Abstracts of papers for CTS 2010

Abstracts

Panel: The Ecumenist and Critical Theology in Canada
Monday, 31 May, 9:00 – 10:30 (MB 3-210)

Panelists: Christine Jamieson, Concordia University; Scott Kline, St. Jerome’s University, University of Waterloo; David Seljak, St. Jerome’s University, University of Waterloo
Respondent: Gregory Baum, McGill University & Le Centre justice et foi
Chair: Don Schweitzer, St. Andrew’s College

This panel traces the development of The Ecumenist, a small but influential theological journal edited by Gregory Baum, from 1962 to 2004, and David Seljak, from 2004 to the present. Christine Jamieson situates The Ecumenist within the context of Gregory Baum’s critical theology, focusing particularly on Baum’s ethic of solidarity. David Seljak examines a number of the early themes in The Ecumenist, especially the reform of the Roman Catholic Church introduced by the Second Vatican Council, ecumenism and interfaith dialogue (especially with Jews). Scott Kline focuses on themes (such as the work of Karl Polanyi) that emerged in The Ecumenist from the early 1990s to the present, a period which is marked by a certain loss of cultural optimism that lead to Baum to reframe critical theology as a “theology of resistance.”

Panel: William E. Connolly’s Contestations and Augustine of Hippo’s Confessions Regarding Evil
Monday, 31 May, 9:00 – 10:30 (MB 3-445)

Presenter: Peter Slater, Trinity College, University of Toronto
Respondents: Kathleen Skerrett, Grinnell College; Nathan Colborne, University of Nipissing; Michel Despland, Concordia University
Chair: to be determined

In several texts, Connolly targets “the Augustinian imperative” to construe difference as heresy, thereby demonizing “the other,” as a major impetus to “fundamentalist unitarianism.” A pragmatic pluralist, he addresses the political ramifications of confessional discourse, allowing for contestable but not dogmatic transcendentalism, while himself espousing non-secular immanentism owing much to Nietzsche and Foucault.

Peter Slater argues that Connolly’s reading misses dialogical nuances in Augustine’s accounts of the temptations of finite goodness and construal of evil in terms of perversion and privation of loving participation in absolute goodness. Read in the context of his own times, Connolly’s  rejection of Augustine’s sense of hierarchical ordering and privileging of ambiguously embodied, egalitarian freedom raises questions for a contemporary Augustinian theology of divine grace exemplified more by Dietrich Bonhoeffer than by Osama Bin Laden or George W. Bush. The text will be circulated to those at the meeting but not read in full.

Kathleen Skerrett’s review article on Connolly’s reading of Augustine (JAAR 72:2, 2004) and subsequent studies of his tragic reading of Genesis draw attention to his essays at a “postsecular, democratic primer on asceticism for the twenty-first century” which balance moral intelligibility with embodied sensibility in any process of faith seeking understanding, whether political and/or theological.

Student Essay Contest Winner: Gregory of Nyssa’s Contra usurarios and Related Sermons
Andrew Staples, Concordia University
Monday, 31 May, 10:45 – 11:45 (MB 3-210)

Zimbabwe: Religion and Ecology in Convergence?”
Robert Matikiti, University of Zimbabwe
Monday, 31 May, 1:00 – 1:55 (MB 3-210)

Religion is a vital force in Zimbabwe. It provides a way to understand the world, a purpose for living, and power to live by. Closely linked to religion is ecology. The ecological idea is rooted in the worldview and collective experience of the people of Zimbabwe. Both religion and ecology are deeply rooted in culture. Not many examples of indigenous ecological knowledge have been reported in literature in Zimbabwe. There is a particularly marked dearth of such studies. Ecotheology is immensely enhancing the Government’s scientific methods of environmental management. The aim of this paper is describe and examine the sacred indigenous ecological knowledge and its bearing on conservation efforts. Environmental movements have been relatively slow to link traditional ecological knowledge with their ecological agenda. Now, as we face an environmental crisis, people can learn some important lessons from the people of Nharira Hills about how best to manage our natural resources and better protect our environment. In the words of M.L. Daneel (1998:239), ‘insights from the traditions of indigenous traditional people are…important groundings for emerging ecotheology”. This article is based on research in Nharira Hills, which is located 30km to the south west of Harare city in Zimbabwe. The area is located in the heartland of the people who call themselves as ‘Zezuru’. The materials presented in this paper comprise of field surveys and interviews carried out in Nharira Hills. Several persons including the headman, religious functionaries were interviewed and interacted with as regards ways of living crucial in maintaining a balance in nature.

Jesus Christ as Woman Wisdom? Complicating the Gender of Christ
Susanne Guenther Loewen, Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo
Monday, 31 May, 1:00 – 1:55 (MB 3-445)

Feminists like Luce Irigaray criticize Christianity for emphasizing a male Saviour and lacking a female divine figure. How accurate is this claim, however? Is Jesus Christ really straightforwardly male? In response, Elizabeth A. Johnson and Elisabeth Schuessler Fiorenza advocate the retrieval of biblical Wisdom imagery to provide a female divine figure, while Graham Ward and Gavin D’Costa argue against the straightforward maleness of Jesus Christ. Following them, I argue that Wisdom can help complicate the gender of Jesus Christ.

Woman Wisdom is a neglected figure whose words, actions, and even relationship to God correspond strikingly to those of Christ. The retrieval of Wisdom Christology can remind the Church that Jesus is divine, i.e. beyond male or female, and therefore can be imaged as male, female – as in Woman Wisdom – or neither.

The historical man, Jesus of Nazareth, cannot be neglected, but neither can his life be interpreted as misogynistic; he modeled the undoing of injustice, including patriarchy. In feminist/gender theory terms, Jesus can be affirmed as biologically male, but not as conforming to the “patriarchal” socio-cultural male gender of his context. Therefore, the historical life of Jesus Christ does not solidify the male gender of the Saviour, especially since Wisdom performs many of the same actions.

Finally, Jesus Christ is male and female in the members of the Body of Christ, the Church. In the Church, the Wisdom-Word of God is imaged in all believers as their lives conform to his, making the Church the multi-gendered Body of Christ.

Thomas Berry and a Cosmology of Religion
Heather Eaton, Saint Paul University
Monday, 31 May, 2:05 – 3:00 (MB 3-210)

Thomas Berry died in June 2009. Since the 1960s he has been a voice for religious response to the ecological crisis. He has influenced the thought and work of religious scholars, theologians, and activists round the world for almost five decades. Thomas Berry wrote about the need for a cosmology of religion, a larger and more comprehensive understanding than a theology, history or sociology of religion. This paper explores what he means by a cosmology of religion. It will begin with a discussion of religions in their symbolic and historical forms. The presentation will concentrate on what Berry means by religions and religious consciousness as a dynamic of Earth and cosmic processes, and what this implies for theology and religious studies as they respond to the contemporary ecological imperatives.

The Real Impossible Possibility: Reflections on Reinhold Niebuhr’s Relative Justice and the Prospect of Non-Violence
Mark Gingerich, University of Otago
Monday, 31 May, 2:05 – 3:00 (MB 3-445)

Within the writings of Reinhold Niebuhr, a central theme is his notion of imperfect nature of all human action and the subsequent need for the achievement of relative justice.  Rooted in his account of the pervasiveness sinfulness that colours all human striving, Niebuhr rejected a direct relation between the life of Jesus and the possibilities of human action, particularly in its social aspect.  Although this implicates the viability of the practice of non-violence, a careful reading of Niebuhr’s anthropology instead makes available the continuing possibility of non-violent witness.  The structure of this contention is two-fold: first, it will be argued that Niebuhr’s account of human sinfulness makes the achievement of relative justice through violent means uncertain.  That is, a thoroughly Niebuhrean account of human nature questions, rather than supports, the possibility of achieving relative justice with violent action.  Second, it will be shown that Niebuhr’s understanding of the limits of human nature, when engaged Christologically, make non-violent response possible, while remaining faithful to Niebuhr’s conception of the limits of ethical action.  It will be evident then, that Niebuhr’s rejection of pacifism for social politics is, by his own account of human sin, unfounded.  Non-violent response is no more implicated in the imperfection of human action than is violent action; and as well is not necessarily less likely to produce relative justice.  It therefore remains a response that is continually viable, both individually and socially.  The paper will conclude by offering some practices that will help strengthen pacifism’s location within the possibilities of human action.

Presidential Address: Abundance and Wretchedness: Theology as Ethics of Exposure
Alyda Faber, Atlantic School of Theology
Monday, 31 May, 3:20 – 4:10 (MB 3-210)

Beyond Christendom: New Maps
Dr. Justo L. González
Monday, 31 May, 7:30 – 9:00 (MB 1-210), reception to follow
Joint CSPS/CSSR/CSBS/CTS/CSCH Lecture, organized by CTS, with financial support from the Canadian Federation of Humanities and Social Sciences

The nineteenth and twentieth centuries have brought momentous changes to the map of Christianity, so that it is no longer possible to speak of Christendom in either geographical or theological terms. How is not only the present reality, but also on the way we look at the entire history of Christianity, reflected in the interpretation of Christianity’s canonical texts? What does the incarnation of Christianity in a wide variety of often conflicting contexts imply for its unity?

Carl Schmitt and the Political Theology of HBO: John Adams and Rome as sites of discourse on De-differentiated Secularism and the relationship between Violence and Law
Andrew Atkinson, Wilfrid Laurier University
Tuesday, 1 June, 9:15 – 10:10 (MB 3-430)

Since Six Feet Under began airing in 2001, HBO has consistently marketed programming that integrates left wing ideals with various religious traditions.  Aside from SFU, one sees this trend in Curb Your Enthusiasm, Entourage, The Sopranos, and the recent success, True Blood.  The star-studded miniseries, John Adams, and the raucous reinvention of the sword and sandal genre, Rome, are both productions that complicate HBO’s ideological stance and aesthetic.  These two shows delve head-long into theo-political concepts that are usually monopolized by conservatives, such as the friend-enemy distinction, the small and powerful state, and the exceptions permitted to the sovereign.  These concepts find a common focus in the writings of Carl Schmitt, the Nazi Jurist who tightly connected religion and politics in his 1922 publication, Political Theology.  Schmitt wrote, “All significant concepts of the modern theory of the state are secularized theological concepts” (36).  Interest in Schmitt’s concepts on TV has clearly been influenced by what Simon Critchley calls the “Crypto-Schmittianism” of the Bush-Cheney years (Critchley 133-48).  However, while Critchley uses this term derisively there are a great number on the left who actively endorse Schmitt’s concepts even though they are grounded in his right-wing Catholic Christology (Political Theology II 113, 124-5).  Such thinkers include Chantal Mouffe, Giorgio Agamben,  Slavoj Z?iz?ek, and perhaps most importantly Jacob Taubes, who draws our attention to Schmitt’s intellectual engagement with Walter Benjamin over the relationship between violence and law (Taubes 70-6).  This paper will seek to argue that the left-right commonality on violence and law is intimately associated with theological understandings the political; moreover, I will demonstrate that this seemingly arcane academic debate between the iconic left (Benjamin) and right (Schmitt) was significant enough for the general public that HBO produced two very expensive productions that investigated it in detail through dramatic means; they are, of course, John Adams and Rome.

Dusting Off the Doctrine
Catherine MacLean, St. Paul’s United Church, Edmonton
Tuesday, 1 June, 9:15 – 10:10 (MB 3-435)

The purpose of this paper is to enliven the understanding of doctrine in preaching. It addresses regular preaching in denominations that have no strict requirements of doctrine.  Written from within the United Church of Canada, it refers to both the 1925 Doctrine Section of the Basis of Union and the 2006 statement A Song of Faith.

Engaging Anselm’s homiletical theory of faith seeking understanding, I warn of the danger of default doctrine. I establish a discipline to ensure that regular homiletical preparation involves more than simple grace, and engages hard questions. By using one doctrine – grace, say, or hope – often at the neglect of others, we preachers fall into default. The danger is idolatry, losing sight of the fullness of God and centering our faith narrowly. I propose that intentionally preaching doctrine shields the congregation from a preacher’s hobbyhorse, widens biblical study beyond the Common Lectionary, and protects the preacher from excessive use of one dogma.

A preaching practice of dusting off the doctrine moves parishioners beyond a default way of seeing God and life, into deeper theological reflection guided by the traditional wisdom of the church. I propose a discipline for this preaching practice and focus on the doctrine of end things to prove it. United Church preachers tend to be silent on the rapture.

Dusting off articles of theology, one uncovers treasures of meaning which bear on contemporary life in mainstream denominations. This discipline brings coherence not only to the pastoral and intellectual lives of our parishioners but to the fullness of the preaching practice.

Le mimetisme comportemental: un mecanisme de l’apprentissage de la theologie
Frederic Belley, Institut d’archéologie Saint-André, Montreal
Tuesday, 1 June, 10:15 – 11:10 (MB 3-430)

L’objet de cette communication sera de montrer, à la lumière des travaux que nous avons réalisé récemment sur le mimétisme, qu’il existe une manière de parler de la génétique et de la religion qui n’interfère pas avec la théologie.  Les résultats de découvertes récentes en génétique suggèrent qu’une réconciliation est souhaitable, voire nécessaire entre cette discipline, l’archéologie et la théologie.  Cette communication présente les résultats d’un projet de recherche en archéologie et met les résultats dans un cadre plus large.  La religion est-elle l’expression d’actes mimétiques?  La littérature scientifique montre que l’archéologie, la génétique et la théologie sont les interfaces d’un même fait, perpétué sous la forme de vestiges matériels, d’une mémoire génétique et d’une création théologique.  Quand des généticiens, avec la collaboration des archéologues, réalisent des analyses génétiques, ils se heurtent à l’obstacle de la mémoire génétique.  Plus nous voulons connaître les origines d’un personnage et d’un fait historiques et plus un vestige matériel est ancien, plus il est difficile d’en extraire tout l’ADN pour en reconstituer un portrait complet et parfait.  Le contexte sociohistorique révélé par l’archéologie et la génétique est le produit de tentatives de reconstitution du portrait des personnages, comme Jésus, qui sont à la base de la théologie.  Reconstituer des connaissances liées à un personnage historique est un processus d’apprentissage.  Cette communication montre certaines limites aux analyses génétiques, à l’archéologie et réfléchit sur la contribution de ces disciplines à la théologie.  En conclusion, la reproduction d’un acte est le fondement de la mémorisation d’une technique.

Public Hope in Dialogue: The Debate Between Moltmann and Ratzinger as a Means to Public Theology
Timothy Harvie, St. Mary’s University College
Tuesday, 1 June, 10:15 – 11:10 (MB 3-435)

In 2008, eminent theologian of hope, Jürgen Moltmann, published a critical response to Pope Benedict XVI’s encyclical Spe salvi.  This paper will analyze the main contours of Moltmann’s argument in light of a summary of the theological contents of the relevant papal encyclical and highlight the ongoing debate between Moltmann’s public theology and Joseph Ratzinger.  This paper will use the above mentioned debate as a launching point to analyze the relatively unexplored topic of Moltmann’s engagment with Catholic theology (Jean-Louis Souletie, La Croix de Dieu [Cerf: 1997]) with a particular view to the ethical critiques prominent in Moltmann’s account (i.e. Moltmann, Trinität und Reich Gottes [Chr. Kaiser:1980], pp.217-227).  By outlining Moltmann’s eshcatological and ethical theology of hope this paper will analyze the ad hoc engagement with Catholic theologians which Moltmann employs throughout his writings.  The paper will call several of these readings into question utilizing encyclicals from the Catholic social tradition and documents from the Second Vatican Council complimented by the doctrine of hope outlined by St. Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologiae (IIaIIae.17-22). This intersection between Moltmann and the Roman Catholic Church on the ethical relevance of theological doctrines raises pertinent issues regarding the potential for an eschatologically informed public theology to be a potential avenue of viable theological dialogue between traditions through a coherent and ecclesiologically informed public ethic.

Newman Lecture
Maurice Boutin, McGill University
Tuesday, 1 June, 11:30 – 12:30 (MB 3-430)

On the Correlation of the Eucharist with Christ in Peter Martyr Vermigli’s Oxford Treatise and Disputation on the Eucharist (1549): Considerations from the Philosophy of Religion Perspective

Reinterpreting the Doctrines of Original Sin and Sanctifying Grace: Integrating Insights from Sociology and the Evolutionary Sciences
Nick Olkovitch, University of St. Michael’s College
Tuesday, 1 June, 1:45 – 2:40 (MB 3-430)

This paper aims to investigate and integrate two complementary attempts to account for what Canadian philosopher and theologian Bernard Lonergan regards as moral impotence, those forms of personal and group egotism – traditionally termed concupiscence – that are central to the classical doctrine of original sin. Whereas proponents of the ‘cultural-transmission model’ such as Piet Schoonenberg account for the universality of moral impotence in neo-Pelagian terms by stressing the prevolitional inheritance of certain culturally mediated predispositions to personal and group egotism, advocates of the ‘evolutionary-transmission model’ – typified by the work of Stephen J. Pope, Philip Hefner and Daryl Domning – argue that this emphasis is at best only half-correct. From a broader perspective that places personal and cultural development within the context of biological evolution, concupiscence refers not only to certain culturally mediated proclivities but also to certain biologically inherited predispositions to disordered forms of self-interest, kin love, reciprocity, and group identification. In the absence of grace, these evolved predispositions constrain the subject’s ability to discern and respond to her emergent desire for cognitive and moral self-transcendence, thereby negatively conditioning the distinctively human process of personal and cultural development. Grace does not negate these predispositions but reintegrates and perfects them by subordinating these proclivities to the subject’s desire for knowledge of, and communion with God. Only this synthesis of sociobiological, sociological and theological insights is capable of providing a sufficiently comprehensive foundation for reinterpreting the anti-Pelagian intention of the doctrine of original sin and for developing a credible, contemporary theology of grace.

Critical Political Theology in an Apocalyptic Key: A Reception of the Work of Jacob Taubes
Kornel Zathureczky, University of Sudbury
Tuesday, 1 June, 1:45 – 2:40 (MB 3-435)

Jacob Taubes’ last lecture on ‘The Political Theology of Paul’ offered a significant opening to help to reconsider – as a phenomenon imbued with the tensions that exists before a an ultimate separation – the central figure of Christian history from the perspective of the tradition of Jewish messianism. Taubes’ other recently translated works, ‘Occidental Eschatology’ and ‘From Cult to Culture,’ generated an added impetus to revisit this hidden core of Christianity. Essential in this enterprise is a reconsideration of the enduring significance of comic Gnostic dualism for a better understanding of what is at stake with the, often suppressed and marginalised, apocalyptic dimension of Christianity and how by retrieving this dimension may serve to construe a critical political theology in what many, including Taubes, consider as a post-Christian stage in history, an epoch that corresponds to Joachim of Fiore’s ‘ecclesia spiritualis.’

The paper’s purpose is thus two-fold: First, it offers a critical reception of the thought of Taubes, one that evaluates his contribution to the genealogy of political theologies. Second, it proposes to draw up the outlines of a contemporary political theology in an apocalyptic key. Here, the recent work of Žižek and Milbank on the apocalyptic substrate of God’s kenosis in Christ serves as a vital conversation partner to further the development of a new political theology in a post-political global bio-polis.

Eco-Theology and the State of Christian Environmentalism in Québec
Robert Smith, Concordia University
Tuesday, 1 June, 2:45 – 3:25 (MB 3-430)

This paper draws from the results of a recent interdisciplinary project at Concordia University entitled “River Ecology, Policies, and Values.” The endeavor is part of a pilot project aimed at creating a multidisciplinary Institute of Sustainability Studies that includes humanistic disciplines like Theological Studies.

The emphasis of this paper centers on the field of Environmental Theology as it relates to socio-spiritual values, and the interface between Church communities and conservation efforts in the Québec region.  An introductory section includes a sociological examination of the human-environmental interactions and challenges of the Saint Lawrence River, as well as a brief discussion on the practical relation between spiritual values, environmental attitudes and behavior.  A second section compares the lack of environmental activism in the mainstream Church in Québec, which tends to separate environmental and social justice issues, with the efforts of more progressive grassroots organizations such as the Green Church and the Guardians of Creation.  This includes an examination of hermeneutical differences, which reflect a shift in the Christian environmental consciousness that corresponds to historical, scientific and technological trends.  A fourth and final section seeks to define (1) how people in the region see the environment as part of their lives, (2) why spiritual values should be understood as part of future environmental policy developments, (3) what approaches have already been tried and what lessons can be learned, and (4) how the Church can collaborate with science and technology to aid society in transitioning towards truly sustainable policies and practices.

Martin Luther on Preaching the Real Presence of Christ
Allan Jorgenson, Waterloo Lutheran Seminary
Tuesday, 1 June, 2:45 – 3:25 (MB 3-435)

In this paper I explore the significance of the so-called Finnish interpretation of Luther Studies for Luther’s theology of the Word and his recommendation of the praxis of preaching.  The Finnish interpretation suggests that Luther’s epistemology was closely aligned with that of his Medieval forebears in his closely linking epistemology to ontology.  This perspective of Luther was lost on many early interpreters of Luther, who operated with the Kantian divorce of epistemology from ontology.  In sum, this view suggests that Luther’s understanding of faith was one in which to know Christ is to know him as present.  In faith Christ himself is present (in ipsa fide Christus adest).  In bringing this insight to bear upon Luther’s theology and praxis of preaching, I explore how preaching itself is an instantiation of the presence of Christ insofar as it calls forth faith.  This understanding of preaching, then, is more carefully connected with sacramental life and so invites the embodied character of the sacraments to be understood as properly a part of proclamation.  In conclusion I consider what this might mean for the praxis of preaching in an age in which the body is too often eclipsed by technology.

World-Making and the Device Paradigm: Constructing a Theology for ‘Connected Understanding’
Kevin Guenther Trautwein, Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo
Tuesday, 1 June, 3:40 – 4:35 (MB 3-430)

The decrease of attention spans is commonly identified as an obstacle to effective teaching and learning, prompting the use of increasingly complex multimedia in the educating enterprise. While such multimedia may be appropriate in scientific, artistic, or political endeavours, the question remains whether they are appropriate for theology. This paper explores the implications of Aleida Assmann’s claim that, like the printing press and the bound book before it, the shift to digital media entails a fundamental change in human cognition, and that attention is what is at stake in this latest development. The loss of attention will be further examined through the lens of Albert Borgmann’s “device paradigm,” according to which the very success of technological devices is responsible for lowering the threshold of effort. While this may seem to be merely a pedagogical concern, Jacques Ellul’s reflections on “words” and “images” provoke questions like, “What happens when the elusive “word” of God becomes a tangible “image” within human control, and is subsequently digitized?” and “Can theology speak of Truth in the face of digital Reality?” These questions are addressed by briefly reviewing historical shifts in media, then describing the current technological milieu and its effects; finally, the majority of the paper is spent outlining a way for theology to move forward. Rather than proposing a luddite retreat from technology, this paper develops Walter Brueggemann’s concept of “world creation” as the positive activity through which theologians contribute to a “connected understanding.”

God’s Patience: Bringing Barth into Dialogue with the ‘Deep Time’ of Evolution
Adrian Langdon, Nipissing University
Tuesday, 1 June, 3:40 – 4:20 (MB 3-435)

Although it has been commonly pointed out that Karl Barth was reluctant to put his theology into dialogue with science, this does not imply that he thought Christian belief to be in conflict with modern science. In this paper I will bring Barth and his theology of time into conversation with notions of deep time found in theories of cosmic and biological evolution. It will be suggested that there are several places in Barth’s thought which invite such a conversation. These openings include his interpretation of Genesis 1-3 as Saga, discussions of the imago dei, his view of natural law and providence, and his general view of the eternity-time relation. But bringing Barth into dialogue with the theory of evolution also entails a critique of Barth, especially his rejection of continuous creation, and suggesting ways in which his theology would need to be supplemented. These supplements include reflections on such topics as divine agency in the process of evolution and a fuller view of the Holy Spirit’s work in creation, both of which point beyond Barth’s focus on divine activity in the history of Jesus Christ.  This constructive and critical dialogue will occur while engaging such thinkers as John Polkinghorne, Arthur Peacocke, and Robert John Russell.

The Suffering Spirit of God: A Pneumatological Critique of the Doctrine of Divine Impassibility
Andrew Gabriel, McMaster Divinity College
Wednesday, 2 June, 9:00 – 9:55 (MB 3-430)

Most trinitarian critiques of the doctrine of divine impassibility focus on the implications that the passion of Christ has for the suffering of God. However, trinitarian doctrines of the divine attributes consistently ignore the implications of pneumatology for the doctrine of impassibility. When these pneumatological implications are adequately integrated into a trinitarian doctrine of the divine attributes, pneumatology confirms for trinitarian theology what has frequently been argued christologically, namely, that God suffers. The biblical texts attribute grief to the Holy Spirit. This divine ‘grief’ includes connotations of suffering, even if one should understand the term ‘grief’ as a metaphor. The notion of the Holy Spirit groaning through and with the prayers of believers as well as the biblical metaphor of ‘rebirth’ further support the conclusion that the Spirit is passible. Lastly, though the Spirit is distinct from creation, the Spirit is indeed immanent to creation and actively enters into the suffering of creation, suffering with creation’s suffering. Overall, these pneumatological perspectives present God as suffering within and along side of that which God has created.

Two Theological Movements in India that complicate Western Reformed Identities
Don Schweitzer, St. Andrew’s College
Wednesday, 2 June, 9:00 – 9:55 (MB 3-435)

This paper argues that Reformed Christian identity tends to lie in characteristics typical of Reformed Christianity, which promote interaction between Reformed churches and the cultures they inhabit. Through this interaction aspects of these cultures enter into their identities. As Reformed churches exist in different cultures around the world, their identities have become diverse and a common Reformed identity difficult to define. The paper then examines how this interaction complicates Western Reformed Christian identities by looking at the challenges posed to Western Reformed Christian identities by two doctrinal developments in India: Indian Christian Theology and Dalit theology.  It examines the demand of Indian Christian theology for the inculturation of the gospel in India, the Christological basis for this, and how this inculturation creates an understanding of the gospel incorporating elements of Hinduism that contrasts sharply with traditional emphases in Western Reformed theology. It analyzes how Western Reformed Christian identities need to be modified in light of this challenge. It then shows how this cross-cultural tension is further complicated by Dalit theology, which demands of Western Christians solidarity with the Dalit struggle against caste oppression, but also resists Western economic and cultural imperialism.

Christian ‘Just War’ Theology and the ‘Eschatological Delay’
David Deane, Atlantic School of Theology
Wednesday, 2 June, 10:05 – 11:00 (MB 3-430)

This paper begins by suggesting a doctrinal answer to the question, “Why, when so many voices from early Christianity offer a pacifist perspective, does Christian pacifism become such a relative rarity after the 5th century?” Central to my argument will be an analysis of a key move Augustine makes that becomes a central facet of Christian Just War theory* ever since, that is, an ‘eschatological delay’ of human participation in the divine life. Augustine, I will argue, is significantly less comfortable with the concept of active embodied participation in the divine life than are many of his predecessors, notably Alexandrian Christian pacifists such as Athenagoras, Origen and Tertullian. Locating coherent participation in the divine life eschatologically, and with it any coherent Christian peacefulness, Augustine must legislate for the now in terms of the hegemony of fallenness. As the now is understood precisely as ‘not the Kingdom’, Christian pacifism begins to be seen in terms of a dereliction of duty towards the, inevitable, victims of violence. I will show that this understanding is inconsistent with other aspects of Augustine’s theology, such as his understanding of sacramentality. I will conclude by suggesting that the reinvigoration of Christian pacifism needs to be based on an active reinvigoration of the soteriological concepts that are avoided in Just War positions, not least, an Alexandrian grammar of theosis. While using doctrinal questions from “Patristic Theology” as its framework, the paper is moving toward the suggestion of a type of soteriology that can fuel Christian pacifism today. As such it could be categorized as historical or systematic theology.

* Not least today through such voices as Oliver O’Donavon and Jean Bethke Elshtain; both of whom use what I call Augustine’s “Eschatological Delay” significantly in their work.

Sexual Theology and Adolescent Female Realities: Integrating Experiences
Doris Keiser, St. Joseph’s College, University of Alberta
Wednesday, 2 June, 10:05 – 11:00 (MB 3-435)

Subject: The Synergy of Psychological Theory and Empirical Evidence Pertaining to Adolescent Females, and Roman Catholic Sexual Theology

Contemporary scholars acknowledge four distinct sources of theology: Scripture, tradition, philosophy, and experience. The fourth source, experience, endeavors to account for the lived realities of persons in the world, both individually, that is, anecdotal evidence and communally, that is, empirical evidence. Thus, theologians address and integrate knowledge from other disciplines as a means of furthering the theological enterprise. However, Roman Catholic sexual theology, particularly official Church teaching, does little to account for the varied developmental and social realities among human persons regarding sexuality and sexual experiences, for instance, adolescent female sexuality. While prematurely sexualizing young females, for example, La Senza Girl, we simultaneously decry their ever earlier sexual debut and the resulting negative consequences, such as sexually transmitted infections or unplanned pregnancies. The Western cultural concern regarding adolescent female sexuality is reflected in the broadly Christian moral insistence on sexual abstinence until marriage. In Canada, however, almost 50% of females will likely engage in sexual intercourse at least once by the time they complete Grade 11. Clearly, the social sexual realities of adolescent females are not in tune with Christian sexual moralities. In this paper, I explicitly engage psychological theory and empirical data pertaining to adolescent female sexualities within a sexual theology accounting for their experiences. I will also address healthy sexuality, as it pertains to adolescent females, in the broader context of sexual flourishing. My purpose is to shed light on young females’ sexual realities and iterate a theology relevant to them.

Posted: March 31, 2010 in category: