This course explores the relationship between coloniality, race and ecology through the lens of “catastrophe.” We will examine a variety of theoretical and literary sources that deploy or refute tropes of the “end of the world,” to place the current discussions in a longer historical contexts. We will also study texts that seek to highlight the connections between environmental devastation with histories of colonialism and radicalization. This course requires independent research, in addition to the readings for class. Students will write a research paper focusing on a specific place of their choice.

This course introduces the primary sources of the Catholic moral traditions from the Commandments and Beatitudes to the moral and theological virtues as a call and response to Christian discipleship. Attention will be given to the tradition’s warrants aligned with moral thought and the philosophical traditions of the virtues and the natural law. Key subjects considered are freedom, authority, sin, conscience, and virtue as well as discernment of the ways to be in a world paradoxically coherent with and contrary to the invitation God extends to all, development of those skills and practices that contribute to growth as a moral agent, and recourse to the remedies of failures encountered along the pilgrim’s way.

This course builds on Catholic social teaching found in the magisterial documentary history and brings the insights on social sin to bear on responsibility, accountability, and justice. Attention will be given to primary sources in light of the contemporary critique of abusive/sinful practices among persons with institutionalized power and authority exposed in anti-racist, post-colonial, and liberation thought. The course a) presents the common good as justice developed in these traditions, b) explores responsibility for the social, economic, educational, health, legal, and political status of vulnerable persons, and c) considers accountability by realizing the preferential option for the poor.

For graduates or undergraduates who have completed one theology Core.Can you be Queer and spiritual? Trans or non-binary and religious? Straight, hooking up, and Catholic? Can you combine pleasure and piety? Of course you can. But how? This course surveys progressive thinkers examining the close relationship of sexuality, gender, the body, and spirituality. We look at evolving views of marriage and single life. We reflect on sexual violence. We ask how traditional religion distorts or supports these issues. Catholic, Protestant, and Episcopal authors explore developments and disagreements! -- that nurture authentically spiritual sexuality. The aim is to promote understanding and care for self and others. Graduates and undergraduates welcome.

Mental health conditions and mental distress have become more visible in our public discourse today. Focusing on depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia, this course asks the following questions: how has the Christian theological tradition understood what we now name as mental illness? How do contemporary psychiatric and psychological approaches enhance theological approaches to mental illness, and vice versa? How and why do mental distress and suicidality especially affect LGBTQ people, indigenous communities, and white men? How can we cultivate proper self-love while processing shame in a healthy way? How do we talk well about mental health without obscuring the structural injustices bound up with imperial, ableist, sanist white supremacist heteropatriarchy? In exploring these questions, we will articulate together what it means to do theology, to work for justice, and to build a society that serves everybody.

Events over the past decade have illustrated how antisemitism, racism, and Christian nationalism are intertwined ideologies. This course will offer a historical and thematic investigation into how these three ideologies emerge within Christian contexts, the ways in which Christian theologies and institutions inform them, and modes of resistance to them. A core outcome of this class will be to recover and generate theological positions that actively counter these ideologies.

This course explores the topic of moral agency through texts in theological ethics treating autonomy, human rights, conscience, and sin. It also incorporates interdisciplinary literature that considers ways in which agency is impacted by social practices, structures, and cultural norms. Case studies will be incorporated to consider how concrete social questions may impact standard understandings of autonomy and agency and the influence of nonrational factors on human freedom.

The purpose of this class is to introduce theological ethicists to some philosophers who have been influential in discussions in theological/religious ethics over the past fifty years. The particular aims are threefold: (1) to allow students to engage with major works of philosophy; (2) to enable the seminar to collectively familiarize itself with the discussions these works have generated in the field of theological ethics; and (3) to encourage doctoral students to engage deeply with one or more of these philosophers in articulating and pursuing questions that will animate their own research, including their comprehensive exams. There are four basic areas covered (1) distributive justice (Rawls, Sandel, Walzer, Nozick); (2) virtue theory (MacIntyre, Nussbaum); (3) rights talk (Finnis, Dworkin, Glendon (on international law)); (4) cosmopolitanism (Appiah, Benhabib). Students will be required to produce two 12-15 page papers; one assessing the role of a philosopher's thought in the field of theological ethics, and the second furthering the student's own work in either comprehensive exam prep or dissertation research.

The course looks at the most important works that shaped Catholic Theological Ethics in the twentieth century. It analyses the innovative works of Lottin, Tillmann, and Gilleman whose works challenged the classical paradigm of manualists like Davis, Jone, Ford and Kelly. The course then looks at Häring, and at the roots of proportionalism that result from that same Council. The legacy of Fuchs as well as twentieth century papal encyclicals are also studied. The course concludes with the emerging work of Latin American liberationists, American feminist and black moral theologians, African inculturationists, and Asian theological ethicists

Will treat major voices connecting feminist theology and ethics/politics( (e.g., Mary Daly, Elizabeth Johnson, Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, Margaret Farley, Ivone Gebara, representatives from Asia and Africa, and applied ethics (e.g., economics, racism, sex, abortion).

May be repeated for credit as topics vary. Topic for Spring 2023: HIV/AIDS, Art, and Religion in America. Examines the history of the AIDS crisis in the U.S., including religious, racial, and moral constructions amid the infamous “culture wars”. Special attention to feminist/queer activists and artists who fostered alternative moral and political visions of disease, sexuality, and health.

What is happiness? How can we achieve a balanced, healthy, fulfilling life? Classical thinkers such as Aristotle, Plato, Chuang Tzu; Stoic, Epicurean, Confucian, Buddhist paths; comparison with contemporary studies on happiness and mindfulness

This course introduces students to the sources and methods of Christian ethics. We will consider the ways in which Christian moral thinking is shaped by the Hebrew Bible and New Testament; survey some prominent approaches to Christian ethical discernment (divine command, natural law, Christian realism, virtue ethics, as well as feminist and womanist ethics); examine the deformation of Christian subject by empire, racism, and economic exploitation; and finally, probe the promise of Christian moral vision in reimagining human response to mass incarceration, finance-dominated capitalism, disabilities, racial capitalism, migration, and environmental justice.

TBA

A study of the fundamental principles and practices of restorative justice as applicable to church and society. The course explores the needs and roles of key stakeholders (victims, offenders, communities, justice systems), outlines the basic principles and values of restorative justice, introduces some of the primary models of practice, and identifies challenges to restorative justice and strategies to respond to them. The course is organized around the issue of crime and harm within a western legal context, but attention is given to applications in other contexts. Of particular interest is the contribution of traditional or indigenous approaches to justice as well as applications in post-conflict situations.

This course introduces you to a variety of ecological justice issues through a combination of excursions, on-campus events, guest speakers, films, art exhibitions, and discussions. There will be 6 units total. You will be required to complete five units. Through this process, you will engage the theological, ethical, spiritual, and practical issues raised by a variety of ecological issues and by different responses to them.

This course continues to expose you to a variety of ecological justice issues through a combination of excursions, on-campus events, guest speakers, films, art exhibitions, and discussions. There will be six units total. You will be required to attend four units. In addition to your attendance at these four units, you will plan and execute one of the units, including an event and discussion. Through this process, you will exercise your own ethical agency in the pursuit of ecological justice and develop your leadership skills. 

This course continues to expose you to a variety of ecological justice issues through a combination of excursions, on-campus events, guest speakers, films, art exhibitions, and discussions. There will be six units total. You will be required to attend four units. In addition to your attendance at these four units, you will plan and execute one of the units, including an event and discussion. Through this process, you will exercise your own ethical agency in the pursuit of ecological justice and develop your leadership skills. 

Multiethnic and interactive class examines racism in terms of a black and white paradigm. A multidisciplinary analysis of this major social problem. Course includes graphic presentations, biblical, psycho social and ethical principles leading to challenging discussions.  

Seeks to develop the student’s theological ethical reflections, social analysis, and types of action for ministering to crucial social issues.  Our three step approach will be: 1) clarification, 2) conceptualization, and 3) confrontation. Issues include: urbanization, economic justice, and environmental ethics.            

When Audre Lorde argued "the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house," the lesbian feminist writer challenged the marginality of Black women in the feminist movement and exposed the invisibility of Black and lesbian epistemic resources in re-imagining freedom, justice, and liberation within political struggles against domination, subjugation, and violence. In doing so, she highlighted the limits of (white liberal) feminist thought and Black politics of respectability to detangle the web of political, racial, economic, gender, and cultural domination in the U.S. and abroad. To this end, Lorde's hermeneutical turn fundamentally altered the conceptual schemes and political aspirations steering post-Black Power writings on politics, transnationalism, and power. This course retrieves Lorde's critical theory as a framework for examining social domination and inequality within the post-Civil Rights era. We will then (re) turn to figures such as W.E.B Du Bois, Frederick Douglass, Maria Stewart, Anna Julia Cooper, and Booker T. Washington to explore the major moral questions that framed the emergence of Black liberal, conservative, nationalist, Marxist, and feminist thought. Lorde’s framework will give us the tools for examining the major political categories at stake (and contested) within Black liberation theology and contemporary Black Political Thought: double consciousness, domination, respectability, freedom, racial uplift, intersectionality, social death and racial solidarity.

This seminar will consider philosophical approaches and perspectives offered by five Western twentieth century thinkers on ethics, religion, politics, and our (self) understanding as human beings. Works from Du Bois, Arendt, Fanon, Levinas and Ricoeur will taken up to interrogate phenomenological, social, political and religious interpretations of the human condition, and our corresponding possibilities and responsibilities.

This course treats persecution in America as a site of public history and ethics. Focusing on three historical cases—the Salem witch trials, the Underground Railroad, and Cold War-era McCarthyism—we will explore how hunts for witches, runaway slaves, and communists (along with their fellow travelers) have shaped American political culture. Literary, historical, theoretical, and cinematographic sources will figure prominently, along with field trips to Salem, Danvers, and various other points around Boston. Using René Girard’s work on violence and persecution to help connect the dots across the centuries, we will try our hands at crafting public history, meditate on efforts to engage “everyday ethics,” and write short pieces on ethical issues for popular audiences. In the final weeks of the course, we will consider how today’s anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sensibilities relate to longstanding impulses to identify and root out alien elements in the body politic.

Susan Howe's poetry—especially Singularities (1990), The Nonconformist’s Memorial (1993), Pierce-Arrow (1999), The Midnight (2003), Souls of the Labadie Tract (2007), That This (2011), debths (2017), and Concordance (2020)—and her prose, My Emily Dickinson (1985), The Birth Mark: Unsettling the Wilderness in American Literary History (1993), and Spontaneous Particulars: The Telepathies of the Archive (2014)— are deeply immersed in archives, particularly, but by no means only, those of American history. Through her work she brings that history alive in all of its violence, contradiction, pain, and pleasure, seeking to make the unknown, repressed, forgotten, or erased visible, legible even as illegible, somehow even potentially livable. Her poetry—and her criticism, as I often find it hard to distinguish, fully, between the two—is a refuge and a refusal, performing a contradictory doubling without which we can’t survive, without which we probably don’t deserve to (thrive). The course will be an exploration of Howe's project, with crucial attention to the work Howe reads, to reading and rereading Howe's work, and to thinking about the archive itself and its relationship to possible futures.

This course focuses on the social movement and practices utilized by spiritual, faith based and ethically communities to understand and engage in reparations as a healing, constructive and decolonial process. This journey will provide an introduction to reparations through its history and major figures and frameworks; it then explores economic, experiential, theoretical and legal bases for understanding reparations as articulated in academia, social movements, and in advocacy arenas. We will examine historical calls for reparations and the current movement and the possibilities toward reparations for Blacks in the U.S. Building on the key histories,theories and ideas that inform reparations, we will frame this contemporary discussion through the lens of spirituality and decoloniality to understand slavery, reconstruction, civil rights, truth and reconciliation, restorative and transitional justice. We will explore various understandings and approaches to reparations from organizations and individuals at the United Nations, Human Rights Watch, the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, National African American Reparations Commission, Caribbean Reparations Commission,Reparations4Slavery, UHURU solidarity, and many others.

This interdisciplinary course examines the conceptual logic of using a settler-colonial lens to interpret the history and politics of Israel/Palestine. Our explorations will include the following: the religious dimensions of settler colonial narratives and practices and their intersections with secular, religious, and apocalyptic nationalisms; what the deployment of a settler-colonial lens illuminates, what it obscures, and why; the recent proliferation of scholarship that has taken a comparative settler colonial approach and triangulating that with the literature on Israel's Jewish identity, its meaning, and how and why those identities and meanings have shifted over the decades. We will likewise engage another set of conversations on nationalism and political theologies and identify the relevance of global anti-racism social movements and their uses and abuses of Palestinian struggles and Israeli narratives. We will finally interrogate the symbolic, semiotic, metaphorical, and theological operation of Zion and Palestine.  The three instructors for this course are grounded in multiple disciplines, including political and legal theory, religious studies, critical pedagogies, and just peace research. There are no prerequisites, and student final projects can range from a research paper on a theme relevant to our explorations to more public facing projects (such as podcasts, educational materials, or photo essays with commentary) focused on an audience related to a student's professional and/or vocational interests.

This course examines the way in which Christianity, and to some extent religious ritual more generally, catalyzes the formation of civilization and culture. Exploring education, social structures, and the patterns of economic and neighborhood life in cities, this course suggests that civilization is the natural result of the life of the Church.This course is for THM online students. Instructor's permission is needed for all other students.

The field of science and technology is an ever-evolving and rapidly developing field that has given rise to countless new possibilities, particularly in the area of healthcare. Although such an enterprise seems enticing, these new developments, especially within the last century, have raised a number of moral questions. Just because something is technically possible does not necessarily mean that it should be done. This course will cover the fundamental principles of Catholic bioethics to see how the Church has consistently responded to bioethical questions from the perspective of both faith and reason. Students will utilize these principles to develop sound moral reasoning to respond to bioethical questions and issues with truth and charity.

Within the historical context of the Catholic social tradition this course will examine the continuity and change embodied in the teaching of three modern popes. The course will focus on the historical context in which they taught, the major texts they contributed to the tradition, and the commentaries about their teaching and the range of socio-political issues to which they addressed their teaching. A particular emphasis will be on issues affecting American society, including domestic and foreign policy.

A study of the 1983 Code of Canon Law marriage canons in their historical and doctrinal context with special consideration given to consent, covenant, and sacrament, as well as mixed and interfaith marriages and pastoral preparation and care for persons marrying.