Description
Engaging and building upon Douglas John Hall’s contextual theology, the colloquium will explore constructive possibilities for Christian theology and the church as we face the end of Christendom. Many ‘signs of the times’ point to the necessity for a radically altered Christian witness, with theological moorings that are rooted in solid foundations of biblical and theological interpretation, sensitive to the immense damage inflicted by Christian colonialism. At the same time therefore they will have to be sufficiently profound to uncover the spiritual malaise of our era, and capable of engaging in dialogue and action with other faiths and systems of meaning that are also committed to the future of global stability and human civilization.
In his contextual theology, Dougals Hall reconstructs and offers profound resources from the past to inspire re-newed understandings of theology and life upon which the church might base its hope for a future beyond Christendom. It is a decolonizing contextual theology a theology of the cross, which can engage a global society facing global issues of survival., and offers a paradigm complex enough to speak of the unspeakable horrors of the holocaust and the residential school system in language still meaningful to today’s globalized world.
PLEASE NOTE – THOSE INTERESTED IN PARTICIPATING IN THE COLLOQUIUM MUST REGISTER FOR EACH DAY THEY INTEND TO BE PRESENT. Students Free, Non Students $35.00.
The colloquium will be held at McGill University
From Friday 1 November until Sunday 3 November, 2019.
COLLOQUIUM SCHEDULE
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 1 – MCGILL UNIVERSITY
REGISTRATION Opening 9:00 am and continuing throughout the day in the Foyer of the Birks Building
Opening Address: 9:15
Graduate Student Panel 1: 9:30-10:45
Questions and Discussion
Break: 10:45-11:00
Graduate Student Panel 2: 11:00-12:35
Questions and Discussion
Lunch: 12:35-13:45 Continued discussion with Professor Emeritus Hall
FREE TIME 13:45-16:30
PART II WELCOME & Presentations 16:30 – 18:00
Birks Chapel
Pamela McCarrol & Patricia Kirkpatrick, Colloquium Convenors – Welcome
Theology and Context: An overview and Reflection on the work of Douglas Hall – David Lott
VIN D’HONNEUR HOSTED BY UNITED THEOLOGICAL COLLEGE 18:00-19:30
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 2 McGILL UNIVERSITY
Registration: 8:30-9:00
Session 1 9:00 – 10:45
Illusion and Hope – Michael Bourgeois
Theology of the Cross as a Response To Our Secular Age: Placing Two McGill Giants in Conversation, Douglas John Hall and Charles Taylor – Andrew Root
Contextual Theology in Canada: Between Covenant and Treaty – Allen Jorgenson
Questions and Discussion
Break 10:45-11:00
Session 2 11:00 – 12:45
Residential Schools and Theology of the Cross – Brian Thorpe
An Eco-Theology of the Cross for a Climate-Changed World – Harold Wells
What are people for? Re-Imaging theo-anthropology in the Anthropocene – Pamela McCarroll
Questions & Discussion
Lunch: 12:45-13:30
Session 3 13:00 – 14:45
God and the Church After Christendom – Harris Athanasiadis
Theology of the Cross: As an organizing principle for the Life of Church in Africa – Ishmael Noko
The Gospel of irresolution Thinking Along with Douglas John Hall about Cross, Theology, and not yet Resurrection – Deanna Thompson
Questions & Discussion
FREE TIME 14:45-18:30
Banquet 18:30 – 20:30 with Musical Tribute
SUNDAY NOVEMBER 3 McGILL UNIVERSITY
Session 4 10:00 – 11:15
Rewilding the Gospel in the Shadow of the Holocaust: Theological and Liturgical Fragments – Gary Gaudin
The Memory of Divine Pathos: Heschel, Hall and the Hebrew Bible – Patricia G. Kirkpatrick
Questions & Discussion
Worship Service 11:15-12:00
Brunch 12:00-12:30
Douglas John Hall Reflections
Closing Remarks – Co-Chairs Pamela McCarroll & Patricia G. Kirkpatrick
SPEAKERS BIOS
Theology and Context: An Overview and Reflection on the work of Douglas John Hall
David Lott is now a freelance editor after serving with Alban Institute and Fortress Press. He edited Douglas John Hall: Collected Readings (Fortress, 2013) and Sallie McFague: Collected Readings (Fortress, 2013) and has been involved in several key works of contemporary theology over the last decades.
Hope in a time of Despair and Decline? Neoliberalism, Populism
Prof. Michael Bourgeois is Associate Professor of Systematic Theology at Emmanuel College in the University of Toronto. He is author of several articles and chapters, contributor and co-editor of The Theology of the United Church of Canada (McGill-Queen’s, 2019)
Theology of the Cross as a Response to Our Secular Age: Placing Two McGill Giants in Conversation, Douglas John Hall & Charles Taylor
Prof. Andrew Root is Associate Professor at Luther Seminary in Minneapolis. He is author of several books and articles, including Christopraxis: Practical Theology of the Cross (Fortress, 2014), Faith formation in a Secular Age (Baker, 2017).
Contextual Theology in Canada: Between Covenant and Treaty
Rev. Prof. Allen Jorgenson is Professor of Systematic Theology at Martin Luther University College in Waterloo. He is author of several articles and books. His most recent works include “Theology, Immigration and First Nations Foundations” in Strangers in this World: Reflections on Immigration. Eds. Allen G. Jorgenson, Alexander Y. Hwang, and Hussam Timani (under contract, Fortress Press)
Residential Schools and Theology of the Cross
Rev. Dr. Brian Thorpe is Minister Emeritus at Pacific Spirit United Church in Vancouver and a sessional lecturer at the Vancouver School of Theology. He was a student of Douglas John Hall both as an undergraduate at St. Andrew’s College, Saskatoon and as a graduate student at McGill, Montreal. As Senior Advisor on Issues related to the legacy of the United Church’s involvement in the residential schools system, he worked with survivors of the system to create alternate dispute resolution processes as an important step toward reconciliation and right relations.
An Eco -theology of the Cross for a Climate-Changed World
Rev. Dr. Harold Wells is Professor Emeritus, Emmanuel College in University of Toronto. He is author, The Christic Centre (Orbis, 2004), Co-author of and dozens of scholarly articles, chapters and books.
The Gospel of irresolution Thinking Along with Douglas John Hall about Cross, Theology, and not yet Resurrection
Prof. Deanna Thomson is Professor of Religion at Hamline University in St. Paul Minnesota. She is author of Glimpsing Resurrection: Cancer, trauma and Ministry (Westminster John Knox, 2018) and The Virtual Body of Christ in a Suffering World (Abingdon, 2016) and several other books and articles.
What are People For? Re-imaging Theo-anthropology in the Anthropocene
Rev. Prof Pamela R. McCarroll is Associate Professor of Practical Theology, Emmanuel College in the University of Toronto. She is Author of At the End of Hope, the Beginning (Fortress, 2014); Waiting at the Foot of the Cross: Toward a Theology of Hope for Today (Pickwick, 2013), and several articles and chapters.
Antecedents of the Theology of the Cross in the OT
Rev. Prof. Patricia G. Kirkpatrick is Associate professor of Old Testament Studies and Chair of Biblical Studies in the School of Religious Studies at McGill University. She is author of The Old Testament and Folkolore Studies, SAP; ed. The Function of Ancient Historiography in Biblical and Cognate Studies, (LHBOTS).
ReWilding the Gospel in the Shadow of the Holocaust: Theological and Liturgical Fragments
Rev. Dr. Gary A. Gaudin recently retired after forty years as “theologian-in-residence” (aka pastor) in a number of different contexts. These contexts included a multi-point rural charge and a military chaplaincy (which took his family to Halifax and Bagotville) before following his vocation took him to the West Coast in 1995 to serve urban congregations. Two things remained constant in all these settings: his love of teaching and his profound appreciation of theology as a gift and challenge to the Church. These he attributes to his teacher, Douglas John Hall, under whose guidance Gary completed his doctoral research in 2003: “Hope Becomes Command: Emil L. Fackenheim’s ‘Destructive Recovery’ of Hope in post-Shoa Jewish Theology and Its Implications for Jewish-Christian Dialogue.”
God & the Church After Christendom: Re-thinking Power with Douglas John Hall
Rev. Dr. Harris Athanasiadis, Sessional faculty, Knox College at the University of Toronto, Minister, Armour Heights Presbyterian Church and author of George Grant and The Theology of the Cross: The Christian Foundations of his Thought (University of Toronto Press, 2001), and other articles on theology of the cross.
Theology of the Cross: As an organizing principle for the Life of Church in Africa
Rev. Dr. Ishmael Noko trained for ordination in the Lutheran church in South Africa and continued graduate work in Canada earning a PhD under the supervision of Douglas John Hall at Mcgill. He lectured for a time at the University of Botswana where, he was appointed head of the Department of Theology/Religious Studies and served for three years as Dean of the Faculty of Humanities. In 1984 he joined the Department for World Service of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), where he worked for refugee services related to the churches, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the Organization of African Unity and other organizations. In June 1994 Noko was appointed as general secretary of the LWF, becoming the first African to hold the position. He was re-elected a second in 2004. In 2018 Noko was awarded the UC Distinguished Professorship in Peace Studies from the University of Cambodia for promoting peace and development and for striving to improve the quality of life of citizens around the world.