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The Rlds Church, Global Denominations, And Globalization: Why The Study Of Denominations Still Matters, David Howlett

Religion: Faculty Publications

Within the halls of academia, denominational history is a thoroughly unfashionable genre about an oft-ignored subject. This was not always so. Historian Lincoln Mullen notes that the field of religious history “used to be dominated by denominational histories, more often than not written by scholars from those denominations.” Such histories might make “a genuine contribution to the field, but most bordered on antiquarianism.” By the 1980s, most historians had turned “their attention to the discussions of race, class, gender, and power that animate the historical professions more generally.”1 Denominational histories, at least in this telling, were left behind due to …

Sympathy For The Devil: Belief In Satan And Moral Beliefs, Scott A. Desmond, Tom Clark, Christoper D. Bader

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

Previous research suggests that religious service attendance, biblical literalism, images of God, and other measures of religion are related to moral beliefs (i.e., that certain behaviors are wrong or deviant). Given previous theory and research on spiritual appraisals (particularly demonization and desecration), we argue that belief in Satan should also predict moral beliefs. Using the first four waves of the Baylor Religion Survey, we tested the association between belief in Satan and belief in the wrongfulness of twelve different behaviors related to abortion, family matters, sexuality, and substance use. Although religious service attendance and biblical literalism were consistently related to …

Black (Muslim) Lives Matter: African American Muslim Social Activism, Jacob C. Riccioni

The Hilltop Review

Over the past eight years, the Black Lives Matter movement has advocated for marginalized communities within the African American population and called for police brutality and anti-black racism to be abolished. With the rise of Black Lives Matter in contemporary society, I am left wondering, do African American Muslims support the Black Lives Matter movement? There is no simple answer for African American Muslim leaders and laypeople because the Black Lives Matter movement supports LGBTQ+ rights, which some Muslims do not condone, and some rallies have broken out into riots. Religious leaders and scholars are split between supporting Black Lives …

Interviews In Global Catholic Studies: Kenneth Parker, Mathew N. Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

Mathew N. Schmalz, Professor of Religious Studies at the College of the Holy Cross and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Global Catholicism, interviews Kenneth Parker, Ryan Endowed Chair for Newman Studies, Professor of Catholic Studies and Historical Theology, and the inaugural Chair of the Department of Catholic Studies at Duquesne University.

Interviews In Global Catholic Studies: Paul D. Murray, Mathew N. Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

Mathew N. Schmalz, Professor of Religious Studies at the College of the Holy Cross and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Global Catholicism, interviews Paul D. Murray, Director of the Centre for Catholic Studies and Professor of Systematic Theology at Durham University, about his own intellectual journey and building a global Catholic studies program at Durham.

Interviews In Global Catholic Studies: William T. Cavanaugh, Mathew N. Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

Mathew N. Schmalz, Professor of Religious Studies at the College of the Holy Cross and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Global Catholicism, interviews William T. Cavanaugh, Professor of Catholic Studies and Director of the Center for World Catholicism & Intercultural Theology at DePaul University.

Overview And Acknowledgments, Marc Roscoe Loustau

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

Puritan Patriarchal Construction Of American Sexual Morality And Woman's Worth: A Daughter's Response, Savannah Mather

Honors Projects

While modern conceptions of Puritanism regard it as an artifact of American history, whose woman-killing theologies are long buried and forgotten, the bible in my father’s closet and the recently leaked Supreme Court draft to overturn Roe. Vs. Wade would argue otherwise. Cotton Mather’s favorite book Ornaments for the Daughters of Zion outlined both the ideals and detriments of the Anglo-American female identity. In this text, white women were taught to absolve themselves of the “nakedness” in dress Puritan settlers associated Indigenous people with. A woman’s ability to align herself to the ideals of chastity determined her own and her …

Reviewing Forming Ministers Or Training Leaders? An Exploration Of Practice In Theological Colleges, James W. Barber

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

No abstract provided.

Developing Critical Consciousness In Students For Cultural Transformation, Carolyn F. Stubbs, Hallett Hullinger

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

In this paper, we address the need for developing critical consciousness in students in institutions of learning. Grounded in Freire’s thoughts on critical pedagogy and drawing from studies and research on critical consciousness, we contend that developing students who transform culture must involve raising their level of critical awareness and increasing social engagement and critical action. This paper examines the literature on critical consciousness development and draws attention to factors that are necessary for developing critical consciousness in students. Special attention is given to creating a curriculum and school culture that result in students who are critically aware and engaged …

Full Issue

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

No abstract provided.

Reimagining The Humanistic Tradition: Using Isocratic Philosophy, Ignatian Pedagogy, And Civic Engagement To Journey With Youth And Walk With The Excluded, Allen Brizee

Jesuit Higher Education: A Journal

The world is in a perilous place. Challenged by zealots, autocrats, a pandemic, and now a war in Europe, elected officials and their constituents no longer exchange ideas in a functioning public sphere, once a hallmark of the humanistic tradition. The timeliness of the Universal Apostolic Preferences (UAPs), therefore, is profound as they provide beacons of light for dark times. In this article, I trace Isocratic philosophy through Ignatian pedagogy and contemporary civic engagement to argue that we can use these three models to help us Journey with Youth and Walk with the Excluded. Key to this approach is a …

Soldiers’ Inward Battle: A Theological Anthropology Of War-Based Moral Injury And The Role Of The Church, Emily Ann Bogle

Honors Projects

Within the interpretive framework of theological anthropology, this paper seeks to address the moral impacts war-based violence can have on the human body, as well as argue how Christian communities and the larger Church are uniquely positioned to faithfully minister to, and with, soldiers who experience moral injury. Along with an introduction to moral injury, scriptural connections, military training effects, church practices, and mutuality in ministry are addressed

Hope And Wonder In The Wasteland: Post-Apocalyptic Fiction As Tolkienian Fairy Story, Alfredo J. Mac Laughlin

Journal of Tolkien Research

J. R. R. Tolkien’s four functions of fantasy stories, as developed in his Andrew Lang lecture “On Fairy Stories” (1939), have become a key conceptual tool for discussing human beings’ attraction to fantasy stories, particularly when attempting to push the analysis beyond the literary into the aesthetic, and beyond the aesthetic into the existential. Applying this interpretive key to an analysis of the expanding genre of post-apocalyptic fiction reveals that post-apocalyptic stories, despite superficial differences, are surprisingly close to fairy stories in their aesthetic core and orientation, and that post-apocalyptic stories are well-suited to fulfill—albeit with their own distinctive aesthetic …

فاعلية تدريس مساق الثقافة الإسلامية في تنمية قيم التسامح لدى طلبة كلية إربد الجامعية The Effectiveness Of Teaching Islamic Culture Courses In Developing Tolerance Values Among Irbid University College Students, Hazem Al Momani, Nayef Fadous Alhamad, Waleed Hayajneh, Tariq Al-Amari

Jordan Journal of Islamic Studies

ملخص

هدفت الدِّراسة إلى التحقق من فاعلية تدريس مساق الثقافة الإسلامية في تنمية قيم التسامح لدى طلبة كلية إربد الجامعية. ولتحقيق ذلك أعدَّ الباحثون مقياسًا لقياس قيم التسامح اشتمل على (48) فقرة وزعت في خمسة مجالات: المجال الفكري والثقافي وله تسع فقرات، والمجال الديني وله عشر فقرات، والمجال السياسي وله تسع فقرات، والمجال الاجتماعي وله (11) فقرة، والمجال العلمي وله تسع فقرات. تكوّن أفراد الدِّراسة من (226) طالبًا وطالبةً من طلبة كلية إربد الجامعية في الفصل الدراسيّ الأول 2019/2020م اختيروا بالطريقة المتيسّرة، اعتبر (119) طالبًا وطالبةً ممن سجلوا مساق الثقافة الإسلامية أفرادًا للمجموعة التجريبية، و(107) طالبًا وطالبةً ممن لم يسجلوا …

Keeping Vigil Part 2, Samantha Wegner

Pastoral Liturgy

No abstract provided.

Artificial Intelligence And Theological Personhood, Michael D. Langford

SPU Works

Can AI be a person? What does God tell us about humanity and personhood? These are questions of theological anthropology and involve inquiring after the nature of humanity as God’s creation and what God wills for human personhood.

To address these inquiries, we will look at three biblical texts that bear on issues of theological anthropology, hopefully garnering some theological resources to consider the anthropological status of AI. Specifically, we will look at three “creation” texts that necessarily deal with the nature of human personhood within the divine economy of salvation history. The first is Genesis 1 and 2, which …

Finding Stability Between Sports Ministry And Sports Ministry Management. A Church-Based Review., Jimmy Smith

Movement and Being: The Journal of the Christian Society for Kinesiology, Leisure and Sports Studies

The field of sports has multiple segments including youth, recreational, college, and professional sport. Research in these areas have produced an abundance of inquiries discussing several managerial function and capacity topics such as finance, marketing, organizational effectiveness, and leadership. While these topics have been applied to many segments of the sport world, the niche segment of sports ministry has not seen these applications. Sports ministers have challenges in that they manage all aspects of the sports programs they provide to the community, but they also supply the resources and support toward the ministry within these programs.

The current research fills …

Gender, Sexuality, And Religion: A Critical Integrative Review And Agenda For Future Research, Landon Schnabel, Eman Abdelhadi, Katherine Zaslavsky, Jacqueline Ho, Angie Torres-Beltran

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This article sets forth a critical integrative review of the study of gender, sexuality, and religion. Treating religion as a cause, an effect, and an intermediary factor in relation to gender and sexuality, it draws on and synthesizes multiple theoretical approaches, including gender and queer lenses on religion, cultural analysis, and intersectionality. The article is structured around 10 big-picture questions about gender, sexuality, and religion and argues that gender and sexuality are a key symbolic boundary and cultural divide in religious and political life in the United States and around the world. It concludes with an agenda for future research.

A Strategy To Transition A Traditional African American Church To A Multicultural Church Where All People Are Welcome To Worship, Darold A. Ingram Jr

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose for this action research thesis is to develop a strategy to transition the MHBC from a traditional African American church to a multicultural church. Looking at the temperature of our country, civil unrest has reached an all-time high. Our society has been separated by every aspect of life and this is not how God intended for us to live out our lives. While the battle amongst cultures thrives, the only thing that can change this climate is Christ, by way of His church. In the following pages you will be exposed to a strategic plan that will help …

Expository Teaching In Small Groups: Training Small Group Leaders How To Develop And Teach Expository Lessons, Draper D. Rogers

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This action-based research project examined the problem that adult small group leaders lack the training to teach expository lessons in their small groups. Therefore, the purpose of this D.M.I.N. action-based research project was to train small group leaders in the Close Reading of Scripture Strategy (CROSS) Method on how to develop expository lessons. In the action-based research project, the author examined how small group leaders study and prepare an expository lesson. The researcher developed The C.R.O.S.S. (Close Reading of Scripture Strategy) Method. The C.R.O.S.S. Method is a strategy that the leaders can use to help them understand the Word of …

Nguyen's "What Does The Bible Say About Strangers, Migrants, And Refugees?" (Book Review), Hannah Loewen

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Examining The Cross-Cultural Competence Of United States Christian Missionaries Engaged In Developing Indigenous Leaders: A Mixed Methods Study, Craig W. Goodman

Dissertations

For the past two millennia, missionaries have crossed from one culture to another to bring the Christian message to all cultures of the world. Questions about the effectiveness of these mission efforts have been asked and researched by many; however, one key question remains unanswered: what personal attributes help a person to be more competent at crossing cultures as they interact with people from other cultures? Although cross-cultural competence has been studied in a variety of fields over the past 50 years, the models and assessments used have never been applied to Christian missionaries.

To address this deficiency, this parallel …

A Oneness Study Story: The Experiences Of Elders And Staff In Leading Change For The Inclusion Of Women In Public Worship Roles, Shannon Clarkson Rains, Jennifer M. Dabbs, Kaley D. Ihfe

Discernment: Theology and the Practice of Ministry

In 2019, the elders at the historic Broadway Church of Christ in Lubbock, Texas, announced to the congregation that women would have the opportunity to take public roles in worship services. The decision marked a major shift from traditional scriptural interpretations held by many independent Churches of Christ which required active roles in worship to be performed by men. This study seeks to document the experiences of the leadership at Broadway Church of Christ during this significant transition. The elders who made the decision and staff members who enacted the new policy were asked to complete a qualitative survey in …

God’S Plan For Life: Training Drill Sergeants To Better Serve Their Neighbor By Developing Moral Character Utilizing The “Transformational Moral Leadership” Model, Matthew Christensen

Doctor of Ministry Major Applied Project

Instances of moral failure within the U.S. Army raises the question of whether an individual’s character may be developed and improved by utilizing a moral decision-making process. If so, is it possible to measure this improvement? From a Lutheran perspective, is it possible to improve moral character without appealing to the boundaries provided by God’s Word and a Christian community influencing the spiritual dimensions of one’s life.

This project set out to build upon an eighteen-hour Transformational Moral Leadership training model being utilized to strengthen the moral character of drill sergeants at Fort Benning, Georgia. The project allowed me as …

From Mission To Competition: The Experiences Of 10 Lds Missionary Student-Athletes Returning To Competition In The National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I, Matthew J. Moore, Leslee A. Fisher, Lindsey A. Miossi, Zach T. Smith, Jacob C. Jensen,

Movement and Being: The Journal of the Christian Society for Kinesiology, Leisure and Sports Studies

The purpose of the current study was to explore the experiences of LDS missionary student-athletes returning to competition in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I (DI). Using Consensual Qualitative Research methods (CQR; Hill, 2012) including a semi-structured interview guide, 10 DI student-athletes/returned LDS missionaries were interviewed regarding their experience (i.e., mean age of 25 years; baseball, cross-country/track and field, football, and swimming). A research team with five members constructed four domains and 16 categories representing DI student-athlete/returned LDS missionary chronological identity changes during this experience: (a) the development of an LDS missionary identity; (b) challenges associated with returning …

How Speech Act Theory Can Help Address Problems In Theology And Church Posed By Modern Philosophy, Charles W. Westby

Doctor of Philosophy Dissertation

Westby, Charles W. “How Speech Act Theory Can Help Address Problems in Theology and Church Posed by Modern Philosophy.” Ph.D. diss., Concordia Seminary, 2022. 347 pp.

This dissertation analyzes modern idealism as developed by René Descartes and Immanuel Kant to show how modern philosophy has impacted conservative theology, focusing on the theology of Carl F. H. Henry. The relationship between theology and philosophy is analyzed in terms of foundationalism, using postliberal theological analysis propounded by Hans Frei and George Lindbeck. Speech Act Theory as propounded by J. L. Austin and John R. Searle is used to critique modern idealism in …

Degree Of Satisfaction Of Elderly About The Services Provided To Them In Social Care Houses In White Beds Association, Yousef Mohammed Al-Shurman, Ferdous Hasan Omari

Al-Balqa Journal for Research and Studies البلقاء للبحوث والدراسات

This study aims at identifying the degree of satisfaction of the elderly about the (social, health, entertainment, psychological) services provided to them in social care houses. The sample of the study includes all residents of the White Beds Association for the care of the elderly in Amman. The researcher designed a questionnaire to use in the interviews with the elderly. The questionnaire has four items, and each item includes a group of questions about the service provided to them. The researcher interviewed all the members of the White Beds Association, whose health condition allowed this, (75 elderly people: 44 men …

Corelates Of Legalism In A Global Sample Of Seventh-Day Adventists, Duane C. Mcbride, Alina M. Baltazar, Karl G. D. Bailey, Shannon M. Trecartin, David Trim

Adventist Human-Subject Researchers Association

The Seventh-day Adventist Church is often identified as a strict church (Iannaccone, 1994; Chen et al., 2019; McBride et al., 2020) in that it has specific dietary and behavioral requirements for joining and continued membership. These include abstinence from alcohol, tobacco, and illicit drugs as well as a strong emphasis on vegetarianism (McBride et al., 2020). This has resulted in longevity advantage for Adventists (Fraser et al., 2020). This focus on behavioral requirements have resulted in critics viewing Adventists as legalists (WELS, 2022). The purpose of this research is to examine the issue of legalism among Adventist Church members.

The Problem Of The "Virtual": Virtual Reality, Digital Dualism, And Religious Experience, Jordan Brady Loewen

Dissertations - ALL

This dissertation uses resources from religious studies to critique the problem of digital dualism haunting notions of the "virtual" in the discourse of contemporary virtual reality technologies (VR). Digital dualism is the idea that digital or "virtual" worlds are fundamentally distinct from the "real" or physical world. Digital dualism is a problem because it mischaracterizes how we experience the spatial and temporal connections to our body in digital-virtual worlds and contributes to a false sense of subjective singularity rather than multiplicity that destabilizes how we relate to ourselves and others. Using the study of religion, philosophy, and aesthetics, we can …