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The Spiritual Well‑Being Scale In The Polish Catholic Setting: Construct, Structure, And Relationships With Psychological Well‑Being, Beata Zarzycka, Kamil Tomaka, Michał Grupa, Raymond F. Paloutzian, Rodger K. Bufford

Faculty Publications - Doctor of Psychology (PsyD) Program

The population of Poland could be of particular interest to researchers studying religion and spirituality. Catholicism has played a significant role in shaping the country’s culture, history, and tradition and is considered a national religion. More recently, however, the processes of moving away from regular participation in religious services and loosening ties with the institution of the Catholic Church are marked (Polish Public Opinion Research Center, CBOS). The Polish Catholic setting may modify the associations between psychological variables that have been studied in their relationships with spirituality, which have been investigated in religious contexts differing from a Polish Catholic one. …

Full Issue

Intersections

No abstract provided.

Creation, Justice, And Communio: Lutheran Insights Empowering Educational Access, Mary Elise Lowe

Intersections

No abstract provided.

In The Face Of God: Analyzing The Influence Of Religion On Social Dynamics And Cultural Preservation In Pniël, Joohee Na

South Africa: Multiculturalism and Human Rights

This research paper examines the role of religion in fostering community cohesion, cultural preservation, and governance in Pniël, a small South African town with deep historical and religious roots. Drawing on interviews with community members, it explores how religious practices and spaces function as mechanisms for maintaining collective identity, transmitting values across generations, and addressing social challenges like modernization and gentrification. The study highlights the interplay between tradition and change, emphasizing the importance of preserving religious heritage and cultural narratives in a secularizing world. It also discusses the implications of these findings for safeguarding the histories and identities of small …

Book Review: Communication In Mission: Global Opportunities And Challenges Edited By Marcus Dean, Scott Moreau, Sue Russell, And Rochelle Scheuermann, I. Francis Kile Iii

Great Commission Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Psalm 110 And Covenantal Faithfulness In The Eschatological Role Of A Faithful Priest, Seng N. Sumhka

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The eschatological role of a faithful priest is first mentioned in a prophecy from Samuel: “I will raise up for myself a faithful priest, who shall do according to what is in my heart and in my mind” (1 Sam 2:35a, English Standard Version). Remarkably, the two oracles in Psalm 110, based on the structure and progressive development of priestly covenants associated with the prophecy of a faithful priest, have the nature and function of the priesthood in the Old Testament. The “priest” mentioned in Psalm 110: 4b refers to a priest-king like Melchizedek, but the “priest” in 1 Samuel …

(Candle)Sticks On Stone: The Representation Of Women In Jewish Tombstone Art, Ruth Ellen Gruber

Jewish Folklore and Ethnology

Candles and candlesticks are a common and potent symbol on the gravestones of Jewish women because lighting the Sabbath candles is one of the three so-called “women’s commandments” carried out by female Jews; it is the only one easily represented in visual terms. This essay describes the author’s field research, photographic, and writing project, “(Candlesticks) on Stone,” carried out mainly in 2009–2011, to explore the variety of ways candles and candlesticks are depicted on women’s gravestones in Eastern Europe. It also questions the transmission of the candle-lighting tradition from her East European ancestors to later generations.

“In Proverbiis Non Semper Veritas”: Reflections On The Reprint Of An Antisemitic Proverb Collection, Wolfgang Mieder

Jewish Folklore and Ethnology

This article concerns the highly questionable 2016 reprint of Ernst Hiemer’s antisemitic proverb collection Der Jude im Sprichwort der Völker (1942, The Jew in the Proverbs of the People). It begins with a glance at earlier antisemitic proverb collections while also reviewing some of the superb Yiddish and Jewish/Hebrew proverb collections and serious studies on this rich repertoire of proverbs. This is followed by a discussion of the misguided antisemitic publications of the nineteenth century that were precursors of even more slanderous and prejudiced collections that appeared during the time of National Socialism. It is shown that both traditional …

Why Were There No Jokes After The 2021 Meron Crowd Crush? On Israeli “Joking Relationships”, Tsafi Sebba-Elran

Jewish Folklore and Ethnology

The vast research literature on disaster jokes demonstrates that no calamity is too horrific to be followed by jokes that typically recontextualize traumatic events and channel the threatening voices that these events provoke. Why, then, did no jokes circulate after the deadliest civil disaster in Israel’s history, which occurred on Mount Meron during the Lag Ba’Omer celebrations in April 2021? Drawing upon the ethnographic concept of “joking relationships,” this essay documents representations of ultra-Orthodox Jews (Haredim) in contemporary Israeli memes and explains the restraint that Israeli society shows toward this group with whom the Meron disaster is associated. …

“Let Me Tell You Some Stories, And You Will Record Them”: Dan Ben-Amos And The Study Of Jewish Folklore And Ethnology, Simon J. Bronner

Jewish Folklore and Ethnology

Dan Ben-Amos (1934–2023) was associated with groundbreaking work beginning during the 1960s on concepts of context and performance and the paradigm shift in folkloristics with his groundbreaking essay “Toward a Definition of Folklore in Context.” His odyssey from Israel to the United States, including formative experiences as a youth absorbing ideas about social reality and Jewish folklore as counterculture, has a profound influence on an equally profound shift in the understanding of Jewish experience as well as on the globalization of folkloristics as a discipline. In addition to interpreting his culminating work of the Folktales of the Jews series of …

Is Acts Really “The Most Overtly Missionary Book”?, Ekaputra Tupamahu

Faculty Publications - Portland Seminary

The aim of this article is twofold: first, to challenge the white reading of the book of Acts, and second, to offer an alternative reading by placing the story of the marginalized people, the colonized people, at the center. The first part of this article interrogates how white pentecostal scholars read the book of Acts as a missionary book and identify themselves with the disciples in the book of Acts. After presenting the problems with this reading, I propose an alternative interpretation of the movement in Acts as a migration movement instead of a missionary movement. Reading it from a …

Cultural Expression And Liturgical Theology In The Worship Songs Sung By British-Born Chinese, James Yat-Man Tang, Jeremy Perigo

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

Multilingual and multicultural worship can take on many models and expressions. Initially, Chinese immigration to the UK in the 1950s and 1960s led to an increased population of churches. Many Chinese church services were conducted in Cantonese, catering to the needs of first-generation immigrants, mainly from Hong Kong. Yet, the children of these older generations grew up with a bicultural hybridized identity expressed first in small English-speaking youth groups that led to English-speaking worship services within Chinese churches. Contributing to the field of worship studies through music repertoire studies over four weeks in June and July 2017 at Birmingham Chinese …

A Matter Of Life And Death: The Conceptualization And Theological Significance Of Blood In The Pentateuch, Jared Greer

Master's Theses

This 2024 Master of Theological Studies thesis at Lipscomb University analyzes the conceptualization and theological significance of blood within the Pentateuch. While the thesis does attend to various anthropological concerns (i.e., the sociocultural understandings of blood that inform the text), it is more chiefly concerned with how such understandings of blood contribute to the broader theology of the Pentateuch. Using a canonical interpretive approach that respects both the diachronic nature of the text and the theological unity intended by its final redactors, the thesis primarily explores the two principal contexts in which blood appears in the Pentateuch: Israel’s cultus and …

The Use Of Space And Place In The Civil Rights Discourse Of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Pamelia Adams

Communication Theses

This thesis, The Use of Space and Place in the Civil Rights Discourse of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., analyzes the academic literature on the social change agent. The study provides a deeper understanding of the relevance of place/location, where Dr. King delivered his civil rights message nationally and internationally. Three historically significant sites and the events impacting the civil rights movement, in the cities of Washington, D.C. and Birmingham, Alabama, are examined. The three sites included in Chapter 2: The Jail Site, Chapter 3: The Bombing Site, and Chapter 4: The March Sites as examples. The main findings of …

Abiding Presence, Abundant Provision: Water Imagery Within The Temple Motif, Mindy N. Ziegler

Masters Theses

This thesis highlights the richness of the New Testament Christological truths in the Fourth Gospel by tracing the connections John made to the Old Testament history and traditions. John wrote his Gospel account after nearly a lifetime of reflection on the Christ-event and its significance. What had been misunderstood while Jesus walked among his disciples had been illuminated by the Spirit through many years of reflection and study. The New Testament, including the Fourth Gospel, was not written in a vacuum, but drew on a rich and colorful history of Yahweh’s revelation to his people that spanned millennia. The Evangelist’s …

Biblical Choice Model: A St. Augustine-Inspired Approach To Behavioral Economics, Adebukola Adebayo

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Economics as defined by Lionel Robbins (1932), is a science which studies human behavior as a relationship between ends and scarce means which have alternative uses. While human behavior relates to how wants and desires are coordinated given decision-making mechanisms, social customs and political realities of society, the natural end of individual human actions should be eudaimonia (human flourishing). However, since sin has affected both our emotive and cultural plausibility structures, thereby leading to a distortion in our wants and desires and ability to desire the good, this has led to a generation that is self-ruling, self-creating and self-evaluating. The …

Documentation For Developing And Managing Multiple Learning Centers As Gospel Outreach Programs In Nyc Chinese American Churches, Alice Tam

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This thesis project is dedicated to creating comprehensive documentation for developing and managing multiple learning centers in various Chinese churches in NYC. It is a strategic initiative for the future growth and expansion of the Creator’s Voice Learning Center, and it also builds up a collaborative effort with churches to encourage gospel outreach in NYC Chinese communities. The CV Learning Center has been a pillar of success in NYC Chinatown for over twenty years as a beacon of hope in gospel outreach. However, CV needs assistance to launch its ministry ideology on multiple sites. The project employed two pilot testing …

Establishing A Christ-Centered Understanding Of The Minor Prophets At First Baptist Church, Greenville, Ky, John Michael Galyen

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this action research project is to help members of First Baptist Church Greenville, KY, interpret and apply the Minor Prophets from a Christ-centered perspective. This project measured church members’ understanding of the Minor Prophets as they pertain to Christians today. It also measured attitudes and affections toward the Minor Prophets. A total of eleven people participated in the study. Eight were female; the other three were male. Each participant completed a pre-intervention survey, along with three instructional workshops that focused on biblical exposition, biblical theology, and hermeneutics. An eight-part sermon series was implemented to model the kind …

Fallenness, Sustainment, And Judgment: Analyzing Coherency In The Thematic Trajectory Of Qohelet, Albert R. Portillo Jr

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This study has sought to establish a basis for coherency in Qohelet’s theological appeal by analyzing a thematic trajectory underpinned by the rhetoric of Qohelet’s emphasis on vanity, joy, and judgment. These emphases follow what have been labeled projectile themes, which aim at particular points, carrying the audience from one thought to another. These thoughts are deeply correlated and best recognized as the substance forming Qohelet’s framework from which Qohelet’s teaching flows. In other words, Qohelet’s thoughts, revealed by his thematic emphasis and endpoint, function as an evangelistic appeal to a theological worldview, whereby the minds and hearts of his …

Frontmatter (Volume 44, Issue 6), Paul B. Mojzes

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

No abstract provided.

Does The Doctrine Of "Separation Of Church And State" Matter?: Examining The Experiences Of Black Christian Families In Massachusetts Public School System, Stephanie Denise Okwudi

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

Students have full freedom under the law to practice religion in public schools. This is especially important for Black students, for whom religion has been shown to improve academic achievement and to mitigate many stressors they face. However, due to misinterpretations of the “separation of church and state” (or the “establishment clause” of the First Amendment), schools may inadvertently suppress the religious freedom of students instead of actively providing a safe space for religious practice. For this research, a single embedded intrinsic case study was conducted to determine how the separation of church and state doctrine manifested in the experiences …

Review Of Aleksandra Djurić-Milovanović'S, “The Untold Journey Of The Nazarene Emigration From Yugoslavia To North America“, Marko Galić

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

A review of Aleksandra Djurić-Milovanović, “The Untold Journey of the Nazarene Emigration from Yugoslavia to North America“ Lexington Books, 2024, 158 pp.

ISBN: 978-1-66692-276-9

Experiencing Gospel: Luther, Men, Women, And Children Around The Table In Reformation And Contemporary Eras; A Tribute To Gordon Jensen, Karen Kuhnert

Consensus

Building primarily on Gordon A. Jensen’s text Experiencing Gospel: The History and Creativity of Martin Luther’s 1534 Bible Project (2023) and the work of Kirsi I. Stjerna et. al in Women Reformers of Early Modern Europe: Profiles, Texts, and Contexts (2022), this essay demonstrates that the theological legacies of knowable Reformation era men, women, and children (in their own cultural, geographic, and linguistic contexts) can be recognized as having crossed the Atlantic with explorers, settlers, and pioneers and that these theological legacies continue to shape North American religious-cultural contexts today. The combined depth and quality of the cited research from …

Trade, Usury, And The Incursion Of Desire, Allen Jorgenson

Consensus

No abstract provided.

A Practical Theology Of The Role Of Emotion In Corporate Musical Worship: A Case Study, Kevin Haglund

Faculty Dissertations

Evangelical worship has undergone significant changes since the mid-20th century, culminating in the 1990s with the merger of two theological streams: “Praise and Worship” and “Contemporary Worship.” This research project examines the role of emotion in corporate musical worship, exploring the potential for emotionalism and the suppression of emotional expression. The study analyzes Scripture, the emotional effects of music and religious practices, and cultural influences on emotional expression in worship. Qualitative case study research involving interviews with individuals from three distinct worship environments was conducted. The goal is to develop a practical theology of the role of emotion in corporate …

Kantian Reason & Epistemic Humility, Elias Seeman

Lux et Fides: A Journal for Undergraduate Christian Scholars

Immanuel Kant continues to be one of the most influential thinkers in the history of philosophy. His thought shapes much of contemporary culture and has dramatically influenced Christian philosophy and theology. While some of this influence is beneficial, there are components of Kantian thought – especially as it pertains to the capabilities of human reason to arrive at true knowledge of God – that are decidedly problematic. In this paper, two different readings on Kant’s work on this subject are presented, followed by a brief overview of key insights and shortcomings. The final section charts a positive way forward for …

Beings-In-Becoming: A Formative Critique Of Schellenberg's Problem Of Divine Hiddenness, Isaiah Parker

Masters Theses

This thesis aims to show that Schellenberg's problem of divine hiddenness fails as an argument for atheism because his assumptions about, and understanding of, what constitutes belief does not account for the nuanced and complex understanding of belief formation presented in contemporary psychology and recently developed dynamic liminal-belief frameworks. This paper argues that Schellenberg has been immodest in his robust claims regarding the existence of a cognitive state of nonresistant unbelief. In other words, he has misdiagnosed the human condition of doubt by unnecessarily holding to a narrow definition of belief. The complexity of belief formation necessitates a holistic credence …

Q & A: Pastor, Professor, Scholar, And Leader: An Interview, Linda Gray

Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning for Christians in Higher Education

In a Q&A format, pastor, professor, scholar, and leader Eric Newberg talks about his forthcoming book, Paradigms of Global Spirit-Empowered Leaders. It is organized in four parts: (1) defining characteristics of Spirit-empowered leadership, (2) notable Spirit-empowered leaders, (3) global paradigms or models, and (4) benchmarks for leadership development. Spirit-empowered leadership is a type of leadership distinguished by a primary focus on the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit. While leadership is a spiritual gift, it also requires practical skills that must be developed. Spirit-empowered leadership can be categorized five paradigms of charismatic leadership (apostle, prophet, healing evangelist, “pastorpreneur,” and teacher/scholar). …

Observing Cairene Narratives And Subjectivities Towards Covid-19: Reflections On The First Year Of The Pandemic, Sarra Moneir

Future Journal of Social Science

Theoretical and methodological toolkits already existing in the field of political science and social science in the grand sense have been challenged by the tremendous impacts of waves and movements of social change since 2010 in the Arab Region. While political and social scientists were, and still remain, engaged in unravelling questions of how to apprehend the forms of social movements (re-)born, not just in the Arab world but also through the Occupy movements in the US and Europe, they soon had to redirect their focus on issues of migration and refugees, only to find themselves once again confronted with …

Textual Triads: The Identification And Justification Of An Apocalyptic Literary Form, Jeffrey R. Dickson

Liberty Theological Review

This study seeks to elucidate just one of the many literary/structural devices found in John’s Apocalypse—textual triads (groupings of three words or ideas that are either repeated or parallel to each other). In so doing, this paper will argue that not only do textual triads exist in Revelation, but they are present in various forms throughout this last canonical work and can be categorized/justified via grammatical/literary markers that help readers identify them within the text of Scripture. All this will prove that, among many other literary devices, the apostle utilizes this unique threefold repetition in pervasive ways to describe, reveal, …