conclude that Irenaeus' "eschatological hospitality" provides a transcendent warrant for the flourishing of human hospitality.

4:15 pm

Break

4:30 pm, Emmanuel College 319

Canadian Theological Society Annual General Meeting

7:00 pm, Location TBA

Canadian Theological Society Dinner

Tuesday, 28 May

9:00 am, Emmanuel College 319

Panel: "Bodily Pain and the Creation of Religious Identity"

Panelists--Alyda Faber, Atlantic School of Theology; Lorraine Ferguson, independent scholar; Kathleen Skerrett, Grinnell College; and Ivette Vargus, Harvard University

In Sacred Pain (Oxford University Press,2001), Ariel Glucklich argues that the effects of bodily pain play a significant role in the disintegration and reintegration of religious identity in many different traditions. This panel considers the significance of bodily pain in the creation of Christian identities and communities. The panel will explore ways that the human capacity for bodily pain provides opportunities to deconstruct and reconstruct commitment to particular worlds of meaning. We inquire how religious meanings become interwoven with experiences of pain, and experiences of pain become interwoven with religious subjectivity. The papers will address pain, therefore, as a situation of human embodiment where physical, spiritual, and theological stimuli converge in powerful ways, and how the psychic experience of pain transforms consciousness of self-body boundaries, and self-other boundaries. These effects of pain play an important role in the creation and transformation of religious identity and communities.

10:30 am

Break

10:45 am, Emmanuel College 319

Paper: "With and Without Boundaries: Christian Homemaking

Amidst Postmodern Homelessness"

Brian J. Walsh, Wycliffe College and Steve Bouma-Prediger, Hope College

The themes of home, homelessness, and homecoming are pervasive in contemporary culture. From the crisis in affordable housing to the decline of the family farm, in scholarly tomes and in the popular press, from literature and art through advertising and the movies, these seemingly ubiquitous motifs illuminate much (including much theology) of what is often called postmodernity. But what precisely does it mean to be at home? And what are the various ways of being homeless? There are, after all, different ways a person can be and feel not at home--immigrant, refugee, migrant, expatriate. And what exactly is homecoming? And if Christian, how should the biblical vision of the world as God's home and of God indwelling all creation shape our thinking and acting? In this paper we argue that a phenomenology of home reveals that authentic homes have certain kinds of boundaries. The making of a home requires a particular kind of boundary-making. But homes, if authentic, are not fortified fortresses, impenetrable to the Other. In healthy homes certain forms of boundary crossing are not just permitted but encouraged and celebrated. Indeed, homecoming elicits homemaking. In receiving the gift of home grateful people exhibit certain virtues and engage in certain actions. Homemakers are people of memory, community, and hospitality. To show how these metaphors can enrich Christian theology is the aim of this paper. Wendell Berry, Christine Pohl, Jürgen Moltmann, Edith Wyschogrod, Emmanuel Levinas, Rosemary Haughton, and Erazim Kohak are amongst our dialogue partners for this project.

11:45 am

Announcements

12:00 pm

• Lunch

• Meeting of 2002-03 CTS Executive, Location TBA

• CCSR Lunch for Graduate Students:

"Preparing for an Academic Career in Religions Studies"

Seminar Room, Centre for the Study of Religion, 123 St. George St.

Pamela Klassen, University of Toronto

1:30 pm, Emmanuel College 319

"Theological Foundations for Conflict Resolution"

Moni McIntyre, Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Graduate programmes in conflict resolution are popular in many institutions these days, including my own Duquesne University, where students may specialize in issues such as community mediation, ethnic conflicts, international relations, environmental concerns, education, and alternative dispute resolution. Our programme and others like it are not sponsored by departments of theology; consequently, their emphasis tends to be on practical, theoretical, and philosophical foundations for success in mediation and peace making. In this paper, I develop theological foundations for conflict resolution. Initially, I define the concept and consider whether conflict resolution is always a desirable goal. In addition, I examine biblical foundations as well as traditional and contemporary Christian approaches to reconciliation, pacifism and nonviolence, the belief in the innate goodness of the human person, creation, human freedom, justice, and mercy. I conclude with a call to departments of theology to consider incorporating conflict resolution as part of their curriculum.

2:30 pm, Emmanuel College 319

Work in Progress: "A La Gloire de Dieu": Stravinsky among the Theologians"

Patrick Patterson, Wycliffe College

"I do not like facile analogies," Stravinsky caustically remarked. But there is nothing facile about the intercourse of theological and musical themes in Stravinsky's own life and work. In permitting this lively mind and passionate soul to take his place in contemporary theological conversation, this paper proposes to make a modest contribution to the brief but illustrious line of border crossings between music and theology, that includes Barth on Mozart, Kung on Mozart, and Pelikan on Bach. More than either Bach or Mozart, Stravinsky was self-consciously and stimulatingly, if also sometimes outrageously, theological in his reflections about a host of topics, including the relationships between faith and art, liturgy and performance, sacred and secular, dogma and creativity. His life spans much of the 20^th century, and reaches from Russia (1882-1913), to Europe (1913-1939), to the United States (1939-1971). From the Krisis of "The Rite of Spring" in the 19-teens, through the so-called neo-classical turn of the 20's, 30's and 40's, to the rejection of Schoenberg's systematic and formally consistent 12-tone method, to the provocative adoption of serial technique in his last years, and in the various attempts at the reform of liturgical music throughout his career, this paper will explore the profound and illuminating methodological implications of Stravinsky's work for the doing of theology at the turn of the millennia.

3:15 pm

Break

3:30 pm, Emmanuel College 319

"With and Without Boundaries: Film and Religious Narratives in the Postmodern World"

Panelists--Scott Kline, McGill University; Mario DeGiglio-Bellemare, University of St. Michael's College; and Erin Runions, Columbia University

This panel will focus on the importance of film as a medium through which religious narratives are revealed in our so-called postmodern world. The panel frames its focus by drawing on the fields of Christian ethics, biblical studies, and systematic theology. Although the papers communicate diverse perspectives, they all seek to critically address questions relating to social justice in Western cinema within the context of the grand narratives of modernity. The papers will consider Krzysztof Kieslowski's portrayal of the quintessential modern values of liberty, equality and fraternity in a world disillusioned by modernity's failure to universalize its core values in politics or society in his Bleu, Blanc and Rouge trilogy; the often maligned horror genre, as seen in films such as Frankenstein (1931) and The Wolf Man (1941), as a key to understanding the place occupied by popular religion in the construction of modern theology; and two imperialist texts--the 1999 film about the gulf war, Three Kings, and the biblical conquest tradition--to question the idea of the subversive excess of signification that has become a popular trope in poststructuralist and postcolonial discourses. Some time for discussion will following each paper.

5:00-7:00 pm, Hart House Great Hall

University of Toronto President's Reception

8:00 pm, Sheraton Hall, Wycliffe College

Joint Session with CSSR, CSBS

Johannes Vorster, Professor of Religion, The University of South Africa (UNISA)