Engaging with World Religions

Module Description:

This module introduces junior sophister students to the larger world-religious scene, particularly to some of the major world religions and ways of Catholic engagement with them.

This module has three goals: it connects today's religions to their classical beliefs and practices; it also focuses on how these religions have responded to and been transformed by the modern world; and it studies the Christian engagement with them in Catholic commentaries and interreligious dialogues. The module combines thorough coverage of the historical background of each religion with up-to-the-minute discussions of its current practices and of Catholic engagement with them. Each discussion opens with a contemporary scenario of religious experience that illustrates the tensions between pre-modern views, modernity and those arising from Catholic engagement.

Revealing the significance of religion in contemporary life, the module introduces firstly some of the major world religious traditions--Judaism, Islam, (Asian) Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, East Asian Religions, indigenous religions, and new religions--as dynamic, ongoing forces in the lives of individuals and in the collective experience of modern societies. Second, it explores key primary texts (in English translation) and theological ideas of world religions and the Catholic engagement with them through missionary encounters, commentarial readings, comparative theologies and interreligious dialogues

Indicative Bibliography:

Becker, K.J. and Morali, I., Catholic Engagement with World Religions (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis 2010).
Burman, T.E., Reading the Qur’an in Latin Christendom, 1140-1560, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press 2007).
Clooney, F.X., Hindu Wisdom for All God’s Children (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis 1998).
Clooney, F.X., Comparative Theology: Deep Learning Across Religious Borders (Malden, MA / Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010).
Cornille, C. (ed.), Song Divine: Christian Commentaries on the Bhagavad Gītā (Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, 2006).
Esposito, J.L., Fasching, D.J., and Lewis, T., World Religions Today (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
Heft, J.L., (ed.), Catholicism and Interreligious Dialogue (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).

Learning Outcomes:

On successful completion of this module students should be able to:

• Appraise the basic features, core texts and motifs of major world religious traditions.
• Illustrate the complexity of the connection between today's religions connect to their classical beliefs and practices.
• Illustrate how world religions have responded to and been transformed by the modern world and through their encounter with Catholicism.
• Differentiate different kinds of Christian engagement with world religions throughout history
• Analyse Catholic magisterial teachings on interfaith relations.

Methods of Assessment and Student Workload:

Continually assessed.