Old News from MC Religious Studies Department
Past Events:
We had a great turn out for Elizabeth Johnson's lecture Ask the Beasts: Darwin and the God of Love. We thank all in attendance and we hope you found the lecture thoughtful and informative!
Faculty News:
Prof. Kevin Ahern, assistant professor of religious studies, was among the 2014 Catholic Press Association Book Award Winners. His book, Visions of Hope, received first place in the 50th Anniversary of Vatican II category.
Over the summer Dr. Ahern organized a series of meetings at the Vatican for an international association of Catholic professionals. The meetings was tried to bring more voices of lay people to the process of Vatican reform. One of the meetings was with the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
Prof. Claudia Setzer published "The Bible in the United States" in The Anselm Companion to the Bible, The Anselm Companion to the New Testament, and The Anselm Companion to the Old Testament.
Prof. Setzer spent last year in London, and gave two talks in the UK. The first was at the University of Edinburgh Divinity School, where she spoke on "His Blood Be on Us and On Our Children: The Blame Game in Matthew's Gospel." She also participated in a conference on The Body, Voice, and Technology," speaking on "'This Voice Has Come for Your Sake."
She celebrated her return to America by joining the Lilly foundation conference on "The Bible in America" at Indiana University-Purdue University, speaking on the Bible and First-Wave Feminism."
Prof. Natalia Imperatori-Lee was welcomed Fairfield University welcomed on Wednesday, October 1, 2014 to speak to students and the community about how Hispanic Americans are greatly impacting many facets of the Church. She gave a talk entitled, "Cuéntame: Counting (and Recounting) the Latino Presence in U.S. Catholicism."
To celebrate the theological achievements of Dominican Fr. Thomas O'Meara, Prof. Imperatori-Lee gave a public lecture on the role of the marginalized in ecclesial reform at a symposium was held at Boston College.
Prof. Natalia Imperatori-Lee also moderated a panel of experts on U.S. Latino/a faith and culture. The panel was entitled “New Perspectives on Catholic Practice Politics, and Experience.”
Prof. Mehnaz Afridi: At this year's American Academy of Religion conference, the Public Understanding of Religion and Academic Relations Committee are sponsoring a forum on Junior Faculty Activism (Saturday, from 1 - 3;30). Mehnaz Afridi will join other colleagues in the AAR in presenting short, discussion-starting presentations on the many forms and challenges of faculty activism both in and off campus.
Prof. Philip Francis recently published an article in The Atlantic on the rise of LGBTQ student groups at evangelical colleges; he also presented a paper at an international aesthetics conference in Helsinki, Finland this past summer. This Fall, he will present two papers at the American Academy of Religion: one called 'Sex Versus Certainty'; the other, 'Raciere's Aesthetics and the Study of Religion.'
