Religion Commons^™

2018 Call For Submissions, Regennia N. Williams

The Journal of Traditions & Beliefs

No abstract provided.

Study Guide For C. S. Lewis's "Mere Christianity", Kerry Irish

Faculty Publications - Department of History and Politics

Dr. Kerry Irish’s study guide for C. S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity is unique in that it begins with an introduction that explains how Mere Christianity came into being, and also how Lewis became a Christian.

The guide consists of six discussions. It is suitable for use by book groups or Sunday schools as well as individual study. It is compatible with any edition of Mere Christianity, as it follows book and chapter designations rather than page numbers.

Thoughts On The Importance Of Attending Church, Kerry Irish

Faculty Publications - Department of History and Politics

A short essay on the purpose and importance of church attendance.

Excerpt: "Today, many Christians have given up consistent attendance of worship services. This tendency is particularly pronounced among young adults. The reasons are numerous and varied. Among the complaints: the worship service is boring; it is impossible to find a church with both a style of worship and theology that is acceptable, and our lives are just too busy. There are surely more reasons for skipping church but these few will suffice to provide helpful and hopeful comment."

Keywords: worship, church, Hebrews 10:24-25, C. S. Lewis, Benedict of Nursia.

Development And Environmental Injustice In Malaysia: A Story Of Indigenous Resistance In Sarawak, May Tay '17

EnviroLab Asia

In 2008, the Federal Government of Malaysian announced an initiative to build 20,000 megawatts of mega dams along a 320km corridor in Sarawak. Named the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE), the scheme would create one of five regional development corridors throughout Malaysia, and was part of the government’s strategy to make the state of Sarawak ‘developed’ by 2020 through industrialization and renewable energy development (Recoda). Of the mega dams planned for construction by 2020, three have been completed, with construction for the others underway and the construction process frequently delayed by resistance from local indigenous communities. Indigenous tribe members …

Considerations Of Development In Malaysian Borneo, Zayn Kassam

EnviroLab Asia

Given Malaysia’s vast natural resources, the country has embarked on an ambitious set of development projects capitalizing on the opportunities afforded by extractive industrialization. Global and national demand for oil palm products, timber, and hydropower resources coupled with a governmental development agenda guided by neoliberal market principles has led to both economic growth and social and environmental injustice. This chapter argues for an alternative development model along the lines suggested by Escobar in addressing Malaysia’s path to development and fiscal well-being in a manner that safeguards its cultural and natural resources.

Hydropower, Oil Palm, And Sustainability, Fernando Salud '17

EnviroLab Asia

This reflection touches on the writer’s experiences during the EnviroLab Asia Clinic trip in early 2016 to Borneo, Malaysia and Singapore. The reflection involves two events: a visit to a blockade protesting the construction of a hydroelectric dam and a meeting with the sustainability department of Wilmar, one of the world’s leading palm oil producers. The first event comments on the tension between the need for renewable energy and the destruction of the natural environment and communities due to the particular energy generation technology chosen. This event highlighted the importance of understanding the societal constraints a technology is being installed …

Beyond Textbooks And Statistics, Jahnavi Kocha '19

EnviroLab Asia

This essay reflects the author’s discovery of what makes studying a subject worth it. The clinic trip to Borneo brought textbooks to life and also enabled us to see beyond the numbers to a more human experience. As someone who grew up in a business family and with a certain mindset, Jahnavi the global and cultural perspectives that make studying the environment more tangible. A small surprise follows the short prose piece.

Introduction, Char Miller

EnviroLab Asia

No abstract provided.

Table Of Contents: Volume 1: Oil Palm In Southeast Asia: Culture, Politics, And Sustainability

EnviroLab Asia

No abstract provided.

Resisting Dams And Plantations: Indigenous Identity In Sarawak, Wan Ping Chua '17

EnviroLab Asia

The market and community are always intertwined, and sustained through economic power, social obligations and ideologies. In Sarawak, Malaysia, the expansion of land use for the development of cash crops and energy infrastructure has faced resistance from indigenous communities who depend upon land for subsistence lifestyles. In this encounter, values and cultures are reworked, and the ways in which the community and market rely upon each other in the community changes. The examination of the rice and wild foods sustenance lifestyle of the indigenous Kenyah in Sarawak, Malaysia, and resistance against land development projects, suggest that in the conflicts over …

What Does “Sustainable Development” Mean?, Grace Stewart '17

EnviroLab Asia

A recurring theme throughout the EnviroLab Asia clinic trip to Singapore and Malaysian Borneo was the concept of "sustainable development." In this essay, I explore my own thoughts and concerns regarding this phrase, such as the tension that exists between "sustainability" (the maintenance of resources) and the conventional concept of "development" (which consumes resources and can often wreak environmental destruction). I reflect on this tension within the context of environmental issues faced by the Dayak people in Sarawak--the building of the Baram Dam, and the prevalence of oil palm plantations.

Going Home, Johann Lim '18

EnviroLab Asia

In this reflection, Johann shares how the people he met on the trip (faculty, student fellows, activists and the indigenous people we lived with) furnished him with a lot of knowledge about his home country and the surrounding region and in the process shattered some misconceptions. He also contemplates how the experience prompted him to reevaluate his role as a consumer, activist, and future educator.

Landscapes Of Globalisation In Se Asia, Brian G. Mcadoo

EnviroLab Asia

As economies continue to expand in Southeast Asia, urban and rural landscapes are undergoing industrial-scale change at a staggering pace. A number of growing industries are responsible for these changes, from soil and biodiversity loss caused by palm-oil deforestation to rainforest flooded in the interest of “climate neutral” hydropower. To best understand the wide-reaching effects of these transformations, a radically interdisciplinary approach is needed to unravel the intersection between environmental degradation, economics and culture. Is the quest for biofuels and carbon-neutral energy to support burgeoning largely urban populations, sometimes in other nations, effectively shifting the environmental costs to rural communities? …

Transformation, Wallace M. Meyer Iii

EnviroLab Asia

Prior to leaving for Claremont Colleges’ Envriolab Asia trip to Malaysia and Singapore, I was conflicted by the question: Do we have the moral authority to interfere with resource extraction and oil-palm development in SE Asia? At that time, the trip seemed imperialistic. Why should people from Malaysia, Indonesia or any developing SE Asia country listen to a group of liberal arts college faculty from a city where widespread habitat modifications have led to significant loss of native habitats, declines in biodiversity, and changes in how these ecosystems function? Many observations transformed my opinion and have inspired me to advocate …

Adaptation And Power, Elizabeth Weinlein '17

EnviroLab Asia

Academic knowledge of some of the inequities and injustices embedded in economic development was given greater depth and significance after the EnviroLab Asia clinic trip to Southeast Asia; the same was true result occurred after the group’s meeting with Dyack activists.

Re-Envisioning Sustainable Oil-Palm In Se Asia, Wallace M. Meyer Iii

EnviroLab Asia

In Southeast Asia, expansion of oil-palm agriculture, in combination with other industries (logging, fiber, and mega-dams), is transforming significant portions of the landscape threatening biodiversity, key ecosystem services, and human cultural diversity. While transformative answers to these multifaceted environmental issues seem daunting, the conservation biology literature provides a road map for effective techniques to mitigate environmental degradation while allowing for thoughtful, well-planned economic growth. I suggest that the lack of strict operational definitions and a holistic approach to sustainability are the two most critical factors hindering development of sustainable oil-palm agriculture. The task for environmental practitioners is to succinctly define …

The Impacts Of Logging And Palm Oil On Aquatic Ecosystems And Freshwater Sources In Southeast Asia, Isabelle Ng '17

EnviroLab Asia

The process of deforestation has large environmental implications on terrestrial as well as aquatic habitats. Palm oil plantations lead to sedimentation and agricultural runoff into streams and rivers. Such high nutrient inputs could lead to eutrophication, bioaccumulation, and toxic blooms, which could lead to changes in aquatic ecosystems as well as drinking water quality for surrounding communities. Pollutants from streams and rivers are furthermore, channeled down into estuarine and coastal marine ecosystems, thus negatively impacting those areas as well. One possible way to reduce the amount of runoff is by treating the waste produced by palm oil mills as well …

Narratives About Energy, Megaprojects, And The Ecology Of Tropical Rivers: The Baram River Dam Project, Marc Los Huertos

EnviroLab Asia

The conflict between development goals to build dams for hydroelectricity and indigenous peoples in Sarawak was set in motion in the 1970s. In spite of the potential ecological damage, hydroelectric development has been justified by developed and developing countries for decades. These impacts include changes in river geomorphology, water quality, and habitat value and access. Moreover, in the Bakun and Baram river watersheds, the Dayak people of Sarawak have poignantly demonstrated the socio-ecological disruption. For the time being, the construction of the Baram Dam has been halted.

Institutional Responses To Pressures For Sustainable Palm Oil, Stephen Marks, Justin Lauw '18, Shivang Mehta '19, Fernando Salud '17

EnviroLab Asia

As the two leading palm oil producing countries, Indonesia and Malaysia have come under external pressures to limit deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions related to land use conversion for oil palm cultivation. We examine various institutional frameworks that have emerged to mediate these pressures. These frameworks can be distinguished by their geographic scope—domestic, region, and global—as well as by the nature of control—private, non-profit, and governmental. The frameworks have taken the form of sustainability certification systems from non-profit organizations or governments, corporate sustainability policies, or the setting through global or bilateral negotiations of voluntary national targets for limiting deforestation or …

Forest Threnody, Yii Kah Hoe

EnviroLab Asia

Yii Kah Hoe’s Forest Threnody, which received its world premiere on November 1, 2015 in Garrison Theater at Scripps College, Claremont CA, was performed by the Claremont Concert Choir and Claremont Chamber Choir of CMC, Harvey Mudd, Pitzer and Scripps Colleges.

Ijcs News, Volume 5, The Institute Of Judaeo-Christian Studies

Newsletters

The 2017 issue of IJCS News, the Institute of Judaeo-Christian Studies' annual newsletter, Vol 5.

The Challenge Of Being In The Minority: Palestinian Christian Theology In Light Of Christian Zionism Post-1948, Medhat S. Yoakiem

Master of Theology Theses

No abstract provided.

Life Story Of Florence Deshazer, Carol Aiko Deshazer Dixon

Overview

Biographical sketch of Florence DeShazer written by her daugher Carol Aiko in 2017.

Editor’S Perspective: The Time Value Of Morality, Michael E. Cafferky

Faculty Works

This article presents the ancient Hebrew idea of Wisdom and its implications for contemporary business.

Editor’S Perspective: The Sacredness Of The Marketplace, Michael E. Cafferky

Faculty Works

This article presents ideas from the ancient Hebrew concept of holiness and its relevance for contemporary business. It explores the thesis that the marketplace is sacred.

Interpretations Of Hagar: Pathway To Healing In The Wake Of Sexual Assault, Kelsey West

Religion: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

No abstract provided.

Orientalism: The Constructed, Violent Muslim “Race”, Clarissa Stephenson

Eddie Mabry Diversity Award

No abstract provided.

Human Reason Allows Faith, Justin Cerniello

Writing Across the Curriculum

The question of are faith and reason compatible has been argued over extensively. Those who claim that the two are not compatible are often hung up on the things that we cannot understand, causing them to think faith is irrational. They say that faith and reason can never be used together because one will always push away the other. In this paper, by analyzing Augustine’s Confessions , Dante’s Divine Comedy , and Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Contra Gentiles I will show that the exact opposite is actually the case. All three of these authors exemplify how it is nearly impossible to …

Christians’ Cut: Popular Religion And The Global Health Campaign For Medical Male Circumcision In Swaziland, Casey Golomski, Sonene Nyawo

Anthropology

Swaziland faces one of the worst HIV epidemics in the world and is a site for the current global health campaign in sub-Saharan Africa to medically circumcise the majority of the male population. Given that Swaziland is also majority Christian, how does the most popular religion influence acceptance, rejection or understandings of medical male circumcision? This article considers interpretive differences by Christians across the Kingdom’s three ecumenical organisations, showing how a diverse group people singly glossed as ‘Christian’ in most public health acceptability studies critically rejected the procedure in unity, but not uniformly. Participants saw medical male circumcision’s promotion and …

1873 Minutes Of The Fifty-Third Session Of The Kentucky Annual Conference Of The Methodist Episcopal Church, South, Methodist Episcopal Church, South

Minutes of the Kentucky Annual Conference

No abstract provided.