Courses

The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular term. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the MyBU Student Portal for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.

• STH TS 848: Global Pentacostalism
  The last 50 years have seen the explosion of Pentecostal-Charismatic type churches in the world, becoming not only the fastest growing segment of Christianity, but also the vanguard of the global Christian movement. This is a basic course on the theology, ethics, and history of the worldwide Pentecostal-Charismatic renewal movements. It offers a historical-descriptive approach of the movements in various countries, theological analyses of their doctrines and beliefs, a sociological investigation of their religious techniques, and an ethical study of their social actions and political spiritualities. Students will learn how Pentecostal-Charismatic movements are transforming themselves to be a major positive force for social justice in this- worldly realm. Drawing on readings from religious studies, theology, politics, sociology, and anthropology, this course seeks to transcend disciplinary boundaries to enable students to better understand Pentecostal and Charismatic movements, their recent histories, and their potentials for renewal of Christianity across denominational lines and across the Catholic- Protestant divide.
• STH TS 849: Cultural Production of Misery
  This course is an examination of the ways in which the intersection of various forms of oppression - such as racism, sexism, ageism, heterosexism, and classism - coalesce to form lifestyles of misery that produce social patterns of domination and subordination. Consideration of how conversations between Christian ethics and other disciplines help frame possible trajectories of justice and justice making.
• STH TS 857: Ethics, Spirituality & Technology
  This class concerns the ethics of emerging technologies of spiritual enhancement. There is a lot more going on than you may realize, from brain stimulation to neurofeedback-guided meditation, and from psychedelics to technodelics, and it is all complicated -- technologically, medically, economically, theologically, and especially ethically. Religious leaders, chaplains, journalists, and just about everyone needs to know about technologies of spiritual enhancement. By moving through the array of new and emerging technologies systematically, analyzing the science, practice, and ethics of each offering, we can come to grips with these profound changes in the worlds of religion and spirituality. This class is recommended for STH masters students heading into positions of religious leadership, COM students working in religion or science journalism, and anyone working in ethics seeking a basic understanding of the brave new world of consciousness hacking and enlightenment engineering, and what it means for all of us.
• STH TS 872: Metaphors of Evil
  This course is an examination of the ways in which metaphors function at the intersections of various forms of oppression in the work of selected African diaspora writers from the West. These writers will be conversation partners with Christian social ethics and theology as well as other disciplines to help frame possible trajectories of freedom and justice by using an interstructured/intersectional methodology to explore the matrix formed by social structural evil.
• STH TS 875: Comparative Religious Ethics
  Comparative religious ethics, as a burgeoning academic field, strives to pursue moral wisdom across religious boundaries. In this course, we first juxtapose the ethical teaching of Christianity with another tradition to probe some perennial moral questions: ultimate end, exemplary virtue, social hierarchy, sexuality and marriage, war and peace, as well as political liberation. We then examine some contemporary issues comparatively in feminist, environmental, and postcolonial ethics. Finally, we study the moral significance of religious traditions as "spiritual exercises" (in the senses given by St. Ignatius and Pierre Hadot). There, we explore how bodily practices such as yogic movements, breathing exercises, Benedictine liturgical prayers, meditation of the cosmos, and contemplation of divine love might have far-reaching ethical consequences.
• STH TS 877: Restorative Justice
  A study of the fundamental principles and practices of restorative justice. The course outlines the basic principles and values of restorative justice, introduces some of the primary models of practice, and identifies challenges to restorative justice and strategies to respond to them. The course is organized around three key themes: the role of religious ethics and Indigenous traditions in the development of restorative justice, the major models of restorative justice practice, and the relationship of restorative justice to racial justice. Attention is given to restorative justice as practiced in criminal legal settings, in contexts of political transition and historical trauma, and in racial justice organizing.
• STH TS 881: Environmental Justice
  This course explores the ways in which injustices are mediated through our physical environment, and how academics, artists, ordinary citizens, organizers, and religious leaders are addressing those injustices. Through articles, case studies, discussion, writing, and excursions to encounter the the work of the environmental justice movement in Boston, we will explore how communities engage (or avoid engaging) the connection between environmental and public health. We will explore how environmental justice activists navigate the complex webs of different stakeholders and analyze the ways that power and voice relate to environmental health. By the end of this course, you will have developed your own creative response to an instance of environmental injustice and have joined the other academics and activists at work in this vital field.
• STH TT 732: History of Christian Theology in Philosophical Perspective
  In its nearly two-millennium long history, Christian theology has been shaped by its dynamic engagements with (and in) various traditions of philosophical reflection. In this course, students will examine how four such traditions-- Platonic, Aristotelian, Kantian/Phenomenological, and Marxist/Critical--have influenced (and been influenced by) theological questions, concepts, and modes of discourse. Thinkers from ancient, medieval, Reformation, modern, and postmodern periods will be studied, with emphasis on historical and social settings.
• STH TT 733: Constructive Theology
  This course introduces students to the major themes of Christian theology with the aim of providing them with a framework for effective and faithful theological reflection. Beginning with revelation and ending with eschatology, we follow a familiar progression in the study of systematic theology, examining modern and postmodern theological perspectives on God, creation, human nature, sin, Christology, ecclesiology and other doctrinal loci. The methodological approach is constructive, in that emphasis is placed on helping students integrate central issues of faith in response to contemporary issues.
• STH TT 807: Christian Eschatology in Post-Apocalyptic Times
  This course explores the Christian eschatological imagination through engagements with pre-modern and contemporary texts dealing with the theological category of the future. Students will be encouraged to reflect how visions of the future inform particular (and often ambiguous) social and political dispositions and sensibilities. The course will further offer resources for constructive readings of Christian eschatology and invite students to develop creative appropriations of the vocabulary of Christian eschatology. Course will include an overview of biblical, Patristic, and medieval sources as a basis from which the vocabulary of Christian eschatology was constructed. It then moves to contemporary sources and a section on contemporary fiction dealing with the post-apocalyptic imagination.
• STH TT 810: Introduction to Christian Theology
  
• STH TT 813: Religion and Science
  This course examines the foundations of the field of Religion and Science (R&S) and ways of construing the R&S relation today. It then applies this examination to specific issues in current R&S research. The course is open to all graduate students. No background in science is necessary.
• STH TT 818: Spirit
  The course shifts focus from studies of the Holy Spirit in Christian teachings to examine what it means to tend to the human spirit, especially under conditions of threat, struggle, and oppression. It features the writings and teachings of three figures -- Howard Thurman, Julian of Norwich, and Gloria Anzaldúa -- and positions them as spiritual guides for exploring our capacities: 1) for connection and care; 2) for living with intention and purpose; and 3) for reimagining collective life. With primary focus on the works of Thurman, this course is an invitation to think with him about what makes religious/spiritual teachings about the human spirit distinctive and compelling. It also invites students, through readings and assignments, to engage with their own spiritual lineages and the spiritual traditions of the communities whom you serve.
• STH TT 826: Political Theology
  Recent developments across a variety of disciplines have led to deep and widespread interest in "political theology" -- a diverse range of approaches to interrogating, (re)imagining, and (de)constructing the intersection of politics, religion, and theology, present and past. Scholars have argued that dominant paradigms of sovereignty, the secular, modernity, and liberalism are themselves secularized, corrupted, or otherwise transformed versions of Jewish and Christian theology. Others contend that modern political practices and paradigms represent not the legacy of early modern secularization but the trail of an early modern reinjection of theology in political and social theory. Others still find in the practices of contemporary communities lived political theologies that subvert existing power structures and cast doubt on common conceptions of contemporary political life and possibilities. This course examines these competing developments, readings, and proposals; their interactions; and the contested histories, theories, and values that underwrite them. Considering political theology as both a historical and contemporary phenomenon and engaging a range of perspectives and figures, the course also considers relations and interactions between political theology and other approaches to questions of "religion and politics."
• STH TT 830: Readings in Marx
  This course will engage in close readings of Karl Marx's political and philosophical work and trace his critique of capitalism as formulated in Capital. Students will be introduced to Marx's intellectual context, his key texts and concepts, and reflect on the legacy of his philosophical and political contributions, particularly in critical studies in religion and theology. The course will also engage with texts that expand the Marxian contribution to the realm of postcolonial studies and critical theory.
• STH TT 832: Paul Tillich
  Centered on one of the major theological works of the twentieth century, the Systematic Theology, this course is designed to assist students to contextualize, interpret, and analyze the thought of Paul Tillich and to assess its significance for contemporary theology.
• STH TT 847: Introduction to Ecological Justice
  This course introduces you to a variety of ecological justice issues through a combination of excursions, on-campus events, guest speakers, films, art exhibitions, and discussions. There will be 6 units total. You will be required to complete five units. Through this process, you will engage the theological, ethical, spiritual, and practical issues raised by a variety of ecological issues and by different responses to them.
• STH TT 848: Engaging Ecological Justice
  This course continues to expose you to a variety of ecological justice issues through a combination of excursions, on-campus events, guest speakers, films, art exhibitions, and discussions. There will be six units total. You will be required to attend four units. In addition to your attendance at these four units, you will plan and execute one of the units, including an event and discussion. Through this process, you will exercise your own ethical agency in the pursuit of ecological justice and develop your leadership skills. (Pre- requisite: STH TT847)
• STH TT 849: Queer Theology
  This course explores queer theology's potential to shape Christian thought and practice as a whole. We first introduce some prominent works of queer theory and ask what the implications of them on queer theology might be. We then consider how queer theology might contribute to some persistent debates in Christian theology: eros and agape, dissent and sainthood, grief and ritual, as well as utopic eschatology. Finally, we will explore how queer experiments in living might help us rethink fundamental moral categories such as kinship, vulnerability, play, fidelity, bodily change, and sexual knowledge.
• STH TT 850: Performing Ecological Justice
  Prerequisite: STH TT847 and STH TT848