Religious studies, also known as the study of religion, is the scientific study of religion. There is no consensus on what qualifies as religion and its definition is highly contested. It describes, compares, interprets, and explains religion, emphasizing empirical, historically based, and cross-cultural perspectives.
Interfaith dialogue refers to cooperative, constructive, and positive interaction between people of different religious traditions and/or spiritual or humanistic beliefs, at both the individual and institutional levels.
Michael Louis Fitzgerald is a British cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and an expert on Christian–Muslim relations. He has had the rank of archbishop since 2002. At his retirement in 2012, he was the apostolic nuncio to Egypt and delegate to the Arab League. He headed the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue from 2002 to 2006. Pope Francis raised him to the rank of cardinal on 5 October 2019.
David Frank Ford is an Anglican public theologian. He was the Regius Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge, beginning in 1991. He is now an Emeritus Regius Professor of Divinity. His research interests include political theology, ecumenical theology, Christian theologians and theologies, theology and poetry, the shaping of universities and of the field of theology and religious studies within universities, hermeneutics, and interfaith theology and relations. He is the founding director of the Cambridge Inter-Faith Programme and a co-founder of the Society for Scriptural Reasoning.
Heup Young Kim is a Korean Christian theologian and a scholar of East Asian religions, specialized in Asian constructive theology, interfaith dialogue, and religion and science. He is the founding director of the Korea Forum for Science and Life and was the Distinguished Asian Theologian in Residence at Graduate Theological Union. He was Professor of Systematic Theology at Kangnam University in South Korea where he also served as a dean of the College of Humanities and Liberal arts, the Graduate School of Theology, and the University Chapel. Kim is one of the founding members and fellows of the International Society for Science and Religion and an Advisor to the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology. He was a co-moderator of the 6th and 7th Congress of Asian Theologians and a president of the Korean Society of Systematic Theology.
Edwin David Aponte is a Puerto Rican-American cultural historian, religious studies scholar, and contributor to the development of Christianity among Hispanic and Latino/a Americans. His research focuses on the interplay between religion and culture, especially Hispanic/Latino(a) religions, African-American religions, North American religious history, and congregational studies. He is one of a small number of U.S. Hispanic historians of Christianity.
Jenn Lindsay is an American social scientist, adjunct professor of Sociology and Communications, documentary filmmaker, video journalist and singer-songwriter currently based in Rome, Italy. Her work focuses on the exploration of social diversity, community building, personal transformation, and social change movements.
Ian Stephen Markham is an Episcopal priest and the Dean and President of Virginia Theological Seminary (VTS) since August 2007. Previously, he served at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut as Dean and Professor of Theology and Ethics.
Mohammed Abu-Nimer is an American expert on conflict resolution and dialogue for peace. He is a full professor at the American University School of International Service in International Peace and Conflict Resolution in Washington, DC, the largest school of international relations in the United States.
Elijah Interfaith Institute is a nonprofit, international, UNESCO-sponsored interfaith organization founded by Alon Goshen-Gottstein in 1997. The organization is headquartered in Jerusalem, with offices and representatives in different countries,
Alon Goshen-Gottstein is a scholar of Jewish studies and a theoretician and activist in the domain of interfaith dialogue. He is founder and director of the Elijah Interfaith Institute since 1997. He specializes in bridging the theological and academic dimension with a variety of practical initiatives, especially involving world religious leadership.
The John Paul II Center for Interreligious Dialogue is an academic center that serves to build bridges between religious traditions, particularly between Catholic Christian and Jewish pastoral and academic leaders. The Center is a partnership between the Russell Berrie Foundation and the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum). It operates as part of the Section for Ecumenism and Dialogue in the Theology Faculty of the Angelicum in Rome.
John Allembillah Azumah is an ordained Ghanaian minister in the Presbyterian Church of Ghana and associate professor of World Christianity and Islam. He is one of the leaders in Islam and Christian–Muslim relations and he is currently working on research in the area of World Christianity and Islam in the Global South.
Multiple religious belonging, also known as double belonging, refers to the idea that individuals can belong to more than one religious tradition. While this is often seen as a common reality in regions such as Asia with its many non-exclusionary religions, religious scholars have begun to discuss multiple religion belonging with respect to religious traditions such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
Catherine Cornille is a professor of comparative theology and specializes in theology of religions and interreligious dialogue. She presently holds the Newton College Alumnae Chair of Western Culture in the department of theology at Boston College.
Geoffrey Claussen is an American rabbi and scholar who serves as a professor of Religious Studies at Elon University. His scholarship focuses on Jewish ethics, theology, and the Musar movement.
Intercultural dialogue (ICD) builds upon the concept of dialogue, which refers to at least two people holding a conversation. And it builds upon the term intercultural, which is typically used to refer to people communicating across differences in nationality, race and ethnicity, or religion. Dialogue has several meanings: it sometimes refers to dialogue in a script, which simply means people talking, but more often it refers to "a quality of communication characterized by the participants' willingness and ability simultaneously to be radically open to the other(s) and to articulate their own views. ... Dialogue's primary goal is understanding rather than agreement."
Leo Dennis Lefebure is an American Roman Catholic priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago, university professor, and author. He is the inaugural Matteo Ricci S. J. Chair of Theology at Georgetown University.
DIMMID, Dialogue Interreligieux Monastique - Monastic Interreligious Dialogue (DIM·MID), is a movement within the Benedictine and Cistercian order aimed to promote interfaith dialogue between monastic communities of different religions. Created in 1977, the movement approaches this aim through a mutual understanding and experience of each other's spirituality.
