The PUBLIC UNDERSTANDING of RELIGION
The Marty Center for the Public Understanding of Religion builds on a longstanding conviction of the Divinity School that the best and most innovative scholarship in religion arises from sustained dialogue with the world beyond the academy. It contributes to this dialogue by offering scholarly perspectives on the religious questions facing the wider public, while encouraging faculty and students to situate their scholarly questions within a broader cultural frame of reference.
MARTY CENTER CONFERENCES & EVENTS
Typologies of Interfaith Education Symposium
January 11-21, 2021The Martin Marty Center is excited to host this symposium in collaboration with Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC), Chicago. It will consist of an opening plenary, led jointly by David Nirenberg, Dean of the University of Chicago Divinity School, and Eboo Patel, Founder and President of Interfaith Youth Core, followed by four interactive panels on relevant themes related to interfaith education.
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Medical Practice in the Midst of Global Pandemic
An Enhancing Life Research LaboratoryThe Enhancing Life Research Laboratory, a pilot program partially funded by the Marty Center, will give 12 physicians from around the world skills and tools to navigate orientational distress.
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Marty Center Symposium on Religion and the 2020 Elections
This Marty Center symposium will address how religion shapes American politics--and vice-versa--in the midst of political polarization, economic crisis, and social upheaval.
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Pantheism, Creation, Emanation
Contemporary Reflections on NatureA conference canvassing the fraught position of nature in the Western tradition in an attempt to analyze it not as an enemy to be feared but as a welcome critical voice and a potential ally of both the divine and the human.
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Religions in the Americas
A lecture seresThe Marty Center's Religions in the Americas lecture series will bring leading scholars in the field to focus on critical topics and key debates, using a variety of methodological approaches
LEARN MORESightings
Sightings reports and comments on the role of religion in current events; contributors are from our faculty, the academy – and the world.
Symphonic Politics, Sibelius, and the Immanent Messiah
Our country cannot afford to wait for a miracle. The music of Jean Sibelius teaches us what the....
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Georgia's Senate Elections and the Life of the Black Church
Senator-elect Warnock's victory shows that the institution that led the fight for civil rights has....
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Meet the Marty Center Fellows
Our Marty Center Fellows situate their research within a broader cultural frame of reference, bringing their perspectives to religious questions facing the wider public.
Harini Kumar
I am a Ph.D Candidate in Anthropology and my dissertation "Formations of Tamil Islam: Negotiations and Contestations in Contemporary South India" focuses on the lived experience of Muslims in South India, specifically Tamil Islamic traditions and practices and how the complex relation between a r...
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Héctor M. Varela Rios
My goal this year can be stated simply: to complete my dissertation. Easier said than done, though. This fellowship with the Martin Marty Center (MMC), especially due to the interdisciplinary conversations with peers and faculty, will be key to accomplishing that goal. More specifically, my disse...
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Izzet Coban
My dissertation will examine complex theological-philosophical speculations concerning the concept of nonbeing, or meontology, in the Medieval Islamic World. I will explain what semantic changes the transmission of Philoponian and Neoplatonic material from Greek into Arabic produced in the ontolo...
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Joel Brown
My dissertation, titled “Breaking the Spiritual Bondage of Whiteness: Race and Social Christianity in Progressive Era Chicago,” attempts to recast the history of social Christianity in America by focusing on themes and questions of race within and surrounding the social gospel during its heyday i...
READ MORESEMINARS & FELLOWSHIPS
Seminar and fellowship programs are oriented towards the intersection of religion and public life, and encourage faculty and students to put their scholarly questions into a broader cultural frame.
Our annual yearlong Marty Center seminar puts together junior and senior scholars for a unique interdisciplinary experience.
The Brauer Seminar encourages interdisciplinary research and teaching, with a new topic (and instructors) annually.