Professor Francis X. Clooney, S.J., reports back after he spent five weeks in India this summer keeping his "eyes and ears wide open," and on the 50th anniversary of his landing in India in 1973 on his way to teach in Nepal.
Professor Francis X. Clooney, S.J., Parkman Professor of Divinity and Professor of Comparative Theology at the Harvard Divinity School led a online conversation with the 2022-23 Yang Visiting Scholars, Dr. Heather Mellquist Lehto, and Dr. Ashok Kumar Mocherla. This conversation showed us how perspectives on the global scene might confirm, yet also challenge, how we think about Christianity and the study of Christianity here in the United States.... Read more about Video: World Christianity, Christianity in the West: Continuities and Differences
“There is a significant difference between the eighteenth century and the present. The white Christian nationalists who supported the American Revolution were tainted by their racism and their refusal to extend political rights to women, but they defended the principle of democracy, even if it was only partially fulfilled as a positive good," said HDS Professor Catherine Brekus. "Today, however, white Christian nationalists are so convinced they have been called to uphold the nation’s special covenant with God that they have been willing to dismantle the legacy of the American Revolution, including the separation of church and state, to preserve their political dominance. Many are no longer committed to the core principles of democracy. White Christian nationalists believe they must protect the nation, which they see as sacred, from the government, which they argue has become corrupt.”
Benjamin Dunning, Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity, helps clear up a myth circulated by a social media post that suggests an ancient text invokes modern-day language about gender identity.
Joan Taylor, coauthor of the forthcoming book, Women Remembered: Jesus’ Female Disciples, pointed to the work of HDS professor and German theologian Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, who pioneered the field of feminist biblical interpretation in the 1980s and 1990s.
On Monday, January 30, 2023, Harvard Divinity School hosted an event on the presence of enslavement in early Christian stories. The event was the first in a series of six public online conversations titled Religion and the Legacies of Slavery, which aims to build on the work of the 2022 Harvard and the Legacy of Slavery report. Following the event, Jude Ayua and Emily Chaudhari, both Master of Theological Studies degree candidates at HDS, sat down together to talk about it.
Harvard Divinity School hosted a discussion on the presence of enslavement and enslaved people in early Christian stories at a virtual forum Monday night
When a crime is committed or moral injury occurs, we often respond in one of two ways: we condemn the offense and seek redress, or we declare our willingness to forgive and move on. But a reflexive willingness to pardon—though praised by the Christian tradition—can actually be a problem, argues Matthew Potts, MDiv '08, PhD '13, a professor and pastor at Harvard Divinity School, and author of the new book Forgiveness: An Alternative Account.
