Anthropology, Psychology and Religion

2025 Call for Papers

Bruno Shah, OP, Providence College

bshah@providence.edu

Wesley Sutermeister, University of Findlay

wesley.sutermeister@findlay.edu

The Anthropology, Psychology and Religion section is pleased to receive all paper proposals that address the 2025 College Theology Society conference theme: The Locus of the Theological Vocation. The following questions include but do not exhaust the lines of investigation and argument that this section is eager to explore:

In what ways is the figure of the sage relevant? Wisdom figures are present in traditional societies, ancient and modern. They influence the life of court, ritual, and families. How are the social locations of traditional sage figures relevant to questions about the contemporary locus of the theological vocation? How are these other figures appointed to their tasks and how is that applicable to the notion of “vocation?”

How do myth and ritual help to coordinate analysis of the work of theology? Can the mediations of divine figures (e.g., representing or hypostatizing wisdom) in non-Christian religious traditions help us to evaluate and re-imagine the place of the theologian? Where is that placement socially; what about cosmically?

How does the category of popular religion that Pope Francis and others invoke relate to the place of the theologian? If the place of the pastor is with the people, accompanying them as they operate in history, where is the place of the theologian? How are other models of popular religion applicable? More critically, how might non-popular, academic/professional models of theological instruction threaten or damage the place of theology in society?

Is it an opportune time to revisit and develop various approaches to local theology (e.g., Clemens Sedmak’s Doing Local Theology (2003))? In what ways does theology operate in an abstract universal code language and sometimes lose sight of the local bustle of human life? Can methods of study not historically associated with theology help theologians develop a robust, empirically driven local theology, such as the ethnologist’s “participant observation?” Do theologians need to take less time talking and more time observing?

Where does the professional practice and popular awareness of psychotherapy relate to the place and work of the theologian? Ivan Illich, Michel Foucault, and others have said that the modern era has witnessed the replacement of sacramental confession with psychological counseling. Analogously, what place does the theologian have in advancing practices of honesty, healing, and acceptance?

Can theologians draw upon the fresh work of anthropologists or other disciplines such as cognitive science

to reinvigorate their own work? Considering the spatial and existential realities of marginality, liminality, fugitivity, and rites of passage, can theology discern voices from the outsides, gaps, and cracks in the dominant systems of our day? Can recent scientific findings about the brain and neurological processes illuminate traditional theological topics, such as concupiscence, soul, prayer and meditation, and the via negativa in theology?

Please submit proposals to the conveners by December 15, 2024. They should be no more than 500 words in length and include the presenter’s institutional affiliation, position, and contact information, as well as any requests for AV support. Ordinarily, presenters should be members of the CTS at the time of the meeting in the summer of 2025.