Gtown & Washington Post endeavor: "On Faith"

[CWS]

I mentioned before that part of DeGioia's vision for G'town is, I think, to make it into an important center for scholarship in the fields of religious studies, theology and interreligious dialogue.

Relately, the university recently announced a new joint endeavor with the Washington Post (and Newsweek) and their "On Faith" online site.

explore.georgetown.edu/news/?ID=25605

As I understand it, Georgetown will provide the site with contributions from scholars involved in the field of religion/theology. The blog by Berlinerblau is just one contribution.

I hope Gtown will provide a real service here and further our society's conversation involving religious matters. But, in a more self-interest vein, Gtown's involvement in this site could also increase its national profile in the area of theological/religious scholarship. If you go to the Washington Post online edition, you'll see see the "On Faith" site prominently featured (left-hide side: in my experience, it's always been so prominently featured; you can't miss it).

This new participation by Gtown in online conversations, along with other elements already in place (e.g., the long-standing Center for Muslim/Christian Understanding, the new Berkley Center [which will hire 3 or 4 senior scholars in the next couple of years], the new PhD program in the Theology Department in Religious Pluralism, and, I hope, the hiring of Dyson) will help put Gtown on the national map as a place doing serious work in religious/theological scholarship.

[EasyEd]

Sure would be nice if it included something on Catholicism.

[TrueHoyaBlue]

Well, there are at least two faculty members already involved from a Catholic perspective.

Chester Gillis - professor of theology
Rev. Thomas Reese, S.J. - senior research fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center

newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/thomas_j_reese/
newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/chester_l_gillis/

[CWS]

Peter Phan, a Catholic priest, was hired several years ago for the newly established chair in Catholic Social Thought. The university just tried to recruit a major Catholic ethicist, but the guy preferred to stay where he was.

I think we have a good number of people doing work in Catholic thought, but we couldn't make Catholic theology the focus of our scholarship in the field of religion without stepping on the toes of Catholic University across town. The Georgetown theology department never developed a graduate program (masters or PhD) in Catholic theology because of a "gentleman's" agreement with CUA (which is sponsored by the US Bishops): Gtown would not develop a program which would compete against theology programs at Catholic. The new PhD program in Religious Pluralism is meant to address new realities in religious scholarship without duplicating Catholic U's program.

[Frank Black]

cws said:

Peter Phan, a Catholic priest, was hired several years ago for the newly established chair in Catholic Social Thought. The university just tried to recruit a major Catholic ethicist, but the guy preferred to stay where he was.

I think we have a good number of people doing work in Catholic thought, but we couldn't make Catholic theology the focus of our scholarship in the field of religion without stepping on the toes of Catholic University across town. The Georgetown theology department never developed a graduate program (masters or PhD) in Catholic theology because of a "gentleman's" agreement with CUA (which is sponsored by the US Bishops): Gtown would not develop a program which would compete against theology programs at Catholic. The new PhD program in Religious Pluralism is meant to address new realities in religious scholarship without duplicating Catholic U's program.

This doesn't make any sense to me, and I'm not sure whether to believe it or not. Georgetown is a Catholic school and as such, you might expect it to place Catholicism as more than one religion among many in the theology department. Fr. Neuhaus has an essay in First Things this month where he says that Georgetown is "lost" to Catholicisim. If that is his assessment, I feel as though I need to be convinced why I should send money to Georgetown instead of a college that is more engaged in the work of God's church.

[DFW HOYA]

cws said:

I think we have a good number of people doing work in Catholic thought, but we couldn't make Catholic theology the focus of our scholarship in the field of religion without stepping on the toes of Catholic University across town. The Georgetown theology department never developed a graduate program (masters or PhD) in Catholic theology because of a "gentleman's" agreement with CUA (which is sponsored by the US Bishops): Gtown would not develop a program which would compete against theology programs at Catholic. The new PhD program in Religious Pluralism is meant to address new realities in religious scholarship without duplicating Catholic U's program.

There is no "territory" on Catholic graduate programs (Villanova offers graduate studies in Theology as does LaSalle, ditto for Fordham and St. John's). Georgetown does offer a Ph.D in Theology and Religious Studies.

Georgetown suffers from a misperception in the academic world that it is shying away from Catholic doctrine because of the larger numbers of secular and/or non-Catholic scholars who are part of the school. Moving to the forefront of doctrinal discussion is a lot more valuable than walking away from it and handing it off to CUA.

[TrueHoyaBlue]

Not that this will make much of a difference to doubters, but Georgetown just announced a new endowed chair in the Catholic Studies program.

explore.georgetown.edu/news/?ID=25715

[CWS]

dfw said:

cws said:

I think we have a good number of people doing work in Catholic thought, but we couldn't make Catholic theology the focus of our scholarship in the field of religion without stepping on the toes of Catholic University across town. The Georgetown theology department never developed a graduate program (masters or PhD) in Catholic theology because of a "gentleman's" agreement with CUA (which is sponsored by the US Bishops): Gtown would not develop a program which would compete against theology programs at Catholic. The new PhD program in Religious Pluralism is meant to address new realities in religious scholarship without duplicating Catholic U's program.

There is no "territory" on Catholic graduate programs (Villanova offers graduate studies in Theology as does LaSalle, ditto for Fordham and St. John's). Georgetown does offer a Ph.D in Theology and Religious Studies.

Georgetown suffers from a misperception in the academic world that it is shying away from Catholic doctrine because of the larger numbers of secular and/or non-Catholic scholars who are part of the school. Moving to the forefront of doctrinal discussion is a lot more valuable than walking away from it and handing it off to CUA.

Yes, there are oodles of other graduate programs in Catholic theology, but not in DC.

The idea that Gtown has long had a gentleman’s agreement with Catholic University NOT to set up a duplicate doctoral program has been repeated to me from so many directions, I’d be surprised if it weren’t true. And it’s the only explanation that makes sense of the fact that Georgetown had never had a graduate program in theology (Master’s or PhD), until 2 years ago. That fact is amazing to anyone who's familiar with graduate programs in Catholic theology (they're legion!). Every Jesuit UNIVERSITY (i.e., those with any graduate programs) in the country that I know of has at least a Master’s program in theology and all the bigger ones (i.e., Marquette, Fordham, Loyola Chicago, Boston College, St. Louis) have Theology PhD programs. Until 2 years ago, Georgetown was the only Catholic school in the top 100 universities that did not offer a graduate degree in theology or religious studies. Because it’s so atypical for a major Catholic institution, a lot of people assume that we have a graduate program. Gtown regularly got applications to a graduate program which didn’t exist.

The fact that it didn’t/doesn’t have a graduate degree that specifically targeted/targets Catholic theology does not reflect a desire to diminish the Catholic identity but rather a desire to respect the preferences of the local bishop and the US bishop’s in general. (Remember: CUA is run by the U.S. Bishops Conference; it is not just one of many Catholic institutions in the country. Every Catholic parish in the country takes up a second collection annually to raise money for the university. In short, it’s special in the eyes of the US hierarchy and Gtown has always respected that).

Also, the fact that the doctoral program is not exclusively centered on Catholic theology does not mean that the theology department is becoming a smorgasbord of religious traditions. The overwhelming majority of the department is doing work in Catholic/Christian fields, and I don’t expect that to change in the future.

One other note: anyone who is Catholic and/or concerned with Catholic issues should, I think, be happy that the kind of multi-religious work that occurs at so many religious studies programs in the country is, finally, happening at a Catholic institution (there are other Catholic schools doing some work in the area, but nothing on the level of Gtown, or none that I'm familiar with). Too often these kind of studies in other institutions are pursued in a way divorced from the perspectives of genuine belief and of believers themselves and from the work of actual practitioners-theologians (i.e., believers doing scholarly work in their own religious tradition).

[reformation]

Just curious--what institutions on a global basis are considered to be the strongest in religious studies--what are the strongest in Catholic thought?

[CWS]

Different schools have strengths in different areas (e.g., patristics, systematics, historical, moral theology, etc.), but in this country, most would have Notre Dame and BC at the top of their list for overall Catholic theology (sorry, but it's true). For religious studies in general, Chicago has a large program (lots of grads) and certainly somewhere at the top of most people's lists. I'd put Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Brown right near the top also.

I'm not real familiar with the international programs, but the Greg in Rome still has a special place in the eyes of many for its importance for Catholic theology (the Gregorianum), especially for the official/authoritative theology; Louvain in Belgium and Muenster in Germany have traditionally been centers of CAtholic thought. Oxford and Cambridge are important centers for religious scholarship in general.