Previous Years' Course Catalogues

This course explores issues in the philosophy of religion, with special reference to The Brothers Karamazov. Major themes include: the existence and nature of God, religious language, religious experience, faith and reason, the problem of evil, religion and morality, and afterlife beliefs. Readings include Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov and selections from theologians and philosophers of religion.

This course explores issues in the philosophy of religion, with special reference to The Brothers Karamazov. Major themes include: the existence and nature of God, religious language, religious experience, faith and reason, the problem of evil, religion and morality, and afterlife beliefs. Readings include Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov and selections from theologians and philosophers of religion. Lectures, discussion, participation, and critical reflection papers.

This course will provide students with an understanding of leadership in the context of a missional church. It will present and examine characteristics of the missional identity combined with reflection and exploration of its implications for leadership. Students will be exposed to the skills required of effective leaders in a post-modern, post-Christendom context. Students will be asked to read extensively, to engage a congregational and leader analysis, and to articulate an understanding of leadership in the contemporary parish.

This course will provide students with an understanding of leadership in the context of a missional church. It will present and examine characteristics of the missional identity combined with reflection and exploration of its implications for leadership. Students will be exposed to the skills required of effective leaders in a post-modern, post-Christendom context. Students will be asked to read extensively, to engage a congregational and leader analysis, and to articulate an understanding of leadership in the contemporary parish. This course will combine lectures, discussions, congregational analysis, and in-class presentations.

Paul's letter to the Romans is seen by many as the centrepiece of his epistles, providing a summary of his theology and the key to his thought. We will, however, read Romans as a thoroughly situational letter, written to communities shaped by the culture and beliefs of imperial Rome, struggling not only with their own social contexts, but also with the place of Judeans and the story of Israel in their midst. The social status of the believing communities in Rome, as well as the social dislocation of many residents of Rome will provide a context for reading Romans from below, as a letter to communities struggling with what it means to be faithful in a context of slavery, poverty and violent distrust of the stranger.

This seminar will trace, explore, and interact with the developing Theopoetics of postmodern philosopher/theologian John D. Caputo. Situated at the interface between deconstruction and the religion, Theopoetics is a radical alternative to both classical theism and classical atheism, insisting that whether or not God shows up depends on us. In the style of Deconstruction, Theopoetics seeks a way between absolutism and relativism, envisioning Truth, not as a claim we make, but as a claim made on us. For Caputo, philosophy (as the search for wisdom) and theology (as the search for God) work together: The one true philosophy- the love of truth - is the love of God.

The last book of the Christian biblical canon, the Book of Revelation is often talked about but less often read. It has inspired and continues to inspire a range of persons and groups, from fringe religious movements through to artistic and intellectual titans. This course will consider the Book of Revelation in its own rights, situating it within its time and place, and also consider what it might mean for Christian thought and practice in the contemporary world.

The last book of the Christian biblical canon, the Book of Revelation is often talked about but less often read. It has inspired and continues to inspire a range of persons and groups, from fringe religious movements through to artistic and intellectual titans. This course will consider the Book of Revelation in its own rights, situating it within its time and place, and also consider what it might mean for Christian thought and practice in the contemporary world.

This course will explore the work of seminal Protestant and Catholic theologians associated with the re-shaping of 'modern' theology in the twentieth century. Our focus will be on the 'nature-grace' relationship - understood as the distinction and connection that theologians posit or discern between 'divine' and 'human' power, freedom, and desire. The famous debate between Karl Barth and Emil Brunner (Natural Theology, ET, 1948) , and the more recent discussions of Leonardo Boff (Liberating Grace, ET, 1979) and Stephen Duffy (The Graced Horizon: Nature and Grace in Modern Catholic Thought, 1992) will stimulate our contemporary reflections on the 'covenantal' nature of reality and the spirituality of existence. Participants will engage key reading s in a seminar setting.

This course is an in-depth analysis of Paul's Second Letter to the Corinthians, in which students will engage in detailed critical interpretation of the biblical text within its socio-historical context. The central theological themes of the letter will be explored [for example, the ministry of reconciliation, the relationship between the old covenant and the new, and the relationship of the Gentile Church to the church in Jerusalem], and there will also be an examination of such introductory questions as the unity of the letter and an investigation of the relevance of the letter for today’s world.

Emphasis on the history of the iconoclastic controversy and ecumenical councils, especially for the development of Christology. Readings from Nicaea II, Theodore the Studite, John of Damascus and Theodore Abu Qurrah. Iconography and spirituality. Church visit.