Rodney Lawrence Petersen is an American scholar in the area of history, ethics, and religious conflict. [1]
He moved to the Boston area from Switzerland in 1990 and worked as the executive director of the Boston Theological Institute. In addition to this work with the BTI, he teaches in both the member schools and overseas. Together with BTI colleagues these courses have taken students to various regions of the world in order to understand and film ways in which faith communities are implicated in regional violence and how they can be avenues of reconciliation.
After growing up in the Chicago area, he received his B.A. from Harvard College, a Master of Divinity from Harvard Divinity School, and a Master of Theology degree also from Harvard Divinity School. His doctorate in history was awarded by Princeton Theological Seminary. He continued his education in Europe at Institut Oecuménique (Geneva, Switzerland), and Institut d'Histoire de la Réformation, Université de Genève.
His early work history included teaching at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (Deerfield, Illinois), Webster University (Geneva, Switzerland), and with the Fédération des Institutions établies à Genève (FIIG). He also worked with churches in France and Eastern Europe, primarily Romania.
Now he is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A., serving on several of their committees and served for seven years as the pastor of the Allston Congregational Church (U.C.C.). He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Council of Churches, the Massachusetts Commission on Christian Unity, the Lord’s Day Alliance of the US, the Refugee Immigration Ministry, the Board of Church and Prison, Sec/tres. American Society of Missiology (Eastern Fellowship), and numerous other academic and ecclesiastical organizations.
He is author, editor/co-editor, or contributor of several articles and scholarly works including:
Karl Barth was a Swiss Reformed theologian. Barth is best known for his commentary The Epistle to the Romans, his involvement in the Confessing Church, including his authorship of the Barmen Declaration, and especially his unfinished multi-volume theological summa the Church Dogmatics. Barth's influence expanded well beyond the academic realm to mainstream culture, leading him to be featured on the cover of Time on 20 April 1962.
Carl Ferdinand Howard Henry was an American evangelical Christian theologian who provided intellectual and institutional leadership to the neo-evangelical movement in the mid-to-late 20th century. He was ordained in 1942 after graduating from Northern Baptist Theological Seminary and went on to teach and lecture at various schools and publish and edit many works surrounding the neo-evangelical movement. His early book, The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism (1947), was influential in calling evangelicals to differentiate themselves from separatist fundamentalism and claim a role in influencing the wider American culture. He was involved in the creation of numerous major evangelical organizations that contributed to his influence in Neo-evangelicalism and lasting legacy, including the National Association of Evangelicals, Fuller Theological Seminary, Evangelical Theological Society, Christianity Today magazine, and the Institute for Advanced Christian Studies. The Carl F. H. Henry Institute for Evangelical Engagement at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and the Carl F. H. Henry Center for Theological Understanding at Trinity International University seek to carry on his legacy. His ideas about Neo-evangelism are still debated to this day and his legacy continues to inspire change in American social and political culture.
Miroslav Volf is a Croatian Protestant theologian and public intellectual and Henry B. Wright Professor of Theology and director of the Yale Center for Faith and Culture at Yale University. He previously taught at the Evangelical Theological Seminary in his native Osijek, Croatia and Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California (1990–1998).
Harvard Divinity School (HDS) is one of the constituent schools of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The school's mission is to educate its students either in the academic study of religion or for leadership roles in religion, government, and service. It also caters to students from other Harvard schools that are interested in the former field. HDS is among a small group of university-based, non-denominational divinity schools in the United States.
Stanley Martin Hauerwas is an American Protestant theologian, ethicist, and public intellectual. Hauerwas originally taught at the University of Notre Dame before moving to Duke University. Hauerwas was a longtime professor at Duke, serving as the Gilbert T. Rowe Professor of Theological Ethics at Duke Divinity School with a joint appointment at the Duke University School of Law. In the fall of 2014, he also assumed a chair in theological ethics at the University of Aberdeen. Hauerwas is considered by many to be one of the world's most influential living theologians and was named "America's Best Theologian" by Time magazine in 2001. He was also the first American theologian to deliver the prestigious Gifford Lectures at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland in over forty years. His work is frequently read and debated by scholars in fields outside of religion or ethics, such as political philosophy, sociology, history, and literary theory. Hauerwas has achieved notability outside of academia as a public intellectual, even appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show.
The Boston Theological Interreligious Consortium (BTI), originally the Boston Theological Institute, is the largest theological consortium in the world, bringing together the resources of theological schools and seminaries throughout the greater Boston area. Its activities include facilitating cross-registration and library access among the member schools and supporting certificate programs and student-led conferences. The BTI is led by Stephanie Edwards, who has served as executive director since the summer of 2020, and by a board of trustees that represent its member schools.
Boston University School of Theology (STH) is the oldest theological seminary of American Methodism and the founding school of Boston University, the largest private research university in New England. It is one of thirteen theological schools maintained by the United Methodist Church. BUSTH is a member of the Boston Theological Institute consortium.
Max Lynn Stackhouse was the Rimmer and Ruth de Vries Professor of Reformed Theology and Public Life Emeritus at Princeton Theological Seminary. He was ordained in the United Church of Christ and was the president of the Berkshire Institute for Theology and the Arts.
Oliver Michael Timothy O'Donovan is a British Anglican priest and academic, known for his work in the field of Christian ethics. He has also made contributions to political theology, both contemporary and historical. He was Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford from 1982 to 2006, and Professor of Christian Ethics and Practical Theology at the University of Edinburgh from 2006 to 2013.
James Luther Adams (1901–1994), an American professor at Harvard Divinity School, Andover Newton Theological School, and Meadville Lombard Theological School, and a Unitarian parish minister, was the most influential theologian among American Unitarian Universalists in the 20th century.
Andover Newton Theological School (ANTS) was a graduate school and seminary in Newton, Massachusetts, affiliated with the American Baptist Churches USA and the United Church of Christ. It was the product of a merger between Andover Theological Seminary and Newton Theological Institution. In recent years, it was an official open and affirming seminary, meaning that it was open to students of same-sex attraction or transgender orientation and generally advocated for tolerance of it in church and society.
Charles Earle Raven was an English theologian and Anglican priest. He was Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge University (1932–1950) and Master of Christ's College, Cambridge (1939–1950). His works have been influential in the history of science publishing on the positive effects that theology has had upon modern science.
Miguel A. De La Torre is a professor of Social Ethics and Latino Studies at Iliff School of Theology, author, and an ordained Southern Baptist minister.
François Bovon was a Swiss biblical scholar and historian of early Christianity. He was the Frothingham Professor Emeritus of the History of Religion at Harvard Divinity School. Bovon was a graduate of the University of Lausanne and held a doctorate in theology from the University of Basel. From 1967 to 1993, he taught in the Faculty of Theology at the University of Geneva. Bovon was an honorary professor at the University of Geneva and in 1993 he received an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Theology at Uppsala University, Sweden. He was president of the Swiss Society of Theology from 1973 to 1977 and president of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas in 2000.
Grant Albert Wacker is an American historian of Christianity in the United States.
Willie James Jennings is an American theologian, known for his contributions on liberation theologies, cultural identities, and theological anthropology. He is currently an associate professor of systematic theology and Africana studies at Yale University.
Raymond Helmick, SJ was an American Jesuit, peacemaker, theologian and author. Helmick worked as a professor at Boston College and the Boston Theological Institute. Helmick travelled around the world as an emissary for peace. Helmick founded the US Interreligious Committee for Peace in the Middle East.
Practical theology is an academic discipline that examines and reflects on religious practices in order to understand the theology enacted in those practices and in order to consider how theological theory and theological practices can be more fully aligned, changed, or improved. Practical theology has often sought to address a perceived disconnection between dogmatics or theology as an academic discipline on the one hand, and the life and practice of the church on the other.
John F. Kilner is a bioethicist who held the Franklin and Dorothy Forman endowed chair in ethics and theology at Trinity International University, where he was also Professor of Bioethics and Contemporary Culture and Director of Bioethics Degree Programs. He is a Senior Fellow at The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity (CBHD) in Deerfield, Illinois, where he served as Founding Director until Fall 2005.
Luke Bretherton is a British author and theologian. His work addresses contemporary moral and political questions, particularly as these relate to the relationship between religion and democracy. He is currently Robert E. Cushman Distinguished Professor of Moral and Political Theology at Duke University in North Carolina (2012–present). Previously he taught at King's College London (2004–2012) and St Augustine’s College (2001–2004). Alongside his scholarly work, he writes in the media on topics related to religion and politics, has worked with a variety of faith-based NGOs and churches around the world, and is actively involved in forms of grassroots democratic politics, both in the UK and the US. He hosts and writes the Listen, Organize, Act! Podcast.