Professing in the Postmodern Academy: Faculty and the Future of Church-Related Colleges

378 Pages·2002·1.98 MB·English

by  Stephen R. Haynes

Preface I
Professing
in the
Postmodern Academy
Faculty and the Future of Church-Related Colleges
Edited by
Stephen R. Haynes
Baylor University Press
Waco, Texas
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II PREFACE
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Preface III
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...................................................................V
PREFACE......................................................................................VII
PART ONE: INTRODUCTION
A Review of Research on Church-Related
Higher Education
STEPHEN R. HAYNES........................................................1
PART TWO: POSTMODERN OPPORTUNITY
The Habit of Empathy: Postmodernity and the
Future of the Church-Related College
PAUL LAKELAND............................................................33
Prolegomena to Any Postmodern Hope for the
Church-Related College
MARGARET FALLS-CORBITT............................................49
A Sense of Place and the Place of Sense
WILLIAM J. CAHOY........................................................73
PART THREE: ACADEMIC VOCATION
Conversation and Authority: A Tension in the
Inheritance of the Church-Related College
RICHARD KYTE.............................................................115
Beyond the Faith-Knowledge Dichotomy:
Teaching As Vocation
ELIZABETH NEWMAN ...................................................131
The Erotic Imagination and the Catholic Academy
JOHN NEARY................................................................149
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IV CPORNETFEANCTES
PART FOUR: PEDAGOGY AND PRAXIS
“Academic” vs. “Confessional” Study of the Bible
in the Postmodern Classroom: A Response to
Philip Davies and David Clines
JULIA M. O’BRIEN .......................................................169
Teaching the Conflicts, For the Bible Tells Me So
TIMOTHY K. BEAL........................................................183
A Pedagogy of Eucharistic Accompaniment
DOMINIC P. SCIBILIA ....................................................195
PART FIVE: MISSION AND CURRICULUM
One-Armed Embrace of Postmodernity:
International Education and Church-Related
Colleges
KEITH GRABER MILLER ................................................217
Religion and the Curriculum at Church-Related
Colleges
MARCIA BUNGE ...........................................................247
From the Ties that Bind to Way-Stations:
The Dynamics of Religious Commitment
among Students and Their Families
D. JONATHAN GRIESER AND CORRIE E. NORMAN.........267
AFTERWORD
A Typology of Church-Related Colleges
and Universities
STEPHEN R. HAYNES....................................................297
NOTES ....................................................................................303
BIBLIOGRAPHY...........................................................................341
CONTRIBUTORS..........................................................................357
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Preface V
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors wish to thank all the persons and institutions
who contributed to the completion of this book, especially Lilly
Endowment Inc. By funding and cultivating the Rhodes Con-
sultation on the Future of the Church-Related College since
1995, the Endowment has made a significant contribution to
church-related higher education and to the lives and careers
of Consultation participants. Craig Dykstra, Vice President of
the Religion Division at Lilly, has been a strong advocate for
this work and a mentor for many of the participants. Jeanne
Knoerle, SP, former Program Officer at the Endowment,
deserves much credit for the Rhodes Consultation’s success.
Before her retirement in 1999, Jeanne fashioned and nurtured
the Consultation in important ways. Her encouragement of
younger scholars, her guidance and leadership, and her faith
in the spirituality of conversation have left their mark on each
of us. We dedicate this volume to her, in appreciation of her
friendship and support.
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VI PREFACE
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Preface VII
PREFACE
Scholars have employed a number of images to describe the
problems and possibilities associated with American church-
related higher education. Charles McCoy (1972) speaks of an
identity crisis, an image that foregrounds the struggles which
accompany maturation and social change. Merrimon
Cuninggim (1994) refers to “uneasy partners,” an image that
captures the shifting relationship between church and college
and the intellectual chafing that results from the unequal yok-
ing of institutions. Studies by George Marsden (1994) and James
Tunstead Burtchaell (1991; 1997)—along with other recent
works on higher education that have its religious dimensions
in view—traffic in images of declension. They plot the history
of higher education in America as a fall from grace, a dimin-
ishment of soul, an exile from pristine origins.
“Professing in the postmodern academy” is the metaphor
we have selected to guide our reflections on the identity and
role of the church-related college. The image of professing in
the postmodern academy commends itself to us for several
reasons. First, it accentuates the faculty voice on an issue where
it is often silent or silenced. Second, by foregrounding the au-
thors’ institutional locations—which include colleges and uni-
versities affiliated with a variety of Protestant (Presbyterian,
Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran, Episcopal and Mennonite) and
Roman Catholic traditions (Norbertine, Lasallian, Benedictine,
Dominican, Jesuit, and Sisters of Holy Cross)—it emphasizes
the faculty role in articulating and embodying religious iden-
tity. Third, while the academic vocation calls us to be profes-
sors, we are aware of professing in a world and an academy
that are in the midst of change. The “postmodern” environ-
ment emerging in the American academy may be one that is
friendly to religious professions—as George M. Marsden and
others have suggested. In any case, if claims of church-
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VIII PREFACE
relatedness at our institutions are to be taken seriously amid
the welter of competing methodologies and truth claims, an
articulate and committed faculty voice is required.
THE RHODES CONSULTATION
Who are these junior scholars who dare to speak about the
importance of church-relatedness at this juncture in the his-
tory of American higher education? The twelve contributors
to this volume are the original members of the Rhodes Con-
sultation on the Future of the Church-Related College, a project
funded since 1995 by Lilly Endowment Inc.1 The Rhodes Con-
sultation began as an attempt to convene outstanding junior
faculty at church-related colleges and universities to reflect to-
gether on the future of our institutions and the role of faculty
in shaping that future. The authors were selected from among
130 applicants to the first round of the Consultation. Because
interest in the project was so great, a second round of conver-
sations was initiated in 1997. Forty-two new participants were
selected, again from well over one hundred applicants. A third
round of the Consultation, which included thirty-six new fac-
ulty members, was launched in 1999. To this point, ninety fac-
ulty representatives from ninety institutions have participated
in the Rhodes Consultation, and as the project has evolved a
majority of participants in the first two rounds have remained
involved in some capacity.
When an institution becomes part of the Consultation, the
first step is initiation of a series of formal campus discussions
dealing with issues of church-relatedness. These faculty dis-
cussions typically move from the general to the specific, and
often utilize the college’s own history as a case study. Every
attempt is made to represent the various attitudes toward
church affiliation to be found on college faculties, with the goal
of establishing the sort of open and respectful dialogue that is
often lacking around this issue. The campus conversations
sponsored by the Consultation yield further discussions, revi-
sion of mission statements, strategic planning documents, and
plans for new initiatives. These developments are institution-
alized in the second step of the Consultation, which calls for
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Preface IX
participants to develop “Institutional Renewal Grant” propos-
als. The Consultation’s IRG program funds projects designed
by faculty to reclaim creatively the institution’s religious tra-
dition. Programs initiated under the IRG banner have included
faculty orientation seminars, mentoring programs, institutional
history projects, and curriculum development (e.g., courses in
“Religion and Education” and Catholic Studies programs). The
ultimate goal of both campus discussions and IRGs is long-
term institutional change. Indeed, after a full year of formal
discussion and two years of a project specifically designed to
enhance the viability of the religious tradition on campus, the
very character of the college can be affected.
This volume represents another contribution of the Rhodes
Consultation to the future of church-related higher education.
Between 1996 and 1998, the twelve original members of the
Consultation met regularly to discuss the situation on their
campuses, their own identity and vocation as scholars, and
the issues affecting church-related higher education about
which they felt most strongly. After undertaking research
projects and writing, revising, and editing together for two
years, the group produced this manuscript. It represents the
reflections of junior teacher-scholars who are religiously com-
mitted and deeply concerned with the future of their institu-
tions. It does not represent the official view of any college,
church, or denomination, but it does capture the spirit of the
Rhodes Consultation, whose aim has been to provoke genu-
ine conversation about the issues we care about and the insti-
tutions to which we are called.
ORIGINS
How did the Rhodes Consultation come to be? Its origins
go back a decade to an episode that is symbolic of the tensions
that animate many church-affiliated institutions. At Rhodes
College, during the opening faculty meeting of the 1991–1992
academic year, a newly hired professor of Political Science was
introduced. Following his official welcome by the Dean, he
asked to address the faculty. The prestigious scholar, whom
the college had lured away from a leading research university,
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