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Vincentian Studies

No abstract provided.

Leadership Dynamics, Transparency, & Governance During Crisis In Religious Organizations: Discussing The Roman Catholic Church’S Centralized Authority, John D. Rudnick Jr, Raymond L. Enzweiler, Srecko Koralija

Interdisciplinary Journal of Leadership Studies

Abstract
This article considers two high-profile crises inside the Roman Catholic Church. The rejection of the Vatican audit in 2015 and the financial loss from a large investment in London real estate exemplify tension and balance between centralized, hierarchical leadership and institutional accountability. These cases examine leadership patterns relative to transparency, communication, and governance, evaluating the efficacy of centralized power under financial distress. The discussion is organized across pre-crisis, active crisis, and post-crisis phases by integrating insights from transactional, transformational, servant, and adaptive leadership style models. Performance improvement (PI) tools such as Before Action Reviews (BARs), After Action Reviews (AARs), …

La Santa Muerte And The Characteristic Damage Of Canonization, Ellen Webber

Journal of Global Catholicism

Devotion to La Santa Muerte, a Mexican folk saint who personifies Death, has

been condemned by the Catholic Church for its affiliation with Mexican drug

cartels. This article challenges mainstream interpretations of La Santa Muerte

devotion using the theological framework of characteristic damage, as defined

by Lauren Winner and Paul J. Griffiths. This framework understands liturgy

as celebrated by sinners in a damaged world, and therefore necessarily damaged

itself. As much as liturgy and Christian practice form us for good, they also per-

petuate damage. I argue that the sins present in La Santa Muerte veneration are

an expression of …

Proxy End-Of-Life Decision-Making: Ethical, Religious And Existential Dimensions, Deborah Kaufman Giordano

Say Something Theological: The Student Journal of Theological Studies

End-of-life decision-making conducted by medical proxies on behalf of incapacitated loved ones presents profound theological, ethical, and existential challenges. In the qualitative study “Influence of Culture and Spiritual Tradition on Support for Families of Children Dying in Intensive Care Units” (Journal of Pediatric Nursing), Ju et al found that the most painful moment for parents and proxies was not the death itself, but the agonizing decision to withdraw life-sustaining treatment. As a hospital chaplain, I have witnessed these moments where faith, culture, and medical ethics collide. This paper argues that proxy decision-making cannot be understood solely through the lens of …

Beyond Preparation: Spiritual And Communal Formation For Urban Catholic School Teachers, Audrey A. Friedman, Myra Rosen-Reynoso, Charles T. Cownie Iii, Maria A. Moreno Vera, Cristina J. Hunter Phd

The Journal of Faith, Education, and Community

Urban Catholic schools face persistent challenges in teacher recruitment and retention, intensified by limited resources, demanding workloads, and structural inequities. Yet, many educators remain committed, sustained by spiritual identity, communal belonging, and mission‑driven work. This qualitative study examines how urban Catholic school teachers understand formation—intellectually, emotionally, socially, and spiritually—and the formative practices that support them. Drawing on interviews with sixteen urban Catholic school teachers, this study uses Palmer’s framework of holistic formation to analyze how faith-based practices, workplace spirituality, community, and solidarity shape teachers’ professional identities and well‑being. Findings reveal that teachers view formation as both professional preparation and …

Editorial, Yuval Baruch

'Atiqot

Editorial

Capitalism & Jurisprudence, Paulo Barrozo

Law and Contemporary Problems

No abstract provided.

Dante Down Under: Poetic Inversion And The Way Back To Eden, Mary A. Watt

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

In the closing moments of Dante’s Inferno, as the pilgrim protagonist and his guide, the Roman poet Virgil, finally emerge from the dark depths of hell, their hope of reaching paradise is rekindled as they look up, ‘to see once again, the stars.’ This directional shift has been effected at the centre of a spherical earth, where Dante and Virgil had to invert themselves in order to start the journey to the southern hemisphere. To find his way back to the ‘right road,’ Dante has had to turn himself upside down, but in order to craft a redemptive iter …

Are Animals “It”? Restoring Animals In Our Language, Gaizel Arguelles Adan

Landas

This essay examines how language marginalizes animals by reducing them to “it,” obscuring their cognition, agency, communication, empathy, and giftedness. Such linguistic marginalization intersects with metaphors and colloquialisms that demean both women and animals and is reinforced by anthropocentric philosophical and theological traditions. While Thomistic thought has often emphasized human superiority, Thomas Aquinas also presents animals as participants in God’s community of creation who reveal divine goodness and glory. Drawing on animal reciprocity and feminist animal care, particularly entangled empathy, this essay proposes an ethic that recognizes animals in their wholeness and uniqueness. Naming becomes a countercultural practice that resists …

Tensions In Translating: The Case Of The Misa Ng Bayang Pilipino, Teofilo Giovan S. Pugeda Iii

Landas

The Misa ng Bayang Pilipino (MBP) is an attempt at liturgical inculturation. Yet the inaction of the Roman Curia in the 1990s regarding the MBP is partly explainable by the MBP's use of the dynamic equivalence theory of translation and inculturated expression at a moment when norms on translation promoted by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments were shifting towards the formal equivalence theory. As a result, it appears that the MBP came into tension with the policy changes for liturgical translation at the time. In a certain way, the translational differences between the MBP …

Full Issue, Volume 38, Issue 2

Landas

No abstract provided.

Papal Jurisprudence, Chad Marzen, William Woodyard

Notre Dame Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

What Does Nature Mean In The Abolition Of Man? Or, The Participatory Ontology Behind The Sublime Waterfall, Chris R. Armstrong

Sehnsucht: The C. S. Lewis Journal

If Lewis’s Abolition of Man is simply an argument for objective moral value, or what we have called “the natural law,” then why begin with waterfalls that demand of us certain kinds of aesthetic judgment,[1] and end by saying that technocrats who take Nature in their own hands to control others with it have stepped outside of something larger than moral law, viz. the Tao, the Real itself, and thereby lost their very humanity?[2]

What, that is, is Nature in the Abolition? Certainly, it is not nature as construed in philosophical naturalism after Jane Austen, after the advent …

Pure Leadership Model: A Framework For Leaders Desiring To Lead With An Upright Heart, Matome Liphy Ramalepe

The Journal of Values-Based Leadership

Contemporary organisations face intensifying demands for value-driven decision-making, ethical consistency, and service-oriented leadership. These demands underscore the need for frameworks that integrate character formation with organisational performance. In response to these challenges, the Pure Leadership Model conceptualises leadership as a virtue-centred system in which specific virtues function as the mediating link between leadership styles and core organisational values. The model positions the virtues of meekness, compassion, courage, faithfulness, sincerity, and prudence as central mechanisms through which servant, ethical, and authentic leadership translate into the organisational values of service, accountability, and integrity. Through this virtuous mediation, the model ultimately promotes organisational …

The Mission And Ministry Of The East Asian Pastoral Institute For The Local Churches In Asia And Oceania, Paul B. Steffen, Svd

Asia Pacific Mission Studies

The EAPI is a typical international, interregional pastoral institute. It trains primarily multipliers in the ecclesial-pastoral ministry for the Asia-Pacific region. In 1986/87, 20 years after the first course, the institute had 14 resident members in the teaching staff. The novelty of the Pastoral Institute has been able to consolidate itself in this region and meet the existing needs. The EAPI is today a centre for the ecclesial-pastoral renewal of the Asian-Pacific local churches and it also contributes to the exchange of pastoral experiences with other local churches.

From Missionary Apologetics To Mission Networking, Arthur Leger, Sj

Asia Pacific Mission Studies

No abstract provided.

Full Issue, Volume 7, Issue 1

Loyola Papers

No abstract provided.

A Critical Analysis Of The Protestant Principle Of Sola Scriptura In Light Of Catholic Arguments On The Temporal Precedence Of Tradition And The Formal Insufficiency Of Scripture, Salvador G. Agualada Jr.

Loyola Papers

This paper critiques the Protestant doctrine of Sola Scriptura from a Catholic theological perspective. It argues that Christian Tradition historically precedes Scripture and that, while Scripture is materially sufficient for revelation, it is formally insufficient apart from the living Tradition of the Church. The study further develops the Catholic position through the thought of the French Dominican theologian Yves Congar, particularly his notion of “the whole genius of tradition.” Drawing on the teaching of Dei Verbum of the Second Vatican Council, the paper emphasizes the intrinsic and inseparable relationship among Scripture, Tradition, and Magisterium.

Contributors, Contributors Contributors

Loyola Papers

No abstract provided.

Proposed Pathways For Renewal: Fabc Restructuring In The Light Of Synodality, Charles Bertille

Landas

Church organizations, like secular ones, face ageing, inertia, and the need for reform. Management scholars argue renewal is best pursued during an organization’s prime, when it is thriving. The Synod on Synodality offers such a pathway, continuing the vision of Vatican II. Renewal is urgent today, given shifting mission contexts and declining religious participation, with many Christians among the religiously disaffiliated. In the build-up to the FABC 50 assembly (November 2022), bishops’ conferences in Asia raised concerns about the Church’s internal life—its structures, ministries, relationships, and governance; and called for a review of the organizational framework of the FABC. For …

The Bombing Of Cities And Economic Sanctions: A Comparative Moral Analysis Using The Catholic Just War Tradition, Eric Marcelo O. Genilo

Landas

This essay analyzes two moral cases using the Church’s just war teaching: the Allied bombing of German cities during World War II and modern-day economic sanctions imposed by certain governments on other countries. The first part of this paper discusses the arguments used by moral theologian John C. Ford, S.J., in his article “The Morality of Obliteration Bombing,” to condemn the Allied forces’ policy of bombing civilian areas in Germany during World War II.1 The second part of this article discusses how economic sanctions are used in international relations as a non-violent means to punish or correct the behavior or …

Contributors

Pastoral Liturgy

No abstract provided.

A Project To Prepare Women As Theological Educators In Papua New Guinea And The Solomon Islands, Jenny O'Brien

Pastoral Liturgy

No abstract provided.

Our Contributors

Pastoral Liturgy

No abstract provided.

From Moral Majority To Constitutional Majority: How 1980 Recast The First Amendment Through White Evangelical Politics, A J. St. Pierre

Florida Atlantic University Undergraduate Law Journal

The 1980 election marked a constitutional turning point in the relationship between religion and American law. Prior to 1980, the First Amendment was largely interpreted through a neutrality framework in which the state could not privilege a particular religious worldview over another. With the ascent of the White Evangelical political movement, particular organizations such as the Moral Majority––a political advocacy group founded in 1979 to mobilize conservative Christians in electoral politics––this balance shifted: religious claims were reframed as constitutional claims, and cultural disputes were relitigated as questions of fundamental rights. This paper argues that the rise of the Moral Majority …

Zero Tolerance Or Strong Cultural Diversity: The Hard Case Of Female Genital Surgery, James M. Donovan, Christiane Canant

Emory International Law Review

This article applies a thesis favoring strong cultural diversity to defend a subject-centered policy regarding female genital surgeries (FGS). That idea posits that cultural variation holds an intrinsic value that should be presumptively respected when setting policy and creating law. Correlatively, cultural homogenization, especially by force, should be resisted.

Taking as a starting point the recent celebration of the United Nation’s Day of Zero-Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation, the paper reviews the context of FGS practices in various societies and critiques the inconsistencies of U.N. arguments to advance its goal of total elimination by 2030. Especially problematic for the U.N. …

Full Journal

Pastoral Liturgy

No abstract provided.

An Interdisciplinary Approach To Understanding The Social Ministry Of The Orthodox Church Of Ukraine In The Context Of Christian Theology And Socio-Humanitarian Sciences, Rostyslav Didukh

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article presents a comprehensive interdisciplinary scientific and theological analysis of the social ministry of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) in the context of Christian theology and socio-humanitarian disciplines. Modern approaches of Orthodox theology to the social mission of Christianity ensure the integrity of the development of the human and society. The need to ensure the coherence of theological concepts of the Orthodox Church social teaching with the existing church and parish life, church educational mission, theological education, and social work is emphasized. Special attention is paid to the interdisciplinary connections of Orthodox theology, religious studies, psychology, pedagogy and …

Religion At The Bedside: Institutionalizing Medical Chaplaincy In Ukraine’S Secular Healthcare Space And Its Moral Tensions, Iryna Horokholinska

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The author conceptualizes medical chaplaincy in Ukraine as a phenomenon of significance for society and its value sphere. It is emerging at the intersection of the secular healthcare system, the social functionality of religion, wartime trauma, and the growing need for spiritual and existential care. The study demonstrates that, in the context of full-scale war, the social relevance of medical chaplaincy is not merely a pragmatic response to psychological and moral challenges, but also a systemic manifestation of the post-secular transformation of the public sphere characteristic of both Ukraine and the contemporary world.

The article further examines the legal and …

The Autonomy Of Bulgarian Theological Scholarship: Institutional Control And Discursive Transformation Under The Communist Regime (1944–1960s), Diana Petrova Tyurkedzhieva

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article examines the autonomy of theological scholarship in Bulgaria under the communist regime as part of the broader problem of academic freedom under authoritarian rule, focusing on 1944 to the 1960s. While existing research has primarily addressed the relationship between the Orthodox Church and the State through institutional restriction and political repression, this study analyses how theological scholarship was transformed institutionally and discursively. It combines historical and institutional analysis with an examination of speeches, public statements, and academic publications in ecclesiastical and theological periodicals. The article argues that the separation of the Faculty of Theology from Sofia University in …