Annual Meeting 2023 Program Book

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Insurrectionist Wisdoms: Toward a North American Indigenous Pastoral Theology (Lexington Books, 2022) uses practical theological and anthro/gynopological methods to analyze the situation of working-class Maya mexicanas working on the assembly line of a multinational corporation in Yucatán, México. Through in-depth, firsthand interviews, Insurrectionist Wisdoms brings to light the exploitation of women of color by large, multimillion-dollar corporations and delves into the ways these women can, and do, fight back. Drawing on a decolonial approach to pastoral theology and feminism, the book proposes Lxs Hijxs de Maíz as an image for pastoral care and counseling.

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In this paper I will discuss a problem unique to the study of Afro-Jewish communities, the problem of ortho-ethnicity (proper people). For practitioners and scholars of African American religion, questions of orthodoxy (proper belief) and orthopraxy (proper practice) have been leveled at particularistic interpretations of Abrahamic traditions regarding their beliefs and practices. Regarding the existence of Afro-Jewish traditions, the additional phenomena of ortho-ethnicity (proper people) emerges as a response to Blacks as Jews that renders orthodoxy and orthopraxis secondary.  In essence, the level of ritual observance and adherence to accepted doctrines are inconsequential if the Black as Jew in question is regarded as unacceptable according to rabbinic law (halakha). I am arguing that rabbinic law (halakha) itself has been racialized and the appearance of Blacks as Jews necessitates a need to authenticate individuals or entire communities on the presumption that Blackness in of itself raises suspicion.

The theme, La Labor de Nuestras Manos, can evoke for those of African descent, the desire to make visible contributions that, although critical and life giving, have been invisiblized. Afro-Latine peoples, especially those born in the U.S. are empowered by the continuity of critique and scholarship present in African American work/labor. Black theology, together with Latinx, Latin American and other liberation theologies, inform their self-understanding within Christianity in the U.S., and have implications for their engagement in theological reflection in faith communities, especially as these communities participate in social justice movements in the U.S. What are the risks and possibilities of an engagement between Black theology and Latinx theology centered in Afro-Latine realities? What methods can be utilized if Afro-Latine realities have been concealed/erased from Latinx and Latin American Theological reflections?

Ten years ago, in an article for The Christian Century, theologian Jonathan Tran heralded the work of three black theologians—J. Kameron Carter, Willie J. Jennings, and Brian Bantum—as inaugurating a “new black theology.” According to Tran, these three thinkers represented “a major theological shift that [would]—if taken as seriously as it deserve[d]—change the face not only of black theology but theology as a whole.”

Now that ten years have passed, this paper asks: Has it? And arguing that it has not, I offer reflections on why it has not. My central my argument is a critique of the way Carter and Bantum offered their revised understanding of racial identity and hybridity by reimagining the identity Jesus through mulatto/a identity. I conclude by suggesting that the appeals made by their colleague—Willie J. Jennings—to “land” and “language” point toward a more constructive path forward.

There is limited scholarly awareness of the Jain impact on yoga, particularly during the period Sagarmal Jain has called the “dark age for Jain yoga” from the 11th century onward. To help shed new light on Jain yoga’s “dark age,” this paper presents elements of my research from two Jain yoga texts: the Yogapradīpa, and Yaśovijaya's Prakriyā commentary on the Pātañjalayogaśāstra (PYS). I discuss how the Yogapradīpa (second millennium AD) presents an eight-fold path to liberation that is similar to that found in the PYS, highlighting how the Yogapradīpa nevertheless assigns higher importance to dhyāna rather than samādhi. I also show how the Yogapradīpa conveys a Jain-inflected trans-sectarian approach to yoga. Similarly, Yaśovijaya, a prominent seventeenth century Jain philosopher from Gujarat, presents his own conciliatory approach towards other religions on the principle of neutrality in his Prakriyā commentary. I compare and contrast these unique Jain contributions toward Jain yoga’s development.

The relevance of the Pātañjalayogaśāstra (PYS) has varied throughout history. Scholarship on the text has mainly focused on Brahmanical and Buddhist traditions and has left out other voices that might complicate the narrative of the history of the text. This paper presents new translations from a text by the so-called last great philosopher of Jainism, the Tapā Gaccha monk Yaśovijaya (1624 –1688). He not only devotes an entire compendium, Dvātriṃśad-Dvtriṃśikā, to an investigation of various forms of spiritual practice he calls 'yoga', but also devotes an entire chapter with the PYS as his chief interlocutor, rendering his own summary version of the text in śloka form. Despite his influence in Jain thought, Yaśovijaya remains understudied and most of his work has not been translated. With original translations, this paper shows how he affirms a Jain position in the PYS through his hermeneutical choices in the Dvātriṃśad-Dvtriṃśikā.

Alongside the well documented work of Rakesh Jhaveri at Dharampur Meditation Centre in Gujarat, three meditation movements have taken up similar work, attempting to promote a spiritual practice in the Jain idiom for contemporary times: Preksha Dhyan established by Acharya Mahaprajna (1920-2010), Adhyatma Dhyan founded by Acharya Shiv Muni (1942-), and the Arham Meditation movement of Muni Pranamya Sagar (1975-). This presentation will highlight key principles of each of these yoga systems, including reports on field site visits and a consideration of how each system incorporates Jain yoga texts into their practices. It will demonstrate the diversity of contemporary Jain yoga systems even as it demonstrates each system’s commitment to similar foundational Jain principles, practices, and soteriological goals.

This paper contextualizes Dr. Narendra Kumar Jain’s (1937-) Eastside Gallery Painting, “The Seven Stages of Enlightenment,” a popular mural on the Berlin Wall featuring a meditating yogi-Buddha with seven cakras, Mahavira, and several other religious and spiritual figures and symbols. The mural’s peace-making bricolage pushes the boundaries of the study of Jainism and yoga to their disciplinary limits, requiring an interdisciplinary approach drawing from Jain Studies and Yoga Studies but also from Buddhist Studies, political science and art history to understand why these various influences converge in Dr. Jain’s popular mural. Even as Dr. Jain emphasizes a universalistic Jain and yogic identity and the apophatic nature of his artistic work, his engagement with all of the intersecting influences presented in this paper place his mural in a very particular socio-historical location, making his work both transcendent and contextualizable, from emic and etic perspectives, respectively.

Contemporary Jains often understand anekānta-vāda to have implications for interfaith goodwill and acceptance in the form of social- and intellectual-ahiṃsā. Following this contemporary approach, this paper considers one genre of Jain texts instrumentalizing anekānta-vāda not only as an epistemological dialectical logic, but also as a mandate for social-ahiṃsā between religions. I revisit several texts on yoga by Haribhadrasūri who is engaged in a type of interfaith dialogue in a way that affords significant positive valuation of other non-Jain yoga traditions. I argue that there is a current of philosophical pragmatism in these texts and within the thought of some other Jain thinkers which subordinates theory to practice and admits the fallibilism in mundane human knowledge in such a way that allows for significant positive valuation of other traditions, thereby fostering potential for interfaith goodwill. In this way, this paper is the first in-depth dialogue between Western Pragmatism and Jain tradition.

Course design has long been a structure of inequity in American higher education, privileging certain languages, persons, and ways of knowing. Unfortunately, we often replicate these inequities uncritically in our classes by passing down syllabi, re-using test banks, and grading in the same ways we have "always" been graded. These practices do not ensure rigor, as some claim, and certainly do not allow equitable access to education. Instead of unthinkingly replicating harmful design in religious studies courses and curricula, we need to work critically and intentionally to address aspects that may be sites of trauma and oppression. In this presentation, we will discuss four features of equity-centered, trauma-informed education that are key to course design, analyze potentially useful examples from courses in religious studies, and workshop one aspect of a current or imagined course and receive feedback on potential changes.  

As students shift away from humanities majors (including religion), it is likely that religion faculty will be asked to teach fewer specialized courses and more general eduation classes. Additionally, data from the AAR/SBL jobs report shows that almost 2/3 of job positings ask faculty to teach five or more course per year. This has two major implications for graduate students preparing for careers in higher eduation: first, they need to prepare to teach a broader array of courses than might have been expected a generation ago; and, second, they need to be prepared to teach a large number of classes. I will review data and show how I come to these conclusions.

Drawing on my experience of over six years as the Dean of Faculty at a small (1,000 student) liberal arts college when I supervised over three dozen faculty searches, I will discuss how to write a cover letter that might make it past the selection committee's first cut. I will identify some specific strategies that applicants can draw upon and note some all-too-common mistakes.

Teaching religion in independent high schools offers a meaningful and a viable mode of teaching for scholars of religion that can be accessed by graduate students across fields of study with key, manageable steps. There are good jobs to be had, if one: 1) effectively navigates the structures of secondary education in the US and the ways in which the study of religion is often framed in each; 2) demonstrates competent understanding of adolescent development; and 3) presents a teaching portfolio that evidences examples of assessment practices, which are equitable, differentiated, creative, and oriented to clear objectives. This presentation provides a schematic overview of these three requirements, in conversation with key resources, chosen for the resources’ ability to anchor an initial exploration into adolescent education and their relevance to current conversations among educators. An annotated bibliographic resource sheet will be available for interested attendees. 

In this presentation I will share with graduate students (and others) how their training in religious studies ideally prepares them for teaching and leadership roles outside the are of religious studies. I will also include practical advice for using the skills and knowledge of a religious studiese scholar to develop courses that can be taught as first-year seminars; how knowledge, training, and experience in religious studies can be drawn upon when applying for positions in first-year experience programs; and how a grounding in religious studies can used to lead and develop first-year experience programs.

I spent several years on the job market before getting onto the tenure track, and I now have been teaching full time for almost two years at a small, regional four-year college. I will share some of what I have learned in the process, and what I wish I had known when I started. Specifically, I will talk about developing alternatives to final papers that can boost student engagement and potentially thwart ChatGPT.

Karl Barth’s Theology of the Reformed Confessions characterized the Reformed confessional texts as more ethical in orientation and more horizontal in focus than the symbols of their Lutheran counterparts. He goes so far as to say that “this understanding of Christianity as the connection, grounded in God and effected in humans, of the invisible divine truth of life and the visible renewal of human life …” simply is “the positive Reformed doctrine of Christianity” (147-148). He builds there on earlier claims made in lecture cycles on Calvin and Zwingli about the ethical and horizontal distinctiveness of the Reformed tradition. This paper examines his source material to explore ways in which he does render early Reformed confessional concerns from 1523 onward but also in what ways his analysis was inflected by his engagement of Luther studies in 1923. 

Common interpretations of the American Presbyterian doctrine of the “spirituality of the church” have been criticized by historians as a theological rationale for the church to avoid addressing racial injustice from slavery to desegregation. In this paper, I supply theological argument to complement these historical criticisms. Common interpretations of the “spirituality of the church” intend to offer a distinction between what political concerns the church can and cannot officially address. I argue that the common interpretations typified in the seminal figures of Stuart Robinson, James Thornwell, and Charles Hodge offer distinctions that are unable to offer guidance in the application of scriptural moral teachings that have social dimensions. As an alternative, I draw upon John Calvin’s and the Westminster Confession of Faith’s recognition that the moral law applies to church and state alike to undergird an understanding of the church that can address political concerns, without sponsoring a state church.

The double bind that Reformed catholicity presents is that churches confess catholicity but their "confusing provincialism" leads to an idealized catholicity that, Karl Barth warns in The Theology of the Reformed Confessions, becomes unity deferred. The symptom of this problem comes in the proliferation of multiple locally-grounded confessional statements. This presentation suggests that there needs to be a way to bring churches from different contexts to the table in a way that is hospitable to many, even if it does not mean uniformity or comfort. This presentation calls this way, “confessional hospitality.” Drawing on Jacques Derrida's dialectic between conditional and unconditional hospitality, confessional hospitality considers the possibilities for local churches to confront universal evils by learning how to talk with each other through Reformed confessions. Thus, confessional hospitality paves the way for a connectional unity without connecting it with a specific institution or structure.

What role does Daoism have for a competitive middle class in China? How are Daoists shaping curricula for a consuming public to solve contemporary concerns? This paper examines how one Daoist academy in Wudangshan pursued a reinterpreted Daoist ideal of the “Authentic Person” (zhenren). It analyzes how, through course lectures and informal social events, Daoist teachers led their individualistic, middle-class students to use this Daoist ideal figure as a framework for personal, social, and spiritual authenticity. These Daoist masters and students suggested that the world in which they lived was morally suspect and “false” (xuwei). Developing a form of Daoist authenticity and acting from it were presented as means of healing an over-worked self, solving social problems, and ensuring success in life. Within this process, the masters of Wudang performed “authentic” traditional sociality through cultured, convivial behavior that was interpreted by students as evidence of the success of Daoist cultivation.

In the People’s Republic of China, "nourishing life" (yangsheng) refers to both an ancient longevity principle and a major economic trend. On the one hand, yangsheng has been discussed from the foundational texts of Daoism as a means to attain immortality through techniques such as meditation, dietetics and calisthenics. On the other hand, "nourishing life" refers to a general idea of longevity and well-being that expresses itself in huge markets of self-help literature and wellness classes. This presentation explores how religion and the consumer-based economy merge in the form of "nourishing life training classes" (yangsheng peixun ban) held within the Medicine King Temple of Mt. Qingcheng, a sacred Daoist mountain. Anxiety about authenticity occurs both on the part of participants who fear that practices are over-commercialized and organizers who fear that too little commercialization may arouse the concern of the state that the practices are too religious in nature.

Many urban Chinese citizens, particularly the young and well-educated, are turning to Buddhist-based meditation practices to cure what they characterize as the restlessness and inauthenticity of social life. This presentation will explore this interest in Chan meditation techniques at three sites: a weeklong Chan meditation camp that promises spiritual renewal to young urban professionals, a Beijing-based teahouse operated by alumni of the camp, and a temple in Jiangsu province that operates a biweekly meditation class for mostly middle-aged lay Buddhists. Drawing on Talal Asad’s notion of the religious and secular as contingent, mutually-creating categories, the presentation will argue that, while the segregation of the religious and spiritual from everyday life in urban China contributes to anxiety about the authentic in the first place, the possibility for Chan meditation to function as a site of the authentic is equally dependent on the segregation of religious sites from everyday time and space.

Feng Xiaogang’s If You Are the One II (2010) achieved the second-highest opening day gross in Chinese box office history. While some laud its deeply Buddhist sensibilities toward living and dying, others lambast its ubiquitous product placements and seemingly unbridled consumerism. At the heart of these contestations lies a perennial conundrum that has become especially acute in post-Mao China: should religion have anything to do with business? This paper explores the entwinement of Buddhism and economics through the prism of a blockbuster romantic comedy. In the film’s production, text, and reception, I observe a swirl of socioreligious discourses animated by the anxiety that artistic and spiritual integrity may be rendered inauthentic by the desire for financial profit. Building on recent work on the corporate form, I frame Feng’s commercial cinema as a vehicle through which the desires for ethical depth, familial well-being, and material prosperity are simultaneously affirmed.