Christianity Commons^™

A Bounded Affinity Theory Of Religion And The Paranormal, Joseph O. Baker, Christoper Bader, F. Carson Mencken

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

We outline a theory of bounded affinity between religious experiences and beliefs and paranormalism, which emphasizes that religious and paranormal experiences and beliefs share inherent physiological, psychological, and ontological similarities. Despite these parallels, organized religious groups typically delineate a narrow subset of experiences and explanatory frames as acceptable and True, banishing others as either false or demonic. Accordingly, the theory provides a revised definition of the “paranormal” as beliefs and experiences explicitly rejected by science and organized religions. To demonstrate the utility of the theory, we show that, after controlling for levels of conventional religious practice, there is a strong, …

Exploding The Nuclear Family, Howard Schaap

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

No abstract provided.

French Women In Art: Reclaiming The Body Through Creation/Les Femmes Artistes Françaises : La Réclamation Du Corps À Travers La Création, Liatris Hethcoat

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The research I have conducted for my French Major Senior Thesis is a culmination of my passion for and studies of both French language and culture and the history and practice of Visual Arts. I have examined, across the history of art, the representation of women, and concluded that until the 20^th century, these representations have been tools employed by the makers of history and those at the top of the patriarchal system, used to control women’s images and thus women themselves. I survey these representations, which are largely created by men—until the 20^th century. I discuss pre-historical …

Race And Policing On The Second Anniversary Of Ferguson, Donald Roth

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"There’s a tendency to make each civilian death an indictment of all police and to make each officer death the fault of those who dare criticize police."

Posting about ­­­­­­­­changes in law enforcement from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/race-and-policing-on-the-second-anniversary-of-ferguson/

Between The World And Me, Michael Brown, And White Imagination, Howard Schaap

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"What can we do as Christians to support each other across racial lines?"

Posting about racial divide in America from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/between-the-world-and-me-michael-brown-and-white-imagination/

Contributors To Indian Catholicism: Interventions And Imaginings, Mathew Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

Contributors to Indian Catholicism: Interventions and Imaginings, the inaugural issue of the Journal of Global Catholicism.

Authority, Representation, And Offense: Dalit Catholics, Foot Washing, And The Study Of Global Catholicism, Mathew Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

In reflecting on a sharp scholarly exchange at a conference, this article explores issues of authority, representation, and offense in global Catholic and South Asian Studies. Focusing on the act of foot washing by Dalit Catholics, the article examines how scholarly offense is linked to particular claims of representational authority. The article also puts this discussion within the context of contemporary debates about Western portrayals of Indian culture and society.

The Tying Of The Ceremonial Wedding Thread: A Feminist Analysis Of “Ritual” And “Tradition” Among Syro-Malabar Catholics In India, Sonja Thomas

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article presents a feminist analysis of patriarchy persisting in Catholicism of the Syro-Malabar rite in Kerala. The article specifically considers the impact of charismatic Catholicism on women of the Syro-Malabar rite and argues that it is important to interrogate this new face of religiosity in order to fully understand how certain rituals are allowed to change and be fluid, while others, especially concerning female sexuality, are enshrined as “tradition” which often restricts the parameters for women’s empowerment and may reinforce caste and patriarchal hegemonies preventing feminist solidarity across different religious- and caste-based groups.

Dalit Catholic Home Shrines In A North Indian Village, Mathew Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article examines three Catholic home shrines in a Dalit community in North Indian and argues that it is misleading to think that home shrines and other collections of material objects are somehow static conveyors of meaning. “Meaning” can mean many things or nothing at all, depending upon the terms we are using and the scholarly methods we deploy. The crucial aspect of Dalit Catholic home shrines is that they are literally open to interpretation and reinterpretation, to touching and being touched. Their significance—their meaning—depends not on decoding their structure or symbolic logic, but interacting with them as part of …

The Grace Of God And The Travails Of Contemporary Indian Catholicism, Kerry P. C. San Chirico

Journal of Global Catholicism

This essay discusses the challenges faced by Indian Catholicism, particularly as it seeks to adapt to and in contemporary, post-colonial India through the process or program of what is called inculturation, a self-conscious program of adaptation to Indian religion and culture. Since Indian Catholicism is constituted by so many irreducible persons-in-relation, the article focuses on the life of the Catholic priest, Swami Ishwar Prasad in whose life we may chart something of the inculturation movement and the Catholic tradition as it is found in North India region, in one rather long and rich lifetime connecting two centuries. The article seeks …

In Continuity With The Past: Indigenous Environmentalism And Indian Christian Visions Of Flora, James Ponniah

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article considers whether Indian Christianity can be said to have a distinctive ecological vision. The first two parts of the article examine Christian environmentalism in two native forms of Indian Christianity: Tamil Christianity and Tribal Christianity. Continuing with the theme of conformity to the local culture—though of the elite—the third part of the article investigates how Christian Ashrams function as dynamic centers for ecological praxis. The last part of the article considers how contemporary Indian Christian communities can respond to the ecological challenges confronting them.

Antoniyar Kōvil: Hindu-Catholic Identity At The St. Anthony Shrine In St. Mary’S Co-Cathedral, Chennai, Pj Johnston

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article combines ethnographic description of the practices of Hindu and Christian visitors of the St. Antony Shrine in Chennai with the observation that this material cannot be understood using the standard world religions paradigm that essentializes Christianity as exclusivistic. Drawing upon the visual and material culture of the shrine in light of premodern and Vatican II templates for inculturation and the negotiation of religious difference, the article highlights overlap between Tamil Hinduism and the Tamil Popular Catholicism of the site to argue that the beliefs and practices documented should inform descriptive and normative accounts of Catholic Christianity. Because Tamil …

Martha And Her Help: A Different Kind Of Relationship, Victoria E. Krus

Martha McMillan Research Papers

In nineteenth century America, middle-class families often had domestic servants in their home. Domestic service looked different in various parts of the country and at different points in the century, but a common theme of racial tension and class struggle defined servant/employer relationships throughout the hundred year period. In Ohio, Martha McMillan recorded the events on her family’s farm in a series of journals from 1867 up until her death in 1913. Thousands of pages portray the day-to-day events of a farmer’s wife, her children, and her relationship with farm employees. In contrast to nineteenth-century employer/employed attitudes and practices, Martha …

Religious Service Attendance And Volunteering: A Growth Curve Analysis, Young-Il Kim, Sung Joon Jang

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Despite methodological advances in studying the relationship between religious attendance and volunteering, its dynamic nature still needs to be elucidated. We apply growth curve modeling to examine whether trajectories of religious attendance and volunteering are related to each other over a 15-year period in a nationally representative sample from the Americans’ Changing Lives data (1986-2002). Multivariate results showed that the rates of change in religious attendance and volunteering were positively related, and excluding religious volunteering did not alter the finding. It was also found that the initial level of religious attendance was positively associated with the rate of increase in …

The Oval Office Is Ready For Madame President: Predictors And Support, Brittney E. Souza

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The 2016 United States Presidential Election brings the revolutionary idea of a woman president with the Democratic candidate of Hillary Clinton. The current opposition for a woman president has been generalized gender stereotypes that she will be incompetent, too sensitive, temperamental and fickle with other world leaders. Many studies show that these arguments lack evidence in current female leaders and many commanding women in democracies have proven to be sufficient leaders to their male counterparts. Judeo-Christian traditions have permeated political voting and has acted as an important role in American public opinion on issues like abortion and same-sex marriage. These …

Wesleyanism, Fundamentalism, And The Dones, Mature Christians Who Are Done With The Institutional Church: Two Book Reviews, Craighton Hippenhammer

Scholar Week 2016 - present

Book #1: "Square Peg: Why Wesleyans Aren't Fundamentalists," written by Nazarene and published by the Nazarene Publishing House. Book #2: "Church Refugees: Sociologists Reveal Why People Are DONE with Church but Not Their Faith," by Josh Packard and Ashleigh Hope, which tells why there are mature, highly educated Christians leaving the institutional church. The reasons why they are leaving are for the same four unexpected reasons. While these folks may not be large in numbers, they may be large in impact because they are doers and leaders at all levels of the church, so they may be leading the church …

Political World Of Bob Dylan, Jeff Taylor, Chad Israelson

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

According to Bob Dylan, we live in what his 1989 song calls a “Political World.” He is correct. But what does this mean? And what is Dylan’s relation to his world?

We Believe In Human Life As Fearfully And Wonderfully Made, Dennis M. Sullivan

Pharmacy Practice Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Mentors Prepare Couples For Marriage Success, Michelle (Cummings) Solomon

Staff Publications

No abstract provided.

The Gender Revolution: Are We Getting It Right?, Dannah (Barker) Gresh

Alumni Publications

No abstract provided.

Church Refugees: Sociologists Reveal Why People Are Done With Church But Not Their Faith, Craighton T. Hippenhammer (Reviewer)

Faculty Scholarship – Library Science

This is a sociological study written for church leaders that examines the phenomenon of mature Christians leaving the institutional church, who keeping their faith, look for alternatives to church, having become convinced that church as it exists is detrimental to their spiritual growth.

How To Talk To Your Kids About Divorce, Erin Olson

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"Being a parent often means answering some tough questions and helping little ones understand things even we as adults might find confusing."

Posting about addressing family brokenness with children from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/how-to-talk-to-your-kids-about-divorce/

Talking To Kids About Race: Against The Grain, Howard Schaap

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"The stories of race are bound up in the story of America and in all of our identities, so directly addressing it with our children is an approach we have no choice but to take."

Posting about teaching children about racial struggles in our society­­­­­­­­ from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/talking-to-kids-about-race-against-the-grain/

Working With An Infant, Kayt E. Frisch

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"My vision of a successful career is shared by many people – I want to be good at what I do, and I want to be happy doing it."

Posting about balancing a career and motherhood from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/working-with-an-infant/

It Is Up To You, Kate Vander Veen

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"If indeed you desire to be healthy, or to at least try to work toward living a healthier life than you do now, you must first answer one core question: what does healthy living mean to you?"

Posting about life choices that promote health from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/it-is-up-to-you/

Your Body Has A Purpose, Nate Wolf

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"How often do we consider using 100% of our bodies in pursuing God’s redemptive call? How often do we succumb to viewing our bodies through culture’s lens of graphically enhanced photos prepared for mass distribution?"

Posting about using the body to glorify God from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/your-body-has-a-purpose/

35 Million Untold Stories, Carlye Tazelaar

Student Work

"With over 35 million people enslaved worldwide (in all forms of slavery, not just sex slavery), we are seeing the largest slavery epidemic in our world’s history."

Posting about the reality of human trafficking all over the world from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/35-million-untold-stories/

Choices You Make, Lisa Smith

Staff Work

Posting about the lack of choices available for those trapped in human trafficking from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/the-choices-you-make/

In Your Neighborhood, Jen Sandbulte

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

"It’s easy to hear about trafficking and think of dusty paths and sordid rooms in countries far from here whose economic system we don’t quite grasp. It is much harder to imagine trafficking happening amongst the quaint scenery in places like Northwest Iowa."

Posting about ­­­­­­­­the problem of human trafficking from In All Things - an online hub committed to the claim that the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ has implications for the entire world.

http://inallthings.org/in-your-neighborhood/

A Christian Perspective Of An Ojibwe Sweat For Women, Carol Z.A. Mcginnis, Julie Ogemaanungokwe Smith

Counseling Educator Scholarship

It is a rare privilege to be invited to participate in a Native American Ojibwe sweat and I was fortunate to experience this as an all-female event with other counselors from across the US. As a pastoral counselor who comes from a Methodist Christian worldview, I thought it may be helpful to share my perspective with other counselors who may work with Native American clients who engage in this type of religious experience. Oftentimes we have difficulty in finding “common ground” from which to connect with clients from different cultures, and this experience helped me to see how our shared …