Student Digs into the Bible
By Jacob Damm
As I sat in JFK airport, detained by El Al security, I had no
way of knowing what my second field season in Israel held in store
for me. It certainly wasn’t off to the start that I had imagined, having been notified before entering the plane that my bag had tested
positive for explosive residue. Imagine my surprise. A long bureaucratic mess later, I was on my flight, sans luggage (a later adventure
saw its return, minus one pair of socks). But things were to improve
markedly once I made it to the field and rejoined my colleagues to
continue the archaeological investigation of
the fortified city, Khirbet Qeiyafa.
The predawn trudge to the top of
the hill, tools for the day in hand, left little
room in our minds for anything but a longing for the first taste of coffee. But the
beauty of Qeiyafa’s natural setting in the
Judean foothills always made for a gorgeous sunrise, something that quickly erased the aches in our muscles and ensured our willingness to make that climb over the next
six weeks. But Qeiyafa would give us
much more than natural beauty, producing discoveries that will continue to revolutionize the understanding of Iron Age
Israel for years to come.
As fascinating and significant as
they were, there was also a sort of hilarity
to the findings. My area, aptly nicknamed
“the swimming pool” for its lack of any
defining feature (apart from the square’s
nice, straight walls), abutted two of the
most productive squares ever uncovered
at Qeiyafa. To the east lay a cultic house,
bursting with religious artifacts, and to our west, a wealthy residence, containing jewelry and finely wrought weaponry.
But, the beauty of being a nerd for all things archaeological meant that merely peering over the baulks into the next square
made my entire time in Israel worthwhile. Beyond that, I was also
able to contribute to one of the most important
investigations into Iron Age Judea to date. Needless to say, it is my full
intention to return to the
field as soon as possible, hopefully avoiding
accusations of terrorism
in the process.
New Faculty to Head Early
Christian Studies
By Erin Roberts
Hello, everyone, I am pleased to be joining the faculty at the University of South Carolina this August, and
would like to offer a brief introduction to my future colleagues, students, and friends. I am originally from Harrison,
OH, and received my B.A. from Centre College in Danville,
KY. At Centre, I studied anthropology, sociology, and religion, and also competed on the school's cross country and
track teams. I then completed an M.Div. at Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, NJ, and went on to receive an
A.M. in Religious Studies and a Ph.D. in Integrative Studies
(classics, philosophy, religious studies) from Brown University in Providence, RI. My areas of expertise include early
Christian history and literature, Classical Greek and Hellenistic philosophy, as well as theory and method for the study
of religion.
My current research is involved with the ways that
ancient writers interested in Judean traditions (including the
apostle Paul, Philo of Alexandria, and the authors of gospels
about Jesus) participated in the discourse of Greek and Roman moral philosophy, especially with relation to psychology and emotion. I am also involved in projects aimed at
naturalizing the study of religion and am interested in the
ways that theological agenda continue to shape the modern
study of Christian origins.
My teaching at USC will focus on early/protoChristian history and literature, Hellenistic moral philosophy, historiography, and theory of religion. I also will develop courses in collaboration with the Department of Philosophy. This fall, I will be teaching Introduction to the
Study of Religion and New Testament and the Formation of
Christianity.
Outside the classroom and the library, I enjoy practicing and competing in the Japanese martial art of Judo. In
the US national rankings I am currently ranked 1st in my age
and weight category,
and 10th in my weight
category across all ages.
I am currently training
to fight at the US Open
in Miami, FL, this August, and hope eventually to start a Judo Club
at USC.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
2
Commentary from Cairo
By Waleed El Ansary
I spent this summer in Cairo, Egypt, where I completed co-editing a book entitled Muslim and Christian Understanding: Theory and Application of A Common Word. The book explores the theological
and moral implications of a “Common Word” initiative commenced in 2007 by scholars, clerics, and
intellectuals from across the Islamic world. It brings to the fore, in the interest of developing a meaningful peace, how the Islamic and Christian communities representing well over half of the world’s
population might
agree on love of God and love of neighbor as common beliefs. The
response to the “Common Word” initiative has
been profound,
finding resonance in the senior levels of Catholic,
Protestant and
Orthodox branches of Christianity, as well as in
academia through conferences at Yale University, USC (upon which
the book is based), and Georgetown University. It is now the most
important theological exchange between
Christianity and Islam in
the world and provides a framework for addressing the most pressing issues between the two world communities. The book is the first
to expand the “Common Word” inquiry on
“vertical” issues arising
from a comparative exploration of theology, mysticism, and metaphysics in Christianity and Islam, and
“horizontal” issues of environmental policy, human rights, and development, points that President Obama
raised in his Cairo address. We refer to these two areas of focus as the theory and application of a
“Common Word,” given an intention to look beyond conventional approaches to interfaith dialogue and
ethics per se to better engage the practical level of shared international challenges. New Book on Solitude in the American Psyche
By Kevin Lewis
Lonesome: The Spiritual Meanings of American Solitude
(London: IBTauris, 2009; distributed in the US by Palgrave Macmillan)
The difference between experiencing
“lonely” and experiencing
“lonesome!” In the new book I suggest we would know ourselves a
little better as (increasingly information-tech driven) Americans by exploring this overlooked difference.
Our cultural heritage includes encouragement to resonant a
“lonesomeness” apart from the
“loneliness” from which it may
spring – while confusingly permitting interchangeable use of
the terms. High time we trace the difference critically.
I explore the meanings of lonesome as more than a
feeling, but rather a feeling-perception. American individualism ensures that it has no one meaning. Call it an open-ended
feeling-perception, elusive in content and at times religiouslike (without the myth and doctrine), expressing a fleeting
sense of otherness/Otherness in quotidian experience.
Mine is the first sustained attempt, interdisciplinary
in character, to explore the distinctively American lonesome
which T.S. Eliot, tantalizingly, referencing specifically only
the African American blues tradition, in a single sentence,
identified over eighty years ago: “Loneliness is known as a
frequent attribute in romantic poetry, and in the form of
“lonesomeness” (as I need not remind American readers) is a
frequent attitude in contemporary lyrics known as 'the blues'.”
Loneliness, by contrast, as theorized by psychologists, is a depressive state of relational deprivation. But in
unbidden moments, loneliness can be transformed into some-
thing approaching “oceanic” consciousness, into what Abraham
Maslow described occurring in
“peak moments.” The American arts
testify to the experience.
Leaving shades of lonely
depressiveness behind, lonesome
offers a sense of reconciling connectedness to the world beyond the
self, or, perhaps, to an “otherness” of
the individual’s unique perception.
The reader, I hope, will find his/her
own words for this un-nameable
content.
I take obvious examples from our country music, rife
with savory lonesomeness., I take several from American fiction – but few from intentional “nature” writers (Thoreau
claimed he was never “lonesome.”)
Though not verbalized, the lonesome in Edward Hopper’s later work, giving us the “Hopperesque,” we find evocative. These images, following those of the precedent nineteenth century school of Luminism merit a chapter.
Poetry provides a consummate medium for lonesome
feeling-perception. Emily Dickinson is an especially good
example. Walt Whitman is a doktor meister.
Sociologist Robert Bellah’s writing on the imminence of transcendence and Rudolf Otto’s classic phenomenology of the “numinous” (the term he invented) help me observe the generally religious character of lonesome.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
3
Dr. Vehlow’s Research in Jerusalem
Arts & Humanities Grant
By KatjaVehlow
I have been teaching at the Department of Religious Studies
and in the Jewish History
Program for two years now.
This semester, I was
awarded an Arts & Humanities Grant to complete a
book and have been relieved of my teaching duties. I often spend my summers in Jerusalem, where I
earned an MA degree a decade ago, and I wanted to share
some of my impressions with you.
Jerusalem, of course, is a city sacred to Jews, Muslims, and Christians, and many of the holy sites overlap: Two
holy mosques stand on the hill Jews regard as the Temple
Mount, and the site of Jesus’ crucifixion is basically next door.
It is, equally obviously, a divided
city, not built for the 700.000 inhabitants crowding in, and lacks many
conveniences westerners are accustomed to. People are often somewhat
rude, the traffic is not much fun, the
bus lines follow an erratic schedule,
and there are not too many supermarkets. There are, however, lots of
small stores, cafes, art projects, and every religious foundation
under the sun seems to have an office in Jerusalem.
When I am in Jerusalem, I live in the western part of
the city, in areas mostly built in the 1930s to 1950s that bear
the imprint of their early “Yekke” inhabitants, Jews of German descent who
fled the Nazis and settled here 60-70
years ago and who perhaps received this
nickname because many of these German men insisted on formal attire, i.e.
jackets (hence Yekke), even in the heat
of the Middle East, in a culture that vehemently rejected these norms. Many
Yekkes were quite prominent intellectuals, and I enjoy passing by their former
homes, in the hope that some of their thoughtfulness might rub
off.
Today, these quarters are predominantly populated
by well-to-do religious Jews. Kosher restaurants abound,
there are many many institutions of Jewish learning, and of
course lots of synagogues of Jews of all flavors. In fact, there
are few non-kosher places in
the city, and most tourists
are a bit in shock when they
see the degree to which the
city shuts down on Shabbat,
the Jewish Sabbath. Not
many restaurants to choose
from on a Friday night!
I usually shop in
the shuk, a market
that today sells
everything from
vegetables to
clothes and, apparently, jewelry. Over the last few years, the shuk has become somewhat gentrified, there are now cafes, even a bar,
and on Monday evenings in August, an art festival takes over.
Some stalls remain open, but mostly, it’s a big happening:
One guy makes art from food, another projects a light on a
wall, and people are making music everywhere.
I spend most of my days in the library, and it takes
me about thirty minutes to walk from my house to the Jewish
National Library on the campus of Givat Ram, opposite of the
Knesset, the Israeli Parliament. I take a shortcut and cross the
Valley of the Cross, and
pass by the Monastery of
the Cross that, according
to legend, was founded by
Queen Helen, mother of
Emperor Constantine the
Great. It is the place
where Abraham’s staff
was planted and turned
into the wood from which
Christ’s cross was crafted. The interior of the monastery’s
churches is truly magnificent, and I am surprised that this site
is not on every tourist’s schedule.
Jerusalem is also bitterly divided, the differences
between both parts, East and West Jerusalem, are apparent to
anyone taking a bus crossing the not so invisible line separating the two. There is plenty of strife surrounding settlements
in East Jerusalem, and one of the more virulent ones has
coined a poignant slogan that rhymes in Hebrew: ‫אין קדושה‬
‫בעיר כבושה‬there is no holiness in an occupied city) and some
of my friends regularly make their way to the weekly protests,
held on Friday afternoons or, during
Ramadan, after the end of Shabbat.
Both East and West Jerusalem and
their inhabitants seem to never interact, but in fact, they do in a myriad
uneven ways. More and more are for
instance shopping in the city, or buying homes on French Hill, a WestJerusalem neighbourhood that lies in
East Jerusalem (but technically is on
the Jewish side of the Green Line)
and elsewhere and Jews and Arabs
mingle in Mamilla, the former Alrov quarter and the latest
luxury mall built opposite of the Old City. From the rooftop of
the Mamilla Hotel, one has the most magnificent view of the
Old City, a powerful reminder of the city’s long history and—
just maybe—offering a glimmer that times can get better, too.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
4
Faculty Shorts
By Christopher McLaughlin
Dr. Kevin Lewis’s book,
Lonesome: The Spiritual
Meanings of American Solitude, was released Fall 2009. It
has been featured on the University of Chicago Martin
Marty Center for the Advanced
Study of Religion’s online
forum “Religion & Culture
Web Forum”. There it has received the invited responses of
several noted scholars including Robert J. Higgs (East Tennessee State), Walter Jost (University of Virginia),
and Henry Weinfield (University of Notre Dame). Links
found in the Forum allow visitors to read both the Preface
and the Second Chapter of Lewis’s book. He was also invited September 20th, 2010, by the Institute of Southern
Studies at the University of South Carolina, to give a talk
on the subject of his book.
In September 2010, Lewis was invited to participate, along with selected graduate directors from other institutions, in a workshop, sponsored by the Wabash Center
for Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion at
Missouri State University, on "Assessing Teaching and
Learning in Terminal M.A. Programs in Religious Studies."
Dr. Waleed El-Ansary and Dr. Katja Vehlow are both
recipients of Arts and Humanities Grants from the Office of
the Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost. Each
were selected from a pool of 85 applicants.
Dr. El-Ansary’s grant, the proposal of which was to seek to
expand the interfaith dialogue
initiative between Muslims and
Christians, has been used to fund
the finalization of a book entitled
Muslim and Christian Understanding: Theory and Application of A Common Word, among
other developing endeavors. The
book is expected to be released November 9th, 2010; for
more information, click here.
Dr. Vehlow’s grant has been
applied to the completion of her
first book. Her work has led her
to Jerusalem, where she is currently doing research. The fruit
of her research will be the first
critical edition, translation, and
analysis of Ibn Daud’s universal
history. This work will enable
non-specialists to access Ibn
Daud’s influential work which would otherwise only be
available to specialists of Jewish medieval historiography.
Dr. Cutsinger’s Maymester course entitled “Mysteries of
the Christian East” was found to be a course both creatively
designed and fruitfully implemented. The course drew students from a variety of backgrounds with an even more
diverse set of motives for taking the class. Structured as a
Socratic discussion, while necessarily allowing for short lectures
and videos for the sake of elucidating ideas and practices that
may have otherwise seemed foreign and unapproachable, the
course allowed students to delve
into the depths of questions which
have remained relevant and potent throughout the Christian
East’s 2,000 year long history.
Including a 5-day trip to a Greek
Orthodox monastery where students were able to catch a glimpse of this Tradition in practice, the unconventional course was unanimously considered to be both intriguing and illuminating.
We at the Religious Studies Department are excited to announce our latest addition to the
Religious Studies faculty, Dr.
Erin Roberts. The recent
Brown University doctoral
graduate was chosen from a vast
and competitive field of candidates, all vying for a position as
professor of Early Christian
Studies. Her unique strengths in
historical, philosophical, and
literary understandings of early
Christianity combined with an
expertise in the methodology of the study of religion will
undoubtedly contribute to her vision for the direction of
what she has deigned “Christian Origins” at the University
of South Carolina. We welcome her and look forward to
her development of the Christian Origins Program.
Dr. Stephanie Mitchem has been named the new Chair of
the department. She succeeds Steven Lynn, now the Senior
Associate Dean for Liberal
Arts. Her fresh ideas and
palpable zeal for new directions in promoting the field
of religious studies in the
academic discipline make
this an exciting time for the
Department of Religious
Studies. Concurrently she is
offering courses such as
“Perspectives in Religious
Studies” and “Women in
Religion.”
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
5
“Silence Only Beyond This Point”
By Erik Grayson
When I reflect on my summer, I think of deep discussions,
impending silence, and a diversity of nationalities. Christian
monasticism, the subject of my summer research, was for me
an experience like no other. I relish the opportunity to visit
Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and modern ecumenical
monasteries, each having very different, yet surprisingly similar, ways of life.
The question that ultimately brought me to “the
field” was a simple one that offers no easy answer: how do
monasteries achieve seclusion from the world? In other
words, how does the monastic community “make disciples
among the nations” and yet cultivate
that inner stillness and solitude modeled by Christ in the Gospels? After
all, the most basic tenet of a monastery is the notion of pulling away
from the world. Yet it seems that in
an age of electronic communication
and increased travel, the people and
ideas of the “world” are knocking
even louder at the cloister doors.
I was one among the many knocking on those doors.
Or rather, less poetically, I was one who wrote emails and
filled out electronic forms to be permitted a visit. But these
are necessary boundaries to preserve the tranquil life of the
monastic. All three of the communities I visited, St. Anthony’s Greek Orthodox Monastery (photo top right), the Roman Catholic Abbey of Gethsemani (photo top left), and the
ecumenical monastery of Taizé (photo bottom right), offered
quiet places of solitude and reflection. Even the grounds of
St. Anthony’s were tremendous, an oasis of serenity.
My arrival at Gethsemani
was greeted by the words, “silence
only beyond this point.” I went
about this Trappist community
alone, lost in my thoughts and
prayers. Contemplative spirituality
was something I had studied, but
never had forced upon me, so to
speak. Everything at Gethsemani was rather mundane and
average, yet in the stillness of the place, there seemed to be an
altogether deeper quality.
I made a similar
observation at St. Anthony’s. The role of the
Orthodox pilgrim was participation in the traditional
liturgical and sacramental
life of the community.
These elements, and even
the magnificent grounds,
were windows to divine truths. Both Gethsemani and St. Anthony’s offer pilgrims – visitors from “the world” – glimpses
into sacred realities.
Taizé, a modern ecumenical phenomenon, attempts
to share the deeper truths through people. From my arrival, I
realized that the experience of silence and solitude was to be
much different here, for I was one among over three thousand
young adult pilgrims from around the world. Taizé understands its mission to the world as one of reconciling the Christian church of the young
generation. Rather than
liturgical traditions and
ample reflection, the program was focused on international dialogue, shared
services of prayer, and acts
of servitude.
Spending a week
in each of these monasteries gave me a brief look into the ways a Christian monastery
can be secluded while sharing their faith with others. I imagine there are probably as many expressions of the seclusionopenness dilemma as there are communities, yet it all comes
down to the same question: how can we be faithful? I look
forward to exploring my observations further in seeking to
answer this question.
A Word from the Chair: Growth, Change Welcomed in Religious Studies
By Stephanie Mitchem
A 2008 study conducted by the American Academy of Religion yielded the following facts about religious studies in higher education:
“The number of religious studies majors increased by 22 percent in the past decade (to an estimated 47,000 students),
with like percentage increases in the total courses offered, course enrollments, and faculty positions in the field. The number of
religious studies majors at public institutions has grown even more rapidly, by 40 percent during the same period. What was
once a major situated largely within liberal arts colleges and denominationally-linked institutions is now establishing a widespread presence at state universities.” In other words, the entire field of religious studies is growing.
The University of South Carolina’s program of Religious Studies was ahead of the curve, establishing an undergraduate
program in 1968, connected to the community and exhibiting the range of possibilities that the 2008 study indicated. Yet, we are
changing! We’re not what we were in 1968 or 1998. Today, the complexities of religions demand deeper study. The programs
today are interdisciplinary, drawing students and faculty from across the Liberal Arts spectrum.
This department continues to be committed to excellence and welcome the changes to come. We’re revising and reshaping who we are for our times. I invite any of you with suggestions about these future directions to contact the department to let us
know. We welcome your ideas as we go forward into the future.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
6
Get to Know the
Office Assistants
We have two graduate assistants and two undergraduate
Religious Studies majors employed in the office. Ula Gaha
and Alison McLetchie are our
two graduate assistants, and
the two undergraduate assistants are Christopher
McLaughlin and Kate Morrison.
After receiving her
Bachelor of Arts in English at
Augusta
State University, Ula
earned her
Master of
Library and
Information
Science as
well as a Master of Arts in
English here at USC Columbia. She is currently working
toward a Specialist degree in
Library and Information Science and maintaining scholarship on William Faulkner. Ula
also has a chapter entitled “The
Multifaceted Beloved: The
Influence of Faulkner in Morrison’s Unique Southern Narrative” in the forthcoming
book Dredging Up Slavery
(McFarland Press). Her central
roles as graduate assistant have
been to aid Dr. Erin Roberts in
two classes, Introduction to the
Study of Religion and New
Testament and the Formation
of Christianity, and she conducts research for Dr. Roberts.
Ula has also been instrumental
in putting together the lay-out
and design of this newsletter.
Alison, having
achieved both a B.A. in Psychology at S.C.
State University and a M.A.
in Anthropology at the University of
South Carolina
-Columbia, is now seeking a
Ph.D. in Sociology from USC
and anticipates graduating in
2011. Her current occupation
in the department is primarily
to work as an assistant to
Mardi on various administrative projects. She also helps
Professors French, Mitchem
and Lewis with research and
technology in the classroom.
Kate is a junior and
has been working in the office
since fall 2009. Her primary
interests in the Religious Studies Department have been interfaith dialogue and cooperation. Kate has especially enjoyed
classes
about
Islam
and Buddhism.
She expects to
graduate in spring 2012 and
plans to take a year off subsequently. During this interim
year she would like to do mission work with Young Adult
Volunteers (YAV) and then
enter into a Presbyterian seminary. This semester Kate has
had the primary responsibility
of planning the Bernardin lectureship, managing the database and public relations.
Christopher is a senior and has also been with us
since fall 2009. He has been
pursuing interests in the esoteric dimensions of religion
and how various religious traditions interact on their
most interior
planes. After
graduation he
hopes to take
a year away
from academics before enrolling in a Graduate Studies program at a
Catholic institution. A major
focus of Christopher’s job in
the office has been the preparation of this newsletter in conjunction with Ula and under
the guidance of Mardi and Dr.
Lewis.
The Last Graduating Class of the
Master’s Program
in
Religious Studies
We currently have five students pursuing a graduate degree
in the department. These students comprise the final class of
graduate students in our department.
Shannon Deer is currently preparing her
thesis, entitled “Orthodox Spiritual Method”.
She anticipates graduation in the spring.
Scott Reeves’ thesis is called: "Saving Christianity from (post) Modern Evangelical Heresey."
He plans to be finished by January. He is
currently Director of HIS International in
Columbia, SC. He plans to be there for
several years and hopes to finish a PhD
or ThD with a focus on missiology. He
also hopes to one day be able to teach in
a seminary.
Cannon Fulmer is working on his thesis,
Correspondences between Martin Luther
and Al Ashari, comparison of Luther’s
theology of the Eucharist and Al Ashari’s
understanding of the divine and created
nature of the Quran. He is concurrently
working for the city of Columbia.
Joseph McDonald is writing his thesis on Fear, how it impacts us theologically and philosophically. He hopes to graduate in the fall of
2011. He is presently working for the
South Carolina Department of Insurance. Upon graduating, Joseph would
like to teach. “Several of the professors
here in the Religious Studies Department have been incredibly influential to
me,” says Joseph, “and to be a part of
their same vocation of teaching would
be an honor and a dream come true.”
Megan Gold is making progress on her thesis. Though currently untitled, her work examines the signs demarking
churches in the Columbia area. Through examining the
“public face” of these churches, she hopes to identify the
various methods these churches use to
both attract people to their particular
church, and how they use their signs to
portray something about themselves in
the public forum. In addition to her
graduate studies, she has a full-time job
at the Riverbanks Zoo as a Habitat Horticulturist; following graduation she
plans to continue her work at the zoo.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
7
Frithjof Schuon Anthology, and Maymester
By James Cutsinger
James Cutsinger continues working on a series of new editions of the books of Frithjof Schuon (photo
right), a leading twentieth-century figure in the perennialist school of comparative religious philosophy.
Cutsinger is thoroughly revising the translation of these works from the French, as well as providing extensive editor’s notes and glossaries. Each volume features an appendix of selections gleaned from Schuon’s
letters and other private, previously unpublished materials. Cutsinger has also just finished his third, and most
ambitious, anthology of Schuon’s writings. Tentatively entitled Splendor of the True: A Frithjof Schuon
Reader, the book includes a foreword by Huston Smith as well as some of Schuon’s poetry and color prints
of a few of his paintings.
Cutsinger’s recent courses have included a 2010 Maymester offering on “Mysteries of the Christian East”, an introduction to
the contemplative spirituality of Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Discussions included Eastern Christian
theology, iconography, music, and liturgy, with a special emphasis on Hesychasm, a form of mystical
practice long associated with the Holy Mountain of Athos (photo left), a monastic republic in northeastern
Greece. The course featured a weeklong trip to Saint Anthony’s Monastery in the Sonoran Desert of
southern Arizona (photo right), an
Orthodox monastic community
founded in 1995 by a spiritual elder
and former abbot of Mount Athos.
Fourteen students, ranging in age
from 20 to 88, accompanied Professor Cutsinger on this metaphysical adventure.
The Tori
Gate outside
Shinto
shrines and
temples
marks for the
pilgrim a
symbolic transition from the
finite to the infinite world.
RELIGIOUS STUDIES is
published for colleagues,
alumni, and friends by the
Department of Religious
Studies, College of Arts and
Sciences, University of South
Carolina, Columbia, SC
29208.
Web site:
www.cas.sc.edu/relg
Stephanie Mitchem, Chair
Kevin Lewis,
Managing Editor
Mardi McCabe, Issue Editor
Ula Gaha, Designer
Christopher McLaughlin,
Reporter & Text / Layout
Composer
Editorial
By Mardi McCabe
Religious Studies is inherently a discipline which examines the ideas, practices
and conceptual structures by which communities, societies, and cultures negotiate
the emotional, psychological, and spiritual transitions of life. So it is entirely appropriate that we are ourselves experiencing challenging rites of passage.
Two of our long-time faculty, Dr. Evans (right)
and Dr. Jones (left), have retired since 2008 when our last newsletter came
out. We’ve hired two new and exciting young professors to cover Jewish
Studies (Katja Vehlow) and Early Christianity (Erin Roberts). But our
graduate program has become a victim of economic necessities.
The department also experienced another significant transition
this year. Dr. Lauren Brubaker, founder of our department, passed away at the age of 95.
You can find a brief biography on our website (http://www.cas.sc.edu/relg/facbios/
brubaker.html) .
Along with all our colleagues in academia and our neighbors and friends, we
are transitioning into an unclear and uncertain future mediated by unprecedented economic and dubious political contingencies.
As we all have to envision and begin construction on our “new realities”, our printed
newsletter (like much of the print media these days) is being given a quiet send-off into the mists
of the past and of memories. However, this actually makes way for a more vibrant, unlimited reincarnation of the newsletter online.
With the online newsletter we will not be restricted by our budget to confine it to four letter-size pages, but can include anything and everything we want. We will also be able to use full
color on every page, again something we could not afford with the print version.
We have been posting the newletter online at the Religious Studies website (http://
www.cas.sc.edu/relg/news/newslett.html) since2001, where it will continue to appear, in addition to
this version sent out in email attachment.
By whichever method you receive the newsletter, we hope you will continue to follow our
ongoing saga as we create our new paths into the coming years.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010
8
The Joseph Cardinal Bernardin
Lecture Series
On Healthcare and the Catholic Church
On Thursday, October 7th the Department of Religious Studies at the University of South Carolina hosted the Joseph Cardinal Bernardin Lecture Series on Healthcare and the Catholic Church.
Father John Langan, Joseph Cardinal Bernardin
Professor of Catholic Social
Thought at Georgetown University,
began the evening with a lecture
entitled “Ethical Vision and Political
Considerations: The Continuing
Relevance of Cardinal Bernardin”. Having received his Ph.D. in
philosophy from the University of
Michigan, Langan has lectured and
written extensively on the ethics of
war and peace, human rights, and
religion and politics, among other
things. He has served on the boards of many different hospital
systems, and in 2005 Langan served as president of the Society for Christian Ethics, the principal organization for scholars in religious ethics.
Sister Judith Anne Karam, President and CEO of
Sisters of Charity Health System, presented a
response following Langan’s speech. She has
led CSA Health System since 1999. Sister
Judith is a Fellow in the American College
Health Care Executives, and she has been a
part of the Mayor of Cleveland’s Task Force
on Health Care and the United Way Health
Care Cabinet (Cleveland).
An afternoon lecture by Sister Carol Keehan, CEO
and President of the Catholic Health
Association of the United States, also
took place entitled “21st Century
Health Care Challenges and Catholic
Hospitals”. Sister Carol was recently
the board chair of Ascension Health’s
Sacred Heart Health System, Pensacola, FL. She is also a representative to
the International Federation of Catholic
Health Care Associations (AISAC) of
the Pontifical Council for Pastoral Health Care.
Father Langan’s evening talk was introduced by
Mrs. Pastides, wife of Harris Pastides the President of our
university. She spoke wonderfully of the life and legacy of
Cardinal Bernardin and found relevance and application in
his words for our everyday lives.
Remarks on Cardinal Bernadin
By Ms. Patricia Moore-Pastides
Joseph Cardinal Bernadin, a Columbia
native and once a pre -med student at
this university left this world in November 1996. Before his death he was
awarded the Medal of Freedom by
President Clinton and received the Caritas Christi Medal from the Catholic
Healthcare System of the Diocese of
Boston. During his lifetime he strove to
protect life and human dignity. He
worked to establish care for people
suffering from AIDS, was a member of
the religious alliance against pornography, the Catholic
Charities USA National Development Task Force and was a
Trustee of the Catholic Health Association.
Through his personal sufferings he became closer to
God and man as he freely ministered from a place of true
empathy. In ‘The Gift of Peace” which he penned during his
final months on earth he classified his pastoral ministry as
both simple and profound. “[My pastoral ministry is] simple
because it involves people in the routines and emergencies of
their daily lives, and profound because the encounter brings
both the minister and flock closer to God.” Cardinal Bernadin recognized that the people Jesus encountered were never
interruptions, distractions or obstacles. For him they were
opportunities to carry out his mission. Serving others was the
meaning of Jesus life and ministry. Through the “ordinary”
circumstances of his own cancer treatment Cardinal Bernadin
discovered the “profound,” which he describes simply this
way:
Somehow when you make that eye contact, when
you convince people that you really care and that,
even if hundreds of others are around, at that particular moment they are the only ones that count—then
you establish a new relationship. They leave feeling
that they have entered into a special intimacy with
you—if only for a moment. They sense that somehow you truly care about them and that, more importantly, you have somehow mediated the love, and
compassion of the Lord. In other words, that encounter also has a significant religious dimension: It
helps strengthen the bond, the relationship, between
each person and God.
I recognize that Cardinal Bernadin’s ministry with cancer
patients left great insight, which Catholic healthcare has perpetuated through offices of charism and mission, but, as a
seeker of the profound, it is also clear to me that we can make
eye contact in all realms of life, in all circumstances, and that
Cardinal Bernadin’s experience as expressed so gently, so
simply and profoundly in this book makes us want to do so.
Department of Religious Studies Newsletter Fall 2010