O lugar da teologia na universidade

Delimiting Religion

Religious Studies in China: Its Current Situation and Prospect

When President Clinton convened the National Bioethics Advisory Commission to examine policy options on human cloning, he cited not only matters of morality but also spirituality. His language suggested that there are aspects of cloning that cannot be completely subsumed under an ethics and policy process that gives primacy of place to appeals to procreative autonomy or a risk-benefit methodology; but that instead evoke deeper and substantive matters of human nature, identity, and meaning. Clinton was not alone in this view. A strong scholarly rationale articulated by some NBAC commissioners supported giving serious consideration to religious discussion of human cloning. One cannot, I believe, really understand the current ethical debate without attending to the vigorous disputes among religious scholars when human cloning was first proposed in the mid-1960s as a scientific solution to preserving the endangered species of humanity. Charles Curran, Joseph Fletcher, Bernard Haring, Richard McCormick, and Paul Ramsey, among others, engaged in very probing and substantive arguments about the justifications and boundaries for human cloning that are remarkably prescient for our current situation. Indeed, although the scientific and social context has changed, I do not think the central questions or ethical themes in human cloning are essentially different than those delineated by Fletcher (pro) and Ramsey (con). While many commentators have lamented that cloning is yet another example of how ethics (and law) is continually racing to keep up with scientific research and technology, a review of this history reveals that it is science that has finally caught up with the theological imagination of the 1960s and 1970s. In any event, it reflects an inadequate historical memory to portray human cloning as a new issue in bioethics. The enduring nature of the arguments and themes articulated by these religious thinkers over cloning is characteristic of the voice in bioethics. Prophecy does not necessarily deliver denunciation and critique; it can also function as a historical memory for the broader society, reminding the community of those values constitutive of its common life and its flourishing. Prophetic voices witness to the values that are already embedded in a society's practices and ideology, which may be compromised or in need of reinterpretation in the context of scientific developments. One such cluster of values concerns the moral significance of family, the meaning of parenting, and the ethics of unchosen obligations that are central to familial relationships. A moral commitment to flourishing families is not only central to the life of religious traditions; it is no less fundamental to the life of the community as a whole. The religious interpretations of cloning presented to NBAC functioned as a prophetic historical conscience of the society, enabling the society to remember itself through affirming these basic moral commitments, which stand in striking contrast to the scenarios of single genetic parenting and appeals to procreative autonomy raised by NBAC commissioners and other public speakers. Religious thought reminds society that the moral life cannot be reduced to chosen, contractual relationships, and that prospective parents frequently do not engage in risk-benefit methodologies prior to procreation. A second value that religious thinkers gave prophetic witness to is the dignity of the human person and the corresponding attitude of respectful awe. The achievement of somatic cell mammalian cloning is unquestionably a significant research breakthrough, but testimony on the scientific and philosophical analysis of the prospects for human cloning tended to depersonalization, reducing human beings to valued cells, tissues, and organs. In so doing, the sentiment of awe--which sets boundaries on the manipulation of the person--is diminished or lost. Einstein wrote that the sense of awe and wonder toward the cosmos and the persons who live within it is at the root of both science and religion. …

152 Journal of Chinese Religions Zhongguo zongjiao baogao 中国宗教报告 (2008) Edited by JIN ZE 金泽 and QIU YONGHUI 邱永辉. Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe 社会科学文献出版社, 2008. 285 pages (incl. CD-Rom). ISBN 978-7-50970252 -9/B-0015. RMB 49.00 paper. Zhongguo zongjiao baogao 中国宗教报告 (2009) Edited by JIN ZE 金泽 and QIU YONGHUI 邱永辉. Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe 社会科学文献出版社, 2009. 311 pages (incl. CD-Rom). ISBN 978-7-50970849 -1. RMB 59.00 paper. These are the first two volumes in a series of “Blue Books of Religions” (zongjiao lanpishu 宗教蓝皮书), published by the Institute of World Religions of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences 中国社会科学院世界宗教研究所. They contain mostly state of the field surveys, with a sprinkling of more focused specialized research reports, and are indispensible sources of insights into current developments in Chinese scholarship and policy. The 2008 volume contains articles on Religious Studies as an academic discipline in China, on recent developments in Daoism and Chinese and Tibetan Buddhism, on Chinese Islam, Sino-Christian theology, on new theoretical approaches in the study of Chinese popular religion, and on various policy issues (Sino-Vatican relations, religion & international security, religions and PRC foreign affairs, legalization of religions in China, “cultic studies”). The 2009 volume offers a similar range of articles on the current state of Buddhism, Daoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, Confucianism, and popular religion. In addition we find theoretical discussions of the study of religions in China, an article on religions and the financial crisis, as well as field reports on Christianity and popular religion in various provinces, and a statistical study of religious faith among college students. PHILIP CLART, Universität Leipzig Laoshan lun dao 崂山论道 Edited by LI ZONGXIAN 李宗贤. Beijing: Zongjiao wenghua chubanshe 宗教文化出版 社, 2007. ISBN 978-7-80123-937-2. RMB 55.00 paper. Conferences on the future of Daoism are all the rage in China, but one of the more established and successful venues has been Laoshan 崂山 in Shandong province, where the speeches that Book Notes 153 ended up in this edited volume were given. The volume is a bit of a grab bag of topics, including Daoism and contemporary society, historical figures in Daoism, culture, wellness, and discussions of classic texts. And of course there are the de rigueur pieces on Daoism and harmony—“harmonious society” is the latest slogan of the day by the Communist Party and many Daoist functionaries see in it an opportunity to win official favor. One of the more interesting contributions is by Li Dahua 李大华 of the Guangdong municipal Academy of Social Sciences, who discusses a study he made of temples in Guangdong. Li discusses methods these temples use to reach out to society, echoing the early 20th century Buddhist movement of 人间佛教. Like many Daoist thinkers, Li thinks Daoism’s top priority must be reconstructing damaged or destroyed temples. But he says they should be used more regularly to draw in people from society, for example by using them for anti-war demonstrations. Another area discussed extensively by other contributors is wellness, part of what appears to be a growing movement in Chinese Daoist circles to reclaim for Daoism yangsheng 养生 techniques that are now mostly taught by lay practitioners. IAN JOHNSON, Beijing Zhongguo Fo-Daojiao siguan jingji xingtai yanjiu 中国佛道教寺观 经济形态研究 LUO LI 罗莉. Beijing: Zhongyang minzu daxue chubanshe 中央民族大学出版社, 2007. ISBN 978-7-81108-457-3. RMB 22.00 paper. This book by Luo Li, a Tibetan scholar at the Central University for Nationalities in Beijing, focuses on the economic situation of Buddhist and Daoist temples. The book has a fair amount of padding, including a long introductory section on the teachings of Buddhism and Daoism and the formation of the two religions’ places of worship. The central section of the book is also likely to be of marginal interest to most scholars, as it explains in very generic terms how both religions’ temples are organized and the principles behind them. Most scholars will find the author’s generalizations too sweeping—for example seldom taking into account the situations in different eras—to be valid. The most interesting section is in the last 100 pages, when the current situation is discussed. The author clearly lays out the government’s policy of “self-reliance,” and although she does not explicitly make this comparison...

Citizenship has become the key concept for democracy in Brazil after transition. Often referred to, it denotes rather a conceptual field than a clear-cut definition. Following the central insights of Liberation Theology, seeking to adapt to the current democratic situation and the need for a focus on citizenship, this article argues for such focus within the framework of a public theology. First, it offers a theoretical, conceptual reflection, followed by a presentation of the contributions to citizenship by three major and representative Brazilian churches, the Roman Catholic Church, the Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil and the Assemblies of God. Finally, it presents, briefly, five elements of a theology of citizenship based on central assets of Lutheran theology that are able to respond to current challenges of Brazilian democracy and society.

The largely acceptable suggestions of the German Council of Science and Humanities give rise to critical questions regarding the specifically scholarly character of theology and the differentiation between theology and religious studies. This applies primarily to theological habilitations, communication, cooperation and the organizational structures of discrepant disciplines, the transfer of Jewish studies and religious studies (missiology/intercultural theology) to the faculty of philosophy and the organization and function of the »advisors« for Islamic theology, since the Council of Science and Humanities is ignoring the legal problems and the scholarly literature and is flouting the general constitutional framework of theology in the pluralistic maintenance of culture in the secular state.

This essay explores intersections among Jesuit, Quaker, and feminist theologies and pedagogies of social justice education in order to propose and elaborate an innovative theoretical and theological framework for experiential learning in religious studies that prioritizes relationality, called erotic education. This essay then applies the relational rationale of erotic education to interpret the author's design of a service or community‐based learning component in a course about contemporary U.S. Christian social justice movements, offered in both religiously‐affiliated and religiously‐inspired liberal arts colleges. The course case study not only chronicles the author's evolving pedagogical praxis as a feminist theologian teaching in Jesuit and Quaker institutions, but also is grounded in how the author's course embodies erotic education, that is, how specific objectives, learning practices, and assignments build and bolster relationships among students (in peer‐to‐peer small groups inside and outside the classroom) as well as among students and their community sites. In developing this framework and implementing it within this particular course, the author argues that erotic education emphasizes the naming and training of our existential desires for interpersonal relations in order to upbuild not only the individual but also the common good.

Aktualna sytuacja teologii pastoralnej w Polsce. Wybrane aspekty

In his Apologia Newman writesI think it would be a very serious evil, which Divine Mercy avert! that the Church should be contracted in Europe within the range of particular nationalities.The collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the subsequent sweeping changes that have taken place in the political configuration of Europe force us to go beyond territorial concerns in our consideration of unity. More than simply a geographical reality, in fact, unity is something that encompasses history, culture and tradition, and which has in Christianity its first matrix.My subject is the Christian scene in the Mediterranean area, the ‘south’ of Europe. Our first task, therefore, must be to rid ourselves of those all too common prejudices which equate the ‘south’ with regress and cultural backwardness. After all, depending on one’s perspective, every country is always to the ‘south’ of another. To deal comprehensively with the situation of Christianity in the Mediterranean area in the short space allocated to me is practically impossible, and would require a knowledge of social and cultural phenomena which do not easily lend themselves to synthesis. Given my background, therefore, the analysis which follows has to be restricted to the Italian situation.The situation in Italy, however, is also one which does not easily lend itself to brief description. A great deal of space would be required even to sketch the background against which the current situation of Christianity has come to be created. I have decided, therefore, to concentrate on two areas: firstly, the general situation of the life of believers in Italy and, secondly, the situation of Italian theology. Taken together, these two perspectives should give some indication of the global condition of the country with regard to Christianity.

The article examines a number of characteristic features of modern concepts of religious tolerance and its "expanded" version – tolerance in general. These concepts now have a noticeable impact on socio-political life. Despite its spread, the concepts of tolerance and the concepts of multiculturalism and pluralism that grew out of them proved unable to solve the serious problems facing the modern international community. The subject of this study is the characteristic features of the concepts of (religious) tolerance. The purpose of the study is to analyze the specifics of the origin of ideas of (religious) tolerance in the works of European thinkers of the XVII–XVIII centuries and to identify a number of features of the corresponding modern socio-political concepts due to this specificity. The article uses: an integrated approach that contributes to the comprehensive disclosure of the problem posed; a causal method that allows us to trace the connection between the features of ideas of (religious) tolerance in the past and certain aspects of relevant modern concepts; methods of generalization and classification. The novelty of the study lies in the fact that one of the goals of religious tolerance in the past has been revealed – to level the influence of Christianity (Catholicism) on society. An attempt is made to answer the question of the reasons for the ineffectiveness of the concepts of tolerance, appealing to the historical origins of the underlying ideas, as well as to the modern period of global changes and geopolitical transformations, including the current military-political situation in Ukraine. The results of the study can be used both in the theoretical, purely scientific aspect (religious studies, philosophy, political science), and in practical – in the strategic planning of the internal political course of Russia. The result of the study is the establishment of a number of reasons for those trends that are inherent both in the process of theoretical development of these concepts and in the practice of their application. The conclusion is that religious tolerance cannot be the foundation for solving interfaith and state-confessional issues in the world.

This essay outlines the current situation of religious studies and provides suggestions for possible developments in organization, method, and methodology. The author argues that religious studies can remain distinctive as a discipline, but have an interdisciplinary approach in research and teaching. The contribution concludes with three examples that show the feasibility of integral religious studies.

A Study on Friedrich Max Müller's Methodology in Religious Studies - With Emphasis on the Critical Revaluation about Current Situation of Religious Studies in Korea -

This article explores the increasing interest in Scriptural Reasoning in Chinese academia: the reasons behind it, its current situation and future development. It argues that there is a parallel between the reading of Chinese Classics and Scriptural Reasoning and that future religious and theological studies in China and the West will possibly be influenced by a Scriptural Reasoning between China and the West.

While dance research is an established field, liturgical dance as a research practice is still emerging. This paper aims to lay the groundwork for this new domain by exploring the intersections of art, religion, performance, and ritual. It delves into the entangled histories that have shaped the current landscape of liturgical dance, highlighting the contributions of dance practitioners, religious scholars, theologians, and conciliar movements. These intertwined narratives reveal the complex factors that have led to the present situation, where liturgical dance is clogged from further development within the Roman Catholic Church and from reaching its full potential. The central problem of liturgical dance lies in the tension between its embodied, often ecstatic expression and the structured, hierarchical nature of traditional liturgy. Through an analysis of the erotic and ecstatic nature of dance and the para-sacerdotal role of the liturgical dancer, the paper uncovers the multifaceted nature of liturgical dance and its potential as a research practice to challenge existing theological frameworks. Theologians are called to mediate between artistic, academic, and religious communities to turn the problem of liturgical dance into a unique and innovative chance for radical renewal. To foster these innovative approaches and expand the boundaries of liturgical dance, the paper emphasizes the need for artistic laboratories. These laboratories can serve as spaces for dialogue and collaboration between theologians, dance scholars, and practitioners, paving the way for a new and promising research field of liturgical dance theology.

Discourses about the relationship between religion and science, whether viewed as one of conflict or compatibility, abound. Scientists, religious scholars and researchers, in peer-reviewed publications, through lectures, and even via social media, debate the truth claims of each “field” and propose ways to integrate, or alternatively, marginalize the deliverables of one type of knowing with respect to the other. In recent years these debates have made their way into Muslim circles as scientists and religious scholars assess how Western philosophical and Christian perspectives compare with Islamic understandings of science and religion. These scholars further grapple with developing frameworks for integration and resolution of potential conflicts between faith and modern science. At present much of these discussions appear broad and superficial; invoking thin conceptions of Islam and science. This has resulted in piecemeal solutions for boundary negotiation between the claims of tradition and claims of modern science. As scholarly work at the intersection of Islam and the biomedical sciences increases this paper anticipates a deeper engagement. We advocate that conceptions of Islam and of science be defined at the outset in a substantive way so that fruitful dialogue can occur, and we propose that the Islamic portion of the dialogue should be set at the level of particular theological and legal schools. Engaging modern science from within a particular Islamic school allows for fundamental Islamic metaphysical and doctrinal commitments to be foregrounded, and in so doing facilitates negotiation about how empirical findings and posited knowledge about nature can be accommodated by established theological frameworks and legal authority structures within the Islamic intellectual tradition.