Intercultural Theology & Interreligious Studies

Course Description
Intercultural Theology and Interreligious Studies integrates a variety of theological and other disciplines in order to explore significant and complex relationships within and between religious communities and their traditions. These fields of study attend closely to the connections and tensions experienced as the religions encounter alternative social, political and cultural resources of meaning and identity. This course focuses on the practical and theoretical possibilities posed by intercultural dialogue, and on the challenges of sustaining communities in which the praxis of peace and reconciliation with others is given concrete embodiment.

A variety of modules is offered each year, drawn from the list below. A module on Research and Methods is compulsory; students select a further 5 modules for assessment and write a dissertation.

Modules:
• Authority, Tradition, Experience: Ecumenics as Intercultural Theology
• World Christianity and Interreligious Dialogue
• Comparative Theology: Meaning and Practice
• Religions and Ethics in a Pluralist World
• Nature, Grace and the Triune God
• NGOs in Theory and Practice
• Developing Doctrine: Identity and Change in Christian Tradition
• Interpreting Ecumenical Ecclesiology
• An Ecumenics of Loss: Religion, Modernity and Reconciliation
• Creation, Cosmology and Ecotheology
• Engaging Religious Fundamentalism
• Translating God(s)
• Christian Seeds in Indic Soil: Christianity in South Asia
• The Church in the Shadow of the Mosque: Christianity in the World of Islam
• On Being Human: Theological Anthropology in Cross-cultural Perspective
• The Many Faces of Jesus: Christology and Cultures
• Comparative/Interreligious Ethics
• Cross-cultural Ministry and Interreligious Encounter
• Muslim God, Christian God: Islam and Muslim-Christian Comparative Theology
• Hindu God, Christian God: Hinduism and Hindu-Christian Comparative Theology
• Judaism and Jewish-Christian Relations
• Issues in Buddhist-Christian Dialogue
• Religion, Conflict and Peace in International Relations

Modules may change from year to year.

Teaching takes place in Dublin over two terms. Modules from the M.Phil. in International Peace Studies are open to students on the M.Phil. in Intercultural Theology and Interreligious Studies. Students may take up to two modules from this other course. Students seeking to be assessed for their work from this course must first secure the permission of the relevant course coordinator.

Dissertation: A research dissertation (15,000 – 20,000 words) to be supervised by an appropriate member of staff and to be submitted in August. Students who complete the taught element of the programme but not the dissertation may be eligible for the postgraduate diploma.

Applicants should normally have an honors degree at second class level or GPA 3.2 or above. Students not meeting these criteria may exceptionally be considered at the discretion of the Dean of Graduate Studies.

Closing Date: 31st March 2023

1 Year Full Time/2 years Part Time

Next Intake September 2020