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RELS 4040 World Religions
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to the major religious traditions of the world. After an introduction to the study of religion, this course explores the cultural and historical settings and the various forms of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Special attention is given to the spirituality and values fostered by each. The concepts of God and the holy, the human condition and destiny, ritual practices, and ethical behavior is among the major topics dealt with and compared. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5000 Academic Study of Religion
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
This course introduces students to the discipline of religious studies and explains how it differs from theology. It outlines the history of the discipline from the 19th century onwards and the view of those writers (like Friedrich Schleiermacher, Rudolph Otto, and Mircea Eliade) who have contributed to its growth and development. Contributions to major areas of study such as the essence, origin, function, and language of religion are discussed. Further, the various methods used in religious studies (such as the historical, phenomenological, and linguistic) are examined and evaluated. How these methods are applied to the study of various religious fields, such as religious experience, the concept of God, and human nature and destiny, are a major focus of the course. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5010 Anthropology of Religion
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to current anthropological approaches to the study of religion. Symbolism, myth, ritual, magic and witchcraft. Contemporary viewpoints on primitive religions and on the great religions. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5020 Contemporary Religious Movements
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
The "cults" of the 1970s and their impact on traditional religion. Understanding their excesses, financial successes and appeal | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5025 World Religions
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to the major religious traditions of the world. After an introduction to the study of religion, this course explores the cultural and historical settings and the various forms of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Special attention is given to the spirituality and values fostered by each. The concepts of God and the holy, the human condition and destiny, ritual practices, and ethical behavior is amount the major topics dealt with and compared. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5030 Hinduism
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
History of Hinduism from its classical and pre-classical origins to contemporary manifestations. The religious and philosophical movements, change and continuity in the development of religious thought and institutions. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5050 Islam
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Understanding and living with religion. Politics and culture in the Middle East. Origin and growth of Islamic civilization, emphasizing the principal teachings, including selections from the Qurian. The life of the Prophet Muhammad, later developments in Sufi mysticism, sectarian differences and the recent Black Muslim experience in America. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5060 Buddhism
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
History of Buddhism from its origins to later manifestations and differentiations into Mahayana and Theravada. Major philosophical schools and Buddhist institutions in South and East Asia. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5061 Asian Religions
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Examination of major religious-philosophical-cultural traditions originated in South and East Asia, including the so-called Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, and Shinto. These tradition swill be introduced in terms of their socio-cultural settings and historical developments, as well as their core teachings, practices, and various cultural expression. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5062 Traditions in China
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An exploration of the historical and contemporary currents of thought and practices in Chinese culture. The development of each of the Three Teachings, i.e. Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism, will be traced, and the interactions among them and their manifestations in the daily lives of Chinese people will be examined. A brief survey of popular and minority religions in China will also be included. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5063 Gender in Asian Religions
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Diverse Asian traditions such as Hindu traditions, Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, Shinto, and shamanism, are often intertwined with one another. Together they present a complicated mixed picture when it comes to women and gender relation. This course focuses on the tension between the elevation of the life-giving feminine, the cosmic subordination of women in the male scripts, and the confluence and contestation among different sub-traditions. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5070 Judiasm
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Essentials of Basic Judaism: the beliefs, practices, customs, ceremonies, holidays and institutions. Current trends in contemporary Jewish life and the concerns of Jewish people today. The different denominations within Judaism. The place of modern Israel. The Holocaust. Modern masters of Jewish thought. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5071 Jews and Judaism in the Modern World
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
The historical processes affecting Jews, Judaism and Jewish life from the time of the French Revolution to Auschwitz and the post-War era of today. Modern Jewish life and times in 19th and 20th century Germany, Russia, Poland, France, England, America and Israel. The dynamics of emancipation and enlightenment, Jewish life in Eastern Europe, the impact of Jewish life on Western culture. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5130 Interreligious Dialogue
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An examination of current efforts to promote interreligious dialogue. Various Christian interpretations (or theologies) of other religions are examined with reference to major official church documents published over the past half century. The meaning of dialogue and arguments put forward to support it, along with its risks and the efforts to harmonize it with Christian evangelization, are considered. Also, understandings of interreligious dialogue from the viewpoints of non-Christian religions are examined as well. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5131 Christianity and World Religions
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Explores the problem of religious pluralism in the contemporary world. This course concentrates on: 1) a description and evaluation of the main theologies of religion, and 2) an examination of the relationships which the major world religions, namely, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism, have developed over the last few decades. Special emphasis is placed on the current movement towards dialogue and the many official documents that relate to dialogue. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5132 Religions and Global Wellbeing
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
With the capitalist globalization, social problems such as socio-economic inequities, gendered violence, and environmental damages have been globalized as well. What are the major world religions' responses to and critiques of capitalistic globalization, and can traditional teachings be applied to this globalized modern world to help human lives and thus prove their respective claims of eternal truths? Do these traditional teachings have something in common, upon which a realistic global ethics can be built? And what can be accomplished through interreligious dialogues and collaborations? This course prompts students to view themselves as citizens of the global village who have global responsibilities, and to maintain an awareness of variances in cultural heritages and real-life situations, thus avoiding naive or dogmatic assumptions that apply familiar "Western" religious rules to the rest of the globe. The course will guide students to examine different religions' responses to globalization and globalized problems, and thereby instill an appreciation of other religions as well as a sensitivity for cultural diversity. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5200 Apocalyptic Literature: Old and New Testaments
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An Intensive review of the book of Revelation and Apocalyptic literature. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5210 Torah and Historical Writings
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A study of the Torah (Genesis through Deuteronomy) and the historical books (Joshua through II Kings). Use of contemporary contemporary methods of critical interpretations of the major stories and their theological insights, humor and enduring power. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5220 Wisdom Literature of Old and New Testaments
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A literary historical examination of wisdom writings in the Hebrew scripture. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5225 Prophets, Wisdom, and Apocalyptic
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A study of the major and minor prophets, the Wisdom literature and the emergence of the Apocalyptic in the book of Daniel. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5230 Passion and Resurrection Narratives
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A critical study of the history, formation, literary characteristics and theology of those chapters in the four gospels which deal with the arrest of Jesus, trial, crucifixion, burial, empty tomb and resurrection appearances. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5235 The Four Gospels
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A survey of modern scholarship on the Gospels. Religious and political conditions of the Greco-Roman world of the first century of the Common Era. The formation of the Gospels, the quest for the historical Jesus movement. The distinctive approaches of the four evangelists, and the relationship of canonical to no-canonical gospels. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5236 Acts, Letters, Revelation
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A study of the development of the primitive church, its Christologies/theologies, lifestyles and leadership conflicts in the context of the political, religious and social currents of the Greco-Roman world of the first century of the Common Era. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5240 Feminist Biblical Interpretation
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Female subordination/male dominance, images of God, power and leadership in institutional religion, differences in the ways African Americans and white Americans read the Bible. Women in Israelite societies, in early Judaism, in the Jesus movement, and in Gnosticism. Major American and European feminist/womanist literary criticism. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5260 Gospel Studies
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An examination of one of the canonical or non-canonical Gospels (its sources, composition, distinctive christological and theological emphasis, historical community context, contemporary relevance), or of a specific topic in Gospel research (parables, roots of Christian anti-Semitism, search for the historical Jesus, etc.) Attention is given to gender issues. See specific course description for the semester in which this course is offered. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5300 Contemporary Christologies
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Modern theories dealing with Christological problems. Readings from E. Schillebeeckx, Karl Rahner, Rudolf Bultmann, Paul Tillich, Rosemary Redford Reuther, Rita Nakashima Brock and other recent theologians. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5305 Introduction to Theology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to recent developments in understanding the theological task through the study of classical and contemporary theologians and theological movements. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5310 The Christian God: The Trinity
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A study of the experience of God as Father, Jesus and Spirit; New Testament formulations (as well as Jewish-scriptural background), Patristic development and Conciliar definitions. Medieval theological elaboration, contemporary reinterpretation and relevance. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5319 Classical and Contemporary Catholicism
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Exploration of the historic Catholic tradition from the patristic to the modern era, with special attention to the philosophical and theological foundations and implications of key beliefs, symbols, doctrines and rituals. Focus on the distinctiveness of Roman Catholicism. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5320 Modern Christian Theologians
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to the thought of some influential modern interpreters of the Christian message, Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5330 Theology of Karl Rahner
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to the thought of the man generally recognized as the greatest Roman Catholic thinker since Newman and to the theological revolution he created before and after the Second Vatican Council. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5340 Theology of Death and Resurrection
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An approach through literature and theology to the deepest of life's mysteries: the dying and rising of Jesus and of every human being. Biblical material as well as psychological and literary analogues to the experience of death and resurrection. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5370 Black Liberation Theology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Investigation of some contemporary theologies in development by people of the African Diaspora, drawing on critical race theory, gender constructions, and social analysis, as direct responses to oppression. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5380 Latin American Liberation Theology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Investigation of some contemporary theological constructions and principles in development by people in various Spanish-speaking countries, as responses to the sociocritical analysis of multiple oppressions. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5390 Ecology and Justice
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An exploration of relationships between justice and the environment, the varied religious meanings and ethical dimensions, and global connections and implications. Special application is made to ecology in the Detroit metropolitan area. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5400 Social Ethics
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A summary of approaches to the problems of social evaluation. The disciplined methods of understanding the nature, function and validity of values in socially-structured situations. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5401 Christian Ethics
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to the foundations of Christian morality in the New Testament and their later development, including contemporary theology and present-day issues and questions (nuclear war, abortion, social justice, etc.) | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5420 Political Theology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Contemporary theology in relationship to the political order. Liberation theology in its various manifestations. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5430 Ethics and Economic Theories
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
The underlying assumptions about human nature, community, and justice expressed in contemporary economic theories in light of religious, especially Christian, teaching in social ethics. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5440 Gender and Religion
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Examination, from women's perspective, of women's experience in various religious traditions. The relationship between religious definitions of women and their social status. Feminists' and womanists' critical theories relating to dogmas, traditions and ethics. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5450 Contemporary Ethical Theories
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An examination of some of the more important theories as they relate to social problems. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5470 Christian Social Thought
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
The positions of major Christian thinkers on the responsibilities of men and women toward each other, government, the legitimacy of dissent, issues of justice. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5480 Justice: Contemporary Issues and Theories
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Contemporary problems of justice in the areas of economics, law, government and international relations in relation to philosophical and religious theories of justice. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5481 Sexuality and Love in Contemporary Christian Thought
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
The nature of human sexuality and its relationship to love. Contemporary theories of psychosexual development. History of Christian teaching regarding sex. Changing attitudes toward sexuality, homosexuality, married love and celibacy. Sexuality and gender roles. Sexual love and its relationship to religious love. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5490 American Religious Social Thought
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to theologically-oriented social thought in America from colonial times to present. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5500 Religion and Psychology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Areas of intersection between religion and psychology, especially as interpreted by the psychodynamic and humanistic schools of thought. Faith development, conscience and superego, the notion of healthy human behavior, origin of the idea of God, quest for meaning, moral development. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5550 Poets, Mystics, and God
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
God as revealed to the intuitive vision of great poets and mystics, chiefly of the English tradition. Works to read include: The Cloud of Unknowing, Eliot's Four Quartets, and the poetry of G.M. Hopkins and Dylan Thomas. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5570 Spiritual Autobiographies
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A careful reading of some of the great religious autobiographies beginning with Augustine's Confessions and moving on to such 20th century giants as Gandhi and Dorothy Day, followed by an attempt to write one's own spiritual history in order to understand God's presence in one's life more clearly. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5580 Theology of the Imagination
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
A study of the process of human creativity and of the ways in which the imagination functions in religious revelation, art and literature to disclose the divine. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5590 Violence Nonviolence and Religion
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Exploration of different relationships between religion and violence through the consideration of various theories about the origins and nature of violence. This course examines the various ways in which different religious faiths have both encouraged violence and condemned it, while proposing ways of ending the cycle of violence and enabling its victims to heal. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5600 Christian Love
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Exploration of the traditional doctrines of love, agape, and caritas, and their related doctrines of grace and sin. Special attention paid to issues made by gender differences, and to recent attempts to reconstruct a model of Christian love in terms of care. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5601 Sexuality and Love in Contemporary Christian Thought
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
The nature of human sexuality and its relationship to love. Contemporary theories of psychosexual development. History of Christian teaching regarding sex. Changing attitudes toward sexuality, homosexuality, married love and celibacy. Sexuality and gender roles. Sexual love and its relationship to religious love. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5610 Modern Roman Catholic Theology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Exploration of traditional and modern Roman Catholic theology since Vatican II. Focus on the theologies of Karl Rahner, Francis Fiorenza, David Tracy, and Elizabeth Johnson. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5620 Religion and Film
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Introduction to the task of interpreting film theologically. Emphasis on the ways in which cinematographic techniques can convey religious meanings and perspectives | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5630 Religion Health and Healing
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Exploration and comparison of healing traditions in indigenous cultures with modern medical culture. Emphasis on shamanism, Jesus Christ as healer, Christian healers and their methods, and energy medicine. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5700 Sex, Race, and Class: Feminist/Womanist Ethics
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
An introduction to Christian feminist and womanist ethics. Topics may include the revisioning of love, justice, sexuality, and the common good. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5950 Directed Readings
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Readings on a selected issue or problem. Permission of instructor required. | 1 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5960 Topics in Biblical Studies
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Topics may include Parables, the Infancy Narratives or the Passion and Resurrection Narratives. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5970 Topics in Theology
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Topics may include Contemporary Christologies; Protestant Theology; Modern Christian Theologians; or the Theology of Karl Rahner. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5980 Topics in Ethics
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Topics may include Ethics and Economic Theories; Theology, Ethics and Health Care; Contemporary Ethical Theories; or American Religious Social Thought. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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RELS 5990 Master's Thesis
| Credit Hours | Recitation/Lecture Hours | Studio Hours | Clinical Hours | Lab Hours |
Students should consult chairperson for format requirements. | 3 | 0 | 0 | | |
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