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In Memoriam: Norman L. Grover, Longstanding Member of AAR, Dies at 82

Rev. Dr. Norman L. Grover, of Blacksburg, VA, passed away on Tuesday, June 15, 2010. For forty-five years, Grover taught at Virginia Tech, and served as their philosophy and religion department head. His education included a Bachelor of Music Education from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (1948); and Bachelor of Divinity (1951), STM (1952), and PhD in Religion (1957) from Yale University.

Grover joined the newly formed Department of Philosophy and Religion (now known as the Department of Religion and Culture) at Virginia Tech in 1957 and served as head of the department until 1975. He continued teaching in the department and the successor Department of Religion, which was established in 1983, until his retirement in 1994.

Grover was a member of AAR for over fifteen years.

Two Schools to Form Interreligious University

Two theological schools, including the nation’s oldest Christian graduate seminary, are joining to form a university to educate people of all religions. Andover Newton Theological School, founded outside Boston in 1807, and the Unitarian Universalist Meadville Lombard Theological School in Chicago, announced Tuesday they’ll unite to form an “interreligious theological university” by next year. The schools will keep their identities under the corporate umbrella of the new school.

Andover-Newton president Nick Carter said students can still receive a degree from his school, but they’ll be interacting with students earning degrees in other religions from other schools on the same campus. Carter said that experience is crucial when working in a multifaith world.

Meadville Lombard is selling its four-building campus in Chicago and the new school will be based at the Andover Newton campus.

Austin Presbyterian Seminary Dean Michael Jinkins to Lead Louisville Seminary

AAR member Michael Jinkins, the sixth academic dean at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, was recently announced the president-elect of the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. He will become the president of Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary effective September 1.

Jinkins has been a member of the faculty of Austin Seminary since 1993, after serving as a pastor in congregations in Irving, Itasca, and Brenham, Texas, and in Aberdeen, Scotland. He is an ordained Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and a member of Mission Presbytery. Jinkins became academic dean of Austin Seminary in January 2004. He is the author of more than twelve books and has served as editor on multiple journals. Jinkins has been a member of the AAR since 1989.

First Goldziher Prize to be Awarded to Mark Cohen for Promoting Understanding across Religious Faiths

The Center for the Study of Jewish-Christian-Muslim Relations announced the first awardee of the Goldziher Prize: Professor Mark R. Cohen of Princeton University. Cohen, the Khedouri A. Zilkha Professor of Jewish Civilization in the Near East at Princeton University, is the author of Under Crescent and Cross: The Jews in the Middle Ages (Princeton University Press, 2008), a powerful study revealing the advantages for Jews of the Middle Ages of being governed by Muslims and a work that has been translated into Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, French, and German; Romanian and Spanish are forthcoming. Cohen is an ordained rabbi.

The Goldziher Prize is a $25,000 cash award, made possible by a generous grant from The William and Mary Greve Foundation and by the vision of one of the Foundation’s principals, John Kiser. The prize is named for the nineteenth century Islamicist, Ignác Goldziher, a Hungarian Jew who revered Islam and Muslim people and validated Islamic studies in the nineteenth century European university context. The prize is being administered by Merrimack College’s Center for the Study of Jewish-Christian-Muslim Relations. The Center promotes reverence, understanding, and collaboration in works of justice and peace among Jews, Christians, and Muslims.

Association of Theological Schools and Luce Foundation Name Six Faculty Members as 2010–2011 Henry Luce III Fellows in Theology

Selected on the basis of the strength of their proposals to conduct creative and innovative theological research, the six Fellows (below) will engage in year-long research in various areas of theological inquiry. The 2010–2011 Fellows constitute the seventeenth class of scholars to be appointed since the inception of the program in 1993, bringing the total number of Luce Fellows to one hundred and seventeen. The program is supported by a grant from The Henry Luce Foundation, honoring the late Henry Luce III.

2010-2011 Henry Luce III Theology Fellows

John R. Bowlin
Princeton University
Counting Virtues: The Difference that Transcendence Makes

Francis X. Clooney, S. J.
Harvard University
When God is Absent: Toward a Theodramatic Reading of Religious Diversity

Linda A. Mercadante
Methodist Theological School in Ohio
Unfettered Belief, Untethered Practice: Thinking Theologically about “Spiritual but Not Religious”

Mary Clark Moschella
Wesley Theological Seminary
Anatomy of Joy: A Pastoral Theological Call for Joy in the Ministry and in Life

Carol A. Newsom
Emory University
Constructions of Good and Evil in Biblical and Early Postbiblical Literature

Kathryn Tanner
University of Chicago
Grace and Gambling

2010–2011 Lilly Theological Research Grant Recipients

Congratulations to the following 2010–2011 Lilly Theological Research Grant winners.

For Faculty Fellowships:

  • Bill T. Arnold, Asbury Theological Seminary, The Singularity of God in the Hebrew Scriptures: Foundations for Interfaith Dialogue
  • David Arthur deSilva, Ashland Theological Seminary, Neither Tamil Nor Sinhalese: Reading Galatians From a Sri Lankan Context
  • Forough Jahanbakhsh, Queen’s Theological College, The Theological Aspect of Reformed Islam
  • Dirk G. Lange, Luther Seminary, Rethinking Communal Prayer: A Baptismal Discipline
  • Joel Marcus LeMon, Emory University, Picturing Divine Violence in the Psalms
  • Cynthia Diane Moe-Lobeda, Seattle University, Christian Ethics for the “Uncreators”: Morality in the Face of Systemic Evil
  • Gale A. Yee, Episcopal Divinity School, Open Your Hand to the Poor: The Bible and the Millennium Development Goals

For Theological Scholars Grants:

  • Max J. Lee, North Park Theological Seminary, Greco-Roman Philosophy of Mind and Paul: Mapping the Apostle’s Moral Landscape
  • B. Diane Lipsett, Wake Forest University, Ancient Interpreters of Matthew’s Parables: Rereading Realism, Rewriting Metaphor
  • Leo G. Perdue, Brite Divinity School, Subverting Empires: Postcolonial Biblical Interpretation and Contemporary China 

For Research Expense Grants:

  • Michael B. Aune, Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary, “All for Love”: Conversations about Liturgy and Christology in the Early Twenty-first Century
  • Jennifer Ryan Ayres, McCormick Theological Seminary, Grounded: Embodied Christian Practices of Food, Earth, and Justice
  • Mark D. Baker, Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary, Contextualizing Galatians in Peru
  • Russell William Dalton, Brite Divinity School, Children’s Bibles in the United States: Adapting the Bible for Youth, 1776 to Today
  • Wil Gafney, Lutheran Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Translating God, Translating God’s Words: A Womanist and Feminist Biblical Hebrew Translation Primer
  • Gordon L. Heath, McMaster Divinity College, Baptists and the South African War, 1899–1902: A View from Five Countries
  • Jaroslav Z. Skira, Regis College, The Second Vatican Council Diaries of the Ukrainian Eastern Catholic Metropolitan Maxim Hermaniuk

For Collaborative Research Grants (project leader is listed first):

  • Hans Boersma, Regent College, and Matthew Levering, University of Dayton, Heaven on Earth?: Exploring Catholic–Evangelical Dialogue
  • Terry Charles Muck, Asbury Theological Seminary, Frances S. Adeney, Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and Arvind Sharma, McGill University, Participatory Mission Theology
  • Brooks Schramm, Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg, and Kirsi Stjerna, Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg, Martin Luther, the Bible, and the Jewish People

Theologos Book Awards

The Association of Theological Booksellers recently announced the 2009 winners of the Theologos Awards. The awards represent the unique, professional evaluations of people who sell academic religious books. The Association of Theological Booksellers is a collaborative organization of diverse theological bookstores and publishers working together to enhance the quality and ensure the future of theological bookselling. Only the bookseller members of the association are eligible to vote.

Best General Interest Book

A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life
Donald Miller
Thomas Nelson

Best Academic Book

Justification: God’s Plan and Paul’s Vision
N. T. Wright
InterVarsity Press

Best Children’s Book

Listen to the Wind: The Story of Dr. Greg and Three Cups of Tea
Written by Greg Mortenson
Illustrated by Susan L. Roth
Dial Books for Young Readers

Book of the Year

Feasting on the Word
Year B, Four volumes
David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, Editors
Westminster John Knox Press

Publisher of the Year (tie)

InterVarsity Press and Baker Publishing Group

Christianity Today Book Awards

Christianity Today has recently announced its 2010 book award winners. The awards serve to recognize outstanding volumes that shed light on people, events, and ideas that shape evangelical life, thought, and mission. This year, 72 publishers nominated 472 titles published in 2009.

The 2010 Christianity Today Book Awards:

Apologetics/Evangelism

God is Great, God is Good: Why Believing in God is Reasonable and Responsible
William Lane Craig and Chad Meister, Editors
InterVarsity Press

Biblical Studies

Sin: A History
Gary A. Anderson
Yale University Press

Christianity and Culture

Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults
Christian Smith, with Patricia Snell
Oxford University Press

Christian Living

I Told Me So: Self-Deception and the Christian Life
Gregg A. Ten Elshof
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

The Church/Pastoral Leadership (tie)

Deep Church: A Third Way Beyond Emerging and Traditional
Jim Belcher
InterVarsity Press

Why We Love the Church: In Praise of Institutions and Organized Religion
Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck
Moody Publishers

Fiction

Notes from Underground
Fyodor Dostoevsky, with Boris Jakim, Translator
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

History/Biography

Predestination: The American Career of a Contentious Doctrine
Peter J. Thuesen
Oxford University Press

Missions/Global Affairs

The New Shape of World Christianity: How American Experience Reflects Global Faith
Mark A. Noll
InterVarsity Press

Spirituality

Longing for God: Seven Paths of Christian Devotion
Richard J. Foster and Gayle D. Beebe
InterVarsity Press

Theology/Ethics (tie)

Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation
James K. A. Smith
Baker Publishing Group

The God I Don’t Understand: Reflections on Tough Questions of Faith
Christopher J. H. Wright
Zondervan Publishers

 

This website contains archived issues of Religious Studies News published online from March 2010 to May 2013, and PDF versions of print editions published from Winter 2001 to October 2009.

This site also contains archived issues of Spotlight on Teaching (May 1999 to May 2013) and Spotlight on Theological Education (March 2007 to March 2013).

For current issues of RSN, beginning with the October 2013 issue, please see here.


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