Students' Spirituality and “Big Questions” in Introductory Religion Courses

Abstract. A study of sixty‐six highly effective teachers of introductory theology and religion courses in various types of institutions reveals very complex challenges for instructors. The majority of students have as a goal their own religious and spiritual development. Faculty members' most frequent goal is critical thinking. Students much less frequently mention critical thinking, and their expectations and voices may be more appropriate for a place of worship or a counseling center. To meet these complex challenges, faculty encourage four student “voices”: the questioner, the applier, the thinker/arguer, and the autobiographer. These voices can help students explicitly to bring their own experiences and beliefs into relationship with course material and critical thinking. Careful planning and guidance for students are the key to making these voices work well.     

Urban American Indian Youth Spirituality and Religion: A Latent Class Analysis

This article explores the interconnected spiritual, religious, and cultural worlds of the majority of American Indian (AI) youth who live in urban areas: their patterns of involvement in religion and Native spirituality and associated well‐being. Latent class analysis of data from 205 AI middle school students identified five distinctive classes using survey measures of religious affiliation, attendance at services, adherence to Christian and traditional spiritual beliefs, Native spirituality, and Native cultural practices. Two classes were Christian groups: one attending Christian churches and following Christian beliefs but uninvolved with Native beliefs, spirituality, or cultural practices; and a nominal Christian group affiliated with but not attending church and unattached to belief systems. Two groups followed Native beliefs and spiritual practices, one affiliated with the Native American Church and another unaffiliated with any church. The fifth, nonreligious group, had no religious affiliation, followed neither Christian nor traditional beliefs, and was uninvolved in Native spirituality and cultural practices. The two groups embracing AI spirituality reported better academic performance, more reservation contact, higher AI enculturation, and stronger bicultural orientations.     

Responses to the AAR‐Teagle White Paper: “The Religious Studies Major in a Post‐9/11 World”

In October 2008 The American Academy of Religion published the findings of an eighteen month study (conducted with funding from the Teagle Foundation) on “The Religious Studies Major in a Post–9/11World: New Challenges, New Opportunities.” Re‐published here, this AAR‐Teagle White Paper provides the opportunity for four respondents to raise issues and questions about the teaching of religion in their own institutional contexts. First, Jane Webster describes how the White Paper's “five characteristics of the religion major” find expression in her biblical literature course. Then James Buckley suggests some of the general level teaching issues provoked by the study and analyzes how well the White Paper aligns with how the teaching of religion is conceived in his Catholic university context. Tim Jensen draws comparisons between the White Paper and the higher education structures and goals from his university context in Denmark, raising questions about what motivates students to major in religious studies, the “utility” of a religious studies major, and whether students' religious and spiritual concerns ought to enter the classroom. And finally Stacey Floyd‐Thomas finds surprising similarities between the state of the religion major and the various crises facing contemporary North American theological education.     

Learning about Spirituality Together with “Seekers”

The present era, often referred to as post‐secular, has in many places seen a resurgence in spirituality. Nevertheless, the contemporary quest for spirituality is unique in the sense that many people do not expect to have their spiritual needs fulfilled within the structures of organized religion, starting on a journey of their own explorations instead. Sociologists of religion, therefore, tend to employ the “dwellers” and “seekers” paradigm to account for this phenomenon. This paper will explore this phenomenon in the context of the Czech Republic, whose citizens are frequently characterized as distrustful toward institutional religiosity, through the lens of the recent World Council of Churches' affirmation on mission and evangelism, Together towards Life: Mission and Evangelism in Changing Landscapes (TTL). For our purpose, the statement's emphasis on both “transformative spirituality” and “mission from the margins” will be of central importance. Using the notion of transformative spirituality as the energy engendered by the Spirit for the transformation of life and creation, it will be suggested that “seekers” can be agents in God's mission of liberation, reconciliation, and transformation, despite their inability or unwillingness to identify themselves with the church as institution. Keeping in mind ethical considerations, the paper will not seek to make a case for a forced “christening” of the seekers. Rather, it will argue that they can become partners in missio Dei, thus giving the notion of “mission from the margins” a new, contextually relevant dimension.     

‘Wounded by the Arrow of Beauty’: The Silent Call of Art

One of the urgent tasks facing Christian educators at the present time is how they might encourage the spiritual growth of their students. This paper invites reflection on this central question by discussing the role aesthetics might play with particular focus on its relationship to the ‘spiritual senses’, a theme which has been strikingly absent from recent publications on religion and Christian education. Paying particular attention to the work of the contemporary French phenomenologist, Jean‐Louis Chrétien, I shall argue that art invites us to listen to as well as to see the power of beauty. Educators should not ignore this capacity of art to engage the spiritual senses within a contemplative ethos of silence. But I go further than simply pointing to these seminal ideas about Christian formation, by discussing the ‘wound’ that beauty inevitably inflicts. I illustrate this suggestion by referring to Pope Benedict XVI's essay ‘Wounded by the Arrow of the Beautiful’ and to two visualizations of religion: Delacroix's painting Fight between Jacob and the Angel and Beauvois' film Of Gods and Men.     

Teaching World Religions without Teaching “World Religions”

Tomoko Masuzawa and a number of other contemporary scholars have recently problematized the categories of “religion” and “world religions” and, in some cases, called for its abandonment altogether as a discipline of scholarly study. In this collaborative essay, we respond to this critique by highlighting three attempts to teach world religions without teaching “world religions.” That is, we attempt to promote student engagement with the empirical study of a plurality of religious traditions without engaging in the rhetoric of pluralism or the reification of the category “religion.” The first two essays focus on topical courses taught at the undergraduate level in self‐consciously Christian settings: the online course “Women and Religion” at Georgian Court University and the service‐learning course “Interreligious Dialogue and Practice” at St. Michael's College, in the University of Toronto. The final essay discusses the integration of texts and traditions from diverse traditions into the graduate theology curriculum more broadly, in this case at Loyola Marymount University. Such confessional settings can, we suggest, offer particularly suitable – if somewhat counter‐intuitive – contexts for bringing the otherwise covert agendas of the world religions discourse to light and subjecting them to a searching inquiry in the religion classroom.     

Most Common Teacher Characteristics Related to Intentionality in Student Spiritual Formation

Teachers have the important commission of guiding students in their spiritual formation, which is the process through which an individual accepts Jesus Christ as Savior and continually becomes more like Him. Given this task, Christian teachers are able to be intentional within classroom management, through instruction, and by modeling. Teachers from 50 schools within the Southeast Region of the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI) were asked to complete a survey regarding intentional practices for student spiritual formation. With a Likert scale, a rating system, and open-ended questions, a triangulation method was used to find the most common characteristics related to spiritual formation intentionality. The characteristics found to be most common included “exhibiting a Christ-like attitude”, “creating a classroom climate that promotes spiritual growth”, and “being intentional in the spiritual disciplines”. By being intentional in these areas, the teacher is able to be that agent that fosters and guides student spiritual formation.     

“I Wasn’t Prepared for the Emotion”: Archival Research in Religious and Theological Studies

One might think that primary research in library and church archives would be a dry, lifeless endeavor, far removed from the present–day spiritual urgency that quickens the religious studies classroom. After all, archives raise the specter of musty tomes housed in dark, dank, and isolated basements. To the contrary, based on interviews with several students and teachers doing such research, this article maintains that primary archival research in religious and theological studies is often experienced as empowering, connecting researchers to their subjects with an immediacy that secondary sources simply cannot provide. Diaries, letters, hymns, administrative reports, and church–school teaching notes are the sorts of documentary evidence and personal effects at issue, and these offer unexpected insights to researchers who brave the archives.     

In What Sense Christian?: The Humane Economic Ethic of Wilhelm Röpke

Christian social thinkers who strongly support the free‐market system often have drawn connections between the social values of their faith and the ideas of Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek. Hayek's comments on religion, however, seem to predict its demise for the sake of progress, whereas his colleague Wilhelm Röpke posits “transcendent” religion and established moral traditions as essential to a humane economy. This essay contends that what Röpke described as “enmassment” has similarities to the present “financialization” of society, which involves the rising influence of financial values in all institutions, exaggerated emphasis on quantitative performance measures, and reliance on technical processes in lieu of human relationships. Röpke's “Christian humanist” philosophy advances the kind of ethical entrepreneurialism needed to morally sustain a global society experiencing enmassment and financialization simultaneously.     

Conversation: The challenges of teaching in a “nano department”

A panel at the 2016 American Academy of Religion conference staged, taped, transcribed, and edited this conversation about the challenges and opportunities of teaching in a “nano department” – an undergraduate religion or religious studies department (or combined religion and philosophy department) with only one, two, or three faculty members. Two things quickly become evident: one is the impossibility of coverage of the full religious studies curriculum, and the other is the necessity for collaboration with other departments. Neither of these is unique to nano departments, but there exists an intimacy between students and faculty in small departments, a necessary freedom to rethink the place of the study of religion in the liberal arts curriculum, and a disruptive value in what can be critiqued and contributed from a marginalized position. Arguably, nano departments are the canaries in the academic coal mine, charting the future of the humanities that cannot be discerned from the vantage point of Research‐1 contexts.     

Examining awareness of privilege among midwestern college students: An analysis of race/ethnicity,gender, and religion

Dominant group members often are not aware of the privileges they benefit from due to their dominant group membership. Yet individuals are members of multiple groups and may simultaneously occupy multiple categories of dominance and marginality, raising the question of how different group memberships work in concert to facilitate or inhibit awareness of multiple forms of privilege. Examining awareness of privilege is important as awareness may be linked to action to dismantle systems of privilege that maintain oppression and inequality. Grounded in intersectional scholarship, in this study we examined how occupying intersecting categories of race/ethnicity, gender, and religion corresponded to an awareness of White, male, and Christian privilege. In a sample of 2321 Midwestern college students, we demonstrated that students from marginalized groups broadly reported greater awareness of all forms of privilege than students from dominant groups, and the difference between marginalized and dominant groups was most pronounced when the specific group category (e.g., gender) aligned with the type of privilege (e.g., male privilege). We also tested interactions among race/ethnicity, gender, and religion, only finding an interaction between race/ethnicity and religion for awareness of White and male privilege. These findings helped to clarify that multiple group memberships tended to contribute to awareness as multiple main effects rather than as multiplicative. Finally, we examined mean differences among the eight intersected groups to explore similarities and differences among groups in awareness of all types of privilege. Taken together, these findings quantitatively demonstrate the ways in which group memberships work together to contribute to awareness of multiple forms of privilege. We discuss study limitations and implications for community psychology research and practice.     

Challenging ‘Belief’ and the Evangelical Bias: Student Christianity in English Universities

Abstract

Popular and academic accounts of university-based religion tend to privilege evangelical Christianity, presented as a morally conservative, conversionist movement at odds with university contexts, which are widely assumed to be vehicles for a progressive Western modernity. This is especially the case in the UK, given the association of higher education with secularisation, yet virtually no research has studied this interface by examining the lives of students. This article discusses findings from the three-year project “Christianity and the University Experience in Contemporary England”, including a nation-wide survey of undergraduate students, in examining how the experience of university shapes on-campus expressions of Christian identity. We argue that a sizeable constituency of undergraduates self-identify as ‘Christian’, but evangelicals emerge not as the dominant majority, but as a vocal minority. The emerging internal complexity is masked by a public discourse that conceives of religion in terms of propositional belief and presents evangelicalism as its pre-eminent form.     

Ethics and Undergraduate Research in the Study of Religion: Place‐Based Pedagogy and Reciprocal Research Relations

In the undergraduate religious studies classroom at the University of Leeds students are introduced to the complexity of religion in locality. One of the most engaging ways to do this is through a place‐based pedagogy utilizing independent fieldwork as part of the learning process. However, undergraduates, like seasoned researchers, must learn to balance and understand the way insider representations influence academic interpretations, and the way their academic interpretations and representations can lead to change in the community being studied. Place‐based pedagogy has, therefore, an important ethical dimension that is not accounted for in the existing literature. Engaging with reciprocal research relations as a way to navigate this terrain introduces students to the human impacts of their research and develops their self‐awareness as researchers and religion specialists. This paper will draw on the Leeds experience to build an understanding of the interaction between place‐based pedagogy and reciprocal research relations which informs both teaching and research in the study of religion, and extends the existing discourse on the ethical dimensions of undergraduate research.     

WHY I AM AN ACCOMMODATIONIST AND PROUD OF IT

There is a strong need of a reasoned defense of what was known as the “independence” position of the science–religion relationship but that more recently has been denigrated as the “accommodationist” position, namely that while there are parts of religion—fundamentalist Christianity in particular—that clash with modern science, the essential parts of religion (Christianity) do not and could not clash with science. A case for this position is made on the grounds of the essentially metaphorical nature of science. Modern science functions because of its root metaphor of the machine: the world is seen in mechanical terms. As Thomas Kuhn insisted, metaphors function in part by ruling some questions outside their domain. In the case of modern science, four questions go unasked and hence unanswered: Why is there something rather than nothing? What is the foundation of morality? What is mind and its relationship to matter? What is the meaning of it all? You can remain a nonreligious skeptic on these questions, but it is open for the Christian to offer his or her answers, so long as they are not scientific answers. Here then is a way that science and religion can coexist.     

“Equal access” without “establishing” religion: The necessity for assessing social perspective-taking skills and institutional atmosphere

We concur withMoshman (1990) that in public high schools there should be unimpeded religious freedom if an empirical assessment shows students have the proficiency to evaluate and freely choose religious systems and practices and to discern attempts by authorities to establish a religion. We differ with Moshman,however, regarding (a) the relative importance of a school's ethical, moral and political climate in influencing the exercise of free religious and political choice; (b) his focus on religious over political freedoms; (c) what kinds of proficiencies need to be assessed; (d) how to assess these proficiencies; (e) his claim that that the reasoning ability of high school and college students is similar; and (f) the manner in which decisions permitting religious clubs in high schools should be made. Reasoning proficiency must be assessed in high school, as well as post-high school, populations of students, teachers, and administrators using a social perspective-taking task with establishment of a religion content. A school's institutional atmosphere must be assessed.     

The Christian College Advantage? The Impact of Christian Versus Secular Training Among Faculty at Christian Colleges and Universities

Are faculty trained at Christian institutions better equipped to integrate their faith with their professional work? This study uses a mixed methods analysis of Council of Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU) faculty survey data to analyze whether and in what ways faculty who graduate from Christian undergraduate, master's, and doctoral programs are more apt to identify connections between their faith tradition and their course objectives. Findings show that faculty members prepared at Christian institutions are more likely to see this relationship and may conceive of it in more sophisticated ways. However, the gap is modest.     

Clinical ethics and the suffering Christian.

Contrary to the ecumenical spirit of our time, the differences among the Christian religions bring into question what one can say or do in common with fellow Christians. This issue, echoing the program of this journal, accentuates those differences, specifically when we focus on the Christian who is ill and suffering. At the bedside, it is the specifics of a religion, including not only its doctrines, but its informing and sustaining narratives, that must particularly be brought into play for the sake of the patient. Given this, our focus in this article regards what such a view implies for the clinician who is caring for a Christian patient whose religion he may or may not share, in general or in its specifics. Our basic conclusion is that the tendency for the clinician to act as both the patient's spiritual counselor, as well as his clinician, is generally neither prudent nor appropriate. Both hats should not be worn concurrently. This view is advanced not only because of concerns regarding patient vulnerability and the possible abuse of power, but also because the two roles may collide with or undermine each other.     

Religious Conflict and the Chain of Command in the American and French Militaries

Analyzing characteristics of the organizational environment, the organization, and its actors recommended by the framework guiding this symposium on the cross‐cultural study of religion in public institutions, we identify common elements of military organization that shape local and national policies surrounding religion cross‐nationally. Comparison of cases from U.S. and French militaries—a secularist group at the U.S. Air Force Academy, and Muslim soldiers in France—demonstrates this framework's utility by directing attention to when, how, and by what logics constitutional protections are afforded to religious (and nonreligious) minorities. This analysis also reveals two additional arenas of investigation important to the study of religion in public institutions. Because religion today is often at the center of disputes over citizens’ conflicting rights, conflicts over religion in the military, and in other public institutions, demand special attention. In addition, our cases call attention to the importance of organizational structures and authority. Military settings make this point obvious, since the chain of command plays a fundamental and powerful role in the operation of militaries cross‐nationally—including in activities and policies surrounding religion and religious groups.     

STUDENT THINKING WHEN STUDYING SCIENCE‐AND‐RELIGION

Thirteen theology/religious studies students were interviewed while studying science‐and‐religion courses at four different institutions of higher education in the United Kingdom. They held a range of views about science and religion, their respective ontological status, and their science‐and‐religion studies. The interviews reveal that it may be possible to assign individuals to one of four different religioscientific conceptual frameworks and, furthermore, to relate differences in their approach when studying science‐and‐religion to their conceptual framework. The implications for course designers are discussed, including how the frameworks may enable teachers to be more aware of the range of possible reactions students may have while being introduced to science‐and‐religion topics.     

Higher Education as Moral Community: Institutional Influences on Religious Participation During College

Borrowing from the literature on religion and deviance, the concept of moral communities is applied to religious and secular postsecondary education to explain institutional influences on student religious participation. Results from nationally representative panel data indicate that students attending Catholic and mainline Protestant affiliated institutions decline in religious participation at a faster rate than students attending evangelical institutions or students attending nonreligious public colleges and universities. This finding is consistent with Catholic and mainline Protestant institutions less successfully providing a shared moral order that legitimates religious language, motive, and behavior when compared to conservative Protestant colleges. At the same time, the religious and ethnic pluralism that activates minority religious identity at nonreligious public institutions is also less likely to be present on Catholic and mainline Protestant college campuses. Additional results indicate that evangelical students' religious participation declines while attending Catholic colleges and universities, while Catholic students increase their participation while attending evangelical institutions. The religious composition of students may act to alter friendship networks, and thus participation rates, on these campuses, although further research is necessary to validate the proposed institutional mechanisms.