Please join us for this two-day virtual colloquium with Lewis Ayres, Professor of Catholic and Historical Theology at Durham University in the UK.
The aim of these two seminars is to think about a knot of interrelated problems that theologians today face. Dr. Ayres’s approach is that of a Catholic theologian, but the problems with which he is concerned beset nearly all Christian traditions. These problems include the separations between theological disciplines, the lack of an adequate theology of the theological task, the difficulty of theology’s relationship with the modern university, the lack of attention played in training – and in theological practice – to the range of intellectual habits that theologians should seek to cultivate. These seminars will examine this knot of interrelated problems and seek to suggest avenues that ought to be pursued if we are to address them.
Thursday, July 22, 12pm–2pm: The Theologian as Curator
The first session will ask in what ways theologians should see themselves as curators, as organizing for display that which is handed down, as creators of relationships with the past. To ask this question in this way is certainly to ask perennial theological questions - how one should reason using authorities?, or how should one participate in pre-existing debates? - but is also to ask far wider questions about appropriate patterns of attention toward and desire for those authorities. It is also to ask how we organize our theological sub-disciplines such that they nurture appropriate attention. In a Catholic context consideration of “tradition” as both content handed down, and as act of handing on, has been the place where argument about the character of our curation begins. One of the most important places where this question becomes concrete concerns the relationship between early and medieval Christian theology and modern “systematic” theology. Dr. Ayres will suggest that a radical rethink of such relationships is essential.
Friday, July 23, 12pm–2pm: The Theologian as Guerrilla Warrior
In this second session Dr. Ayres will address the topic of the theologian as curator of Scripture. Exploring how this aspect of curatorial work necessarily involves a further rethinking of the boundaries between sub-disciplines will lead to the argument that any discussion of how the theologian conceives their work is inseparable from how the theologian considers their place in the university. In one sense, the relationship between the theologian and the scholarly or philological tradition has been a constant feature of Christian thought since antiquity – and understanding the dynamics of this interaction can provide key points of reference for discussion of our context today. And yet, we face particular circumstances which flow from the character of the modern research university, and the particular struggles attendant on defining the purposes of education in late modernity.
Dr. Lewis Ayres previously taught at Emory University in the US, and a long time ago at Trinity College, Dublin. He writes on early Christian theology and modern Catholic theology. In 2019 he co-edited, with Medi Ann Volpe, the Oxford Handbook of Catholic Theology, which was described in The Tablet as “encyclopaedic” and as “a welcome addition to the prestigious series of Oxford Handbooks.” He is currently working on two books, As It Is Written: Ancient Literary Criticism and the Rise of Scripture AD 100-250 (Princeton), and On Theology: Tradition, Scripture, University (Cambridge), but attempting to finish two books means that neither will be finished on time.’
Date: Thursday, July 22, 2021-Friday, July 23, 2021
Time: 12:00 PM-2:00 PM ET
Location: Zoom
Registration: These webinars are free and open to faculty and graduate students only. Click the button on the left to sign up.
Professor Lewis Ayres’s opening lecture on the first day of a two-day virtual colloquium was recorded. To watch the video on our YouTube channel, click the button on the right.