Violence committed by religious young people has become a regular feature of our daily news reports. What we hear less about are the growing numbers of religious young people from all faith backgrounds who are committed to interfaith understanding and cooperation. Building the Interfaith Youth Movement is the first book to describe this important phenomenon. Contributions include concrete descriptions of various interfaith youth projects across the country_from an arts-program in the South Bronx to a research program at Harvard University to a national organization called the Interfaith Youth Core based in Chicago_written by the founders and leaders of those initiatives. Additional chapters articulate the theory and methodology of this important new movement. This book is a must-read for college chaplains, religious leaders who work with youth, and students and scholars of contemporary religion.

This book addresses the question of human rights education in a world that is witnessing a resurgence of religion in public life, and a continuation of religion across much of the globe, long after secularization theories predicted its decline. Promoting a universal vision of human rights while acknowledging religious diversity is a challenge for schools. This book starts with the basic premise that human rights are grounded in a belief in the dignity and ultimate worth of the human person. Drawing on key philosophical and theological sources for understanding dignity, it builds a vision of human rights and religious education that seeks to square the impossible circle of universal human rights education in a religiously diverse world.

Teaching with the Wind tackles the question, "Can education for a Canadian civic spirituality bridge the sometimes incommensurable worldviews of faith-based schools and secular public schools?" An affirmative answer is offered based on two foundations. First, that a national soul can be identified and thus serve as the content of spiritual education in Canada schools. Second, that a reconstructed approach to the contemplation-in-action method found in world religions and philosophy can provide an appropriate pedagogy for Canadian spiritual education. This book argues that education for civic spirituality is of paramount importance as Canada continues its transition from a Judeo-Christian and bicultural nation to a multi-faith and multicultural nation within a secular democracy. It offers a direction that would enrich religious and secular education systems as well as Canada as a whole.

The first basic thesis of Anti-Roman Cryptograms in the New Testament: Hidden Transcripts of Hope and Liberation is that the Jesus of history and his earliest and closest followers during his lifetime and during the decades after he had been crucified by the Romans had not only a deep longing for eternal life with God beyond the limits of this world, but also a strong desire for liberation from Roman political, economic, and social oppression. The second basic thesis of Anti-Roman Cryptograms in the New Testament is that within the Christian Scriptures there are more hidden transcripts, coded messages (anti-Roman cryptograms) of hope and liberation, for « freedom now within this life, than we have realized throughout most of the history of interpretation. Hidden transcripts of hope and liberation are coded so that oppressed people are able to communicate to their fellow oppressed people in ways in which their message and their intent are shielded from the perceptions of their oppressors. These messages by the Jesus of history and by the writers of New Testament and related literature use the language of faith, of salvation, of Deity, and of adversaries of Deity, giving words that are commonly used by the oppressed people new and double meanings. Within interaction with other scholars who are publishing studies of hidden transcripts, this book is an analysis of hidden transcripts within each of the New Testament documents. The book is designed to be used in New Testament Studies courses at undergraduate and/or graduate levels, by study groups, and by all persons who desire a more adequate understanding of the Jesus of history, his closest followers, and their oral and written communications during the first three centuries C.E.

"In this thoughtful and provocative book Philip Barnes challenges religious educators to re-think their field, and proposes a new, post-liberal model of religious education to help them do so. His model both confronts prejudice and intolerance and also allows the voices of different religions to be heard and critically explored. While Education, Religion and Diversity is directed to a British audience the issues it raises and the alternative it proposes are important for those educators in the United States who believe that the public schools have an important role in teaching students about religion." Walter Feinberg, Professor Emeritus of Education Policy, Organization and Leadership at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. "Philip Barnes offers a penetrating and lucid analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of modern religious education in Britain. He considers a range of epistemological and methodological issues and identifies two contrasting models of religious education that have been influential, what he calls a liberal and a postmodern model. After a detailed review and criticism of both, he outlines his own new post-liberal model of religious education, one that is compatible with both confessional and non-confessional forms of religious education, yet takes religious diversity and religious truth claims seriously. Essential reading for all religious educators and those concerned with the role of religion in schools." Bernd Schroeder, Professor of Practical Theology and Religious Education, University of Goettingen. "What place, if any, does religious education have in the schools of an increasingly diverse society? This lucid and authoritative book makes an incisive contribution to this crucial debate." Roger Trigg is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of Warwick, and Senior Research Fellow, Ian Ramsey Centre, Oxford. The challenge of diversity is central to education in modern liberal, democratic states, and religious education is often the point where these differences become both most acute and where it is believed, of all curriculum subjects, resolutions are most likely to be found. Education, Religion and Diversity identifies and explores the commitments and convictions that have guided post-confessional religious education and concludes controversially that the subject as currently theorised and practised is incapable of challenging religious intolerance and of developing respectful relationships between people from different communities and groups within society. It is argued that despite the rhetoric of success, which religious education is obliged to rehearse in order to perpetuate its status in the curriculum and to ensure political support, a fundamentally new model of religious education is required to meet the challenge of diversity to education and to society. A new framework for religious education is developed which offers the potential for the subject to make a genuine contribution to the creation of a responsible, respectful society. Education, Religion and Diversity is a wide-ranging, provocative exploration of religious education in modern liberal democracies. It is essential reading for those concerned with the role of religion in education and for religious and theological educators who want to think critically about the aims and character of religious education.

"In this thoughtful and provocative book Philip Barnes challenges religious educators to re-think their field, and proposes a new, post-liberal model of religious education to help them do so. His model both confronts prejudice and intolerance and also allows the voices of different religions to be heard and critically explored. While Education, Religion and Diversity is directed to a British audience the issues it raises and the alternative it proposes are important for those educators in the United States who believe that the public schools have an important role in teaching students about religion." Walter Feinberg, Professor Emeritus of Education Policy, Organization and Leadership at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. "Philip Barnes offers a penetrating and lucid analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of modern religious education in Britain. He considers a range of epistemological and methodological issues and identifies two contrasting models of religious education that have been influential, what he calls a liberal and a postmodern model. After a detailed review and criticism of both, he outlines his own new post-liberal model of religious education, one that is compatible with both confessional and non-confessional forms of religious education, yet takes religious diversity and religious truth claims seriously. Essential reading for all religious educators and those concerned with the role of religion in schools." Bernd Schroeder, Professor of Practical Theology and Religious Education, University of Goettingen. "What place, if any, does religious education have in the schools of an increasingly diverse society? This lucid and authoritative book makes an incisive contribution to this crucial debate." Roger Trigg is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of Warwick, and Senior Research Fellow, Ian Ramsey Centre, Oxford. The challenge of diversity is central to education in modern liberal, democratic states, and religious education is often the point where these differences become both most acute and where it is believed, of all curriculum subjects, resolutions are most likely to be found. Education, Religion and Diversity identifies and explores the commitments and convictions that have guided post-confessional religious education and concludes controversially that the subject as currently theorised and practised is incapable of challenging religious intolerance and of developing respectful relationships between people from different communities and groups within society. It is argued that despite the rhetoric of success, which religious education is obliged to rehearse in order to perpetuate its status in the curriculum and to ensure political support, a fundamentally new model of religious education is required to meet the challenge of diversity to education and to society. A new framework for religious education is developed which offers the potential for the subject to make a genuine contribution to the creation of a responsible, respectful society. Education, Religion and Diversity is a wide-ranging, provocative exploration of religious education in modern liberal democracies. It is essential reading for those concerned with the role of religion in education and for religious and theological educators who want to think critically about the aims and character of religious education.

Comprised of fifteen essays, Religion, Culture, Curriculum, and Diversity in 21st Century America, provides a cutting-edge examination of diversity issues against the backdrop of curriculum development and outcomes in Christian higher education. The primary focus on diversity of race, ethnicity, and disabilities is explored in comparison with institutional changes in these areas that harmonize the efforts of administration, faculty, and students. Hiring practices are analyzed, as well as recruitment and retention of minority faculty and students. This works' secondary focus is on similarities and differences between Christianity and Islam regarding international customs and norms of immigrants, primarily from Africa, Asia, and India on America's Christian academia. The work is reader-friendly and recommended for students and scholars as well as for laypersons desirous of keeping pace with current diversity trends in American culture and religion.

As liberal democracies include increasingly diverse and multifaceted populations, the longstanding debate about the role of the state in religious education and the place of religion in public life seems imperative now more than ever. The maintenance of religious schools and the planning of religious education curricula raise a profound challenge. Too much state supervision can be conceived as interference in religious freedom and as a confinement of the right to cultural liberty. Too little supervision can be seen as neglecting the development of the liberal values required to live and work in a democratic society and as abandoning those who within their communities wish to attain a more rigorous education for citizenship and democracy. This book draws together leading educationalists, philosophers, theologians, and social scientists to explore issues, problems, and tensions concerning religious education in a variety of international settings. The contributors explore the possibilities and limitations of religious education in preparing citizens in multicultural and multi-religious democratic societies.

This book draws upon ethical dimensions of Muslim education as a means through which to address contemporary issues, such as social and societal conflicts, exclusion and marginalisation, and violence. It argues that an ethical Muslim education is underscored by the practice of autonomous, critical and deliberative engagement that can engender reflective judgement, compassionate recognition and a responsible ethical (Muslim) community. Such a community is not only capable of cultivating human relationships based on non-coercion, truthful and peaceful human coexistence, but can also quell the stereotypes and forms of dystopia and exclusion that are pervasive in contemporary society. Put differently, Muslim education extends the neo-Kantian view that ethical human conduct can be rationalised in terms of achieving morally worthwhile action towards forms of engagement that are potentially disruptive.

This book presents a history of the CPE movement from precursors in educational reform to its development into the Association for Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) until 1990. Readers will understand issues, choices, and dynamics of how CPE evolved, and appreciate how CPE has lived its mantra, "trust the process." The book also engages the reader to reflect upon his or her own understanding of theological education. Built upon a foundation of educational reform, CPE has provided supervised clinical experience as a means to enhance understanding, skills, and personal and interpersonal growth. CPE moved from a simple value of care toward a value of professional competence while seeking to institutionally guarantee consistent quality education. Early leaders of the unified ACPE focused upon internal development and professional excellence. The next generation invested in interorganizational cooperation and reclaiming concern for public issues.

This book highlights the work of faculty in many disciplines who have connected service-learning with their teaching and scholarship. The challenge of Christian scholarship in service-learning is to use the scholarly tool of our disciplines, with perspective and goals originating from the faith tradition, to describe how community connections enable us to be agents of renewal in society.

The work of practical theologian James E. Loder, Jr. (1931-2001) deserves a wider audience. For more than forty years, he developed and exercised an interdisciplinary methodology that identified patterns of correlation in the fields of psychology, educational theory, phenomenology, epistemology, and physics, producing a compelling theological vision that centers on the person and work of the Holy Spirit engaging and transforming human life. At his untimely death in November 2001, Loder was the Mary D. Synnott Professor of Philosophy of Christian Education at Princeton Theological Seminary, where he lectured primarily in the areas of human development and the philosophy of education. This book introduces and examines, explores and untangles the complexity of Loder's thought in order to make it more accessible to a broader audience. At the core of Loder's work is a relational phenomenological pneumatology of inestimable value to the theologian engaged in the ongoing renewal of the church. The Christian life is preeminently relational, distinguished by a relationship with God constituted by Jesus Christ, and sustained by the Holy Spirit. Relationality, Loder claims, takes place in and through the life of the Holy Spirit who operates within a complementary relationship with the human spirit, through an analogia spiritus: a profound, transformational interrelation of the Holy Spirit and the human spirit. The Holy Spirit, intimately connected to the person and work of Christ, takes up and extends the work begun in the incarnation by enfleshing the presence of Christ, thus transforming human life. Loder is distinctive for articulating a pneumatology that incorporates 'how' the self participates in the relationship and the way the self, through the relationship, comes to have a full knowledge of itself, the world, and God. It is precisely the logic of this Christomorphic dynamic that has extraordinary implications for the way we attempt to fathom the depths and convey the meaning of Christian experience. Loder's relational phenomenological pneumatology contains rich and principally unrecognized resources for providing new frameworks for the Christian life.

This volume provides a key text for debates on spiritual education in the 21st . It presents spiritual education as a distinctive field of academic enquiry in its own right.The strengths of the book lie in its international appeal, research based orientation, and interdisciplinary character, and is divided into three main sections: religious and theological approaches; psychological and anthropological approaches; and pedagogical approaches. Issues of cultural, religious, gender and social difference are addressed in research and pedagogical terms, and the ways in which faith traditions and secular stancescontribute to values and understanding of human purpose are explored.

One of the most basic questions for any legal system is that of methodology: how one interprets, analyzes, weighs, and applies a mass of often competing legal rules, precedents, practices, customs, and traditions to reach final determinations and practical guidance about the correct legal-prescribed course of action in any given situation. Questions of legal methodology raise not only practical concerns, but theoretical and philosophical ones as well. We expect law to be more than the arbitrary result of a given decision maker's personal preferences, and so we demand that legal methodologies be principled as well as practical. These issues are especially acute in religious legal systems, where the stakes are raised by concerns for respecting not just human, but divine law. Despite this, the major scholars and codifiers of halakhah, or Jewish law, have only rarely explicated their own methods for reaching principled legal decisions. This book explains the major jurisprudential factors driving the halakhic jurisprudence of Rabbi Yehiel Mikhel Epstein, twentieth-century author of the Arukh Hashulchan-the most comprehensive, seminal, and original modern restatement of Jewish law since Maimonides. Reasoning inductively from a broad review of hundreds of rulings from the Orach Chaim section of the Arukh Hashulchan, the book teases out and explicates ten core halakhic principles that animate Rabbi Epstein's halakhic decision-making. Along the way, it compares the Arukh Hashulchan methodology to that of the Mishna Berura. This book will help any reader understand important methodological issues in both Jewish and general jurisprudence.

With a particular emphasis on the soul, this book explores Edith Stein's holistic conception of the human being's body-soul-spirit unity, which forms the foundation of her Christian anthropology and her view of human formation. Characterized by an unremitting attention to interconnections, Stein emerges as a forerunner of contemporary holistic approaches. Edith Stein and the Body-Soul-Spirit at the Center of Holistic Formation demonstrates the breadth and relevance of Stein's work by engaging her thought with the anthropological views of fellow phenomenologist John Paul II, Wilkie Au's perspectives on holistic spirituality and formation, and several nonreductionist, neuroscientific viewpoints of the human being. This book also makes available to the English reader a significant amount of material from Stein's untranslated works. Anyone interested in theological anthropology, holistic spirituality, human formation, the body-mind question, or Edith Stein studies will benefit from the wealth of material presented in this single book.

At a time when the popularity of Buddhism is at a peak in the west, both inside and outside the university setting, scholars and students alike are searching for guidance: How should Buddhism, a religion which is ultimately 'foreign' to western experience, be taught? How should one teach central Buddhist doctrines and ideas? Should one teach Buddhist practise; if so how? Until now, those interested in these and other related matters have been left with little guidance. Despite the wealth of scholarly publications on Buddhist traditions and the plethora of books about meditation and enlightenment, a serious lacuna exists in the sphere of teaching Buddhism.
This book fills this lacuna, by providing a series of thematically arranged articles written by contemporary scholars of Buddhism throughout North America. Some of the major themes covered are the history of teaching Buddhism in Europe and North America (Reynolds, Prebish), the problem of representations of Buddhism in undergraduate teaching (Lewis), the problem of crossing cultural and historical divides (Jenkins), the place of the body and mind in the Buddhist classroom (Waterhouse), alternative pedagogical methods in teaching Buddhism (Wotypka, Jarow, Hori, Grimes) and the use of the Internet as a resource, and metaphor for teaching Buddhism (Fenn, Grieder).

This volume provides a key text for debates on spiritual education in the 21st . It presents spiritual education as a distinctive field of academic enquiry in its own right.The strengths of the book lie in its international appeal, research based orientation, and interdisciplinary character, and is divided into three main sections: religious and theological approaches; psychological and anthropological approaches; and pedagogical approaches. Issues of cultural, religious, gender and social difference are addressed in research and pedagogical terms, and the ways in which faith traditions and secular stancescontribute to values and understanding of human purpose are explored.

How and what to teach about religion is controversial in every country. The Routledge International Handbook of Religious Education is the first book to comprehensively address the range of ways that major countries around the world teach religion in public and private educational institutions. It discusses how three models in particular seem to dominate the landscape. Countries with strong cultural traditions focused on a majority religion tend to adopt an "identification model," where instruction is provided only in the tenets of the majority religion, often to the detriment of other religions and their adherents. Countries with traditions that differentiate church and state tend to adopt a "separation model," thus either offering instruction in a wide range of religions, or in some cases teaching very little about religion, intentionally leaving it to religious institutions and the home setting to provide religious instruction. Still other countries attempt "managed pluralism," in which neither one, nor many, but rather a limited handful of major religious traditions are taught. Inevitably, there are countries which do not fit any of these dominant models and the range of methods touched upon in this book will surprise even the most enlightened reader. Religious instruction by educational institutions in 53 countries and regions of the world are explored by experts native to each country. These chapters discuss: Legal parameters in terms of subjective versus objective instruction in religion Constitutional, statutory, social and political contexts to religious approaches Distinctions between the kinds of instruction permitted in elementary and secondary schools versus what is allowed in institutions of higher learning. Regional assessments which provide a welcome overview and comparison. This comprehensive and authoritative volume will appeal to educators, scholars, religious leaders, politicians, and others interested in how religion and education interface around the world.

The majority of books on religious education are written by those who are themselves adherents of particular religious beliefs and such books almost invariably reflect their authors' religious inclinations. Therefore a critical look at certain key aspects in religious education from a secular point of view was long overview when this title was f

John Dewey's fame as an educational theorist is matched by his infamy as a critic of traditional religion. This interdisciplinary work explores Dewey's philosophy of education in correlation with Christian theology, proposing that we see "theology as education". In conversation with Friedrich Schleiermacher (the father of modern theology), St. Benedict (the founder of Western monasticism), and Rowan Williams (the renowned archbishop of Canterbury), this innovative and accessible book develops a distinctive "Deweyan theology". John Dewey among the Theologians will be welcomed by readers interested in interdisciplinary theology, educational theory, religious education, and pragmatism.

"Yin-Yang" Interplay: A Renewed Formation Program for the Catholic Seminary in China puts the spotlight on the design of a renewed formation program for the Catholic seminary in China. Without any renewed formation, transformation becomes pessimistic in the Chinese Catholic Church (CCC). Though the road marching to spiritual transformation in China is long and winding, "Yin-Yang" Interplay offers those who are interested in laboring in this special vineyard vision a dream, and, more profoundly, hope. Indeed, this hope is based on the analysis of the political and religious background of the CCC and the data collected from twenty-six interviewees, especially the seminarians whose sincere sharing substantiates the author's academic research and simultaneously opens a window to the world for understanding the CCC. On the foundation of theory and experience, the author suggests a renewed formation program that customizes the special political and religious situations in China. The program integrates traditional Confucianism, modern educational theory, and contemporary Chinese culture in order to foster a seedbed for the clerical formation of the CCC.

When serious conflict surfaces in a congregation, lay people are usually stunned. They feel frightened, angry, and helpless. Congregational Fitness explores why congregations are prone to conflict and describes healthy behaviors lay people can practice to manage conflict constructively. Goodman argues that since it is members of the congregation who carry on from one pastor to another, it is important for them to know and practice positive behaviors continually, rather than reacting out of emotion and anxiety to an unexpected situation. Designed for use by individuals, study groups, and retreat participants.

Revitalizing Practice is designed to help theological faculties engage a common set of challenges, particularly in the areas of diversity, formation, and institutional identity. These are not technical problems but are instead the very stuff out of which teaching and learning are practiced. Yet addressing such issues requires intentional strategies and collaborative work. Revitalizing Practice offers four such intentional strategies: "A New Ecology Model", "An Improvisational Model", "An Appreciative Inquiry Model", and "A World Cafe Model". Each of these models provides a thorough and practical framework (based on sound theoretical concepts) designed to help faculties revitalize their practices of theological teaching and learning.