Research areas
A summary of our main areas of research is provided here. The Theology Research webpages provide more comprehensive details about current research projects. Details on individual staff research interests and publications can be found on the Theology staff profiles pages.
These broad headings indicate some of the main areas where our work is focused:
- Religion and ethics in public life
- Biblical studies and biblical interpretation
- Christian theology and the learning church
- Philosophical reflection and aspects of human life
Current and recent research projects
We have a successful track record in attracting funding for a variety of research projects advancing debates in Theology and Religion and contributing to our knowledge of important interdisciplinary topics, with a recent focus on:
- Uses of the Bible in environmental ethics
- Exploring formation for ministry in a learning church
- The church and climate change
- Texts of land, sea and hope
- Vegetarianism as a spiritual choice in historical and contemporary theology
Research centres
Centre for Biblical Studies
- Uses of the Bible in Environmental Ethics
- Texts of Land, Hope and Sea
- The Roles of Ancestor Veneration in Biblical Land Claims (British Academy) 2007-2008
- Publication of Pre-Islamic Incantation Bowls (British Academy, 2009). Dr Siam Bhayro is collaborating with a team of scholars in Israel, under the supervision of Professor Shaul Shaked (Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Religion, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem).
- Louise Lawrence, "Sensory Impairment in the New Testament and Biblical Interpretation" (British Academy Small Research Grant, 2009-2011, to support research activity leading to a monograph for an OUP series entitled Sense and Stigma: Refiguring Sensory Impaired Characters in the Gospels.
- Cherryl Hunt is currently engaged in a research project funded by Bible Society to evaluate the progress and outcomes of their Pathfinder programme, which is being run within a small group of churches of different denominations.
Centre for the Learning Church
- The church and climate change (Dr Michael W. DeLashmutt, supported by the Nuffield Foundation)
- Exploring Formation for Ministry in a Learning Church (Dr Michael DeLashmutt, St Luke's College Foundation, 2007-2010)
- Texts of Land Sea and Hope (Louise Lawrence; SWMTC; 2006-2009)
Network for Religion in Public Life
Areas of particular interest include:
- Religion in public life
- Cultural diversity, belief pluralism and political theory
- Global human rights discourses
- Legal and theological perspectives on natural law
- Social and political co-operation between faith communities
- The common good in theology, philosophy, ethics and political science
- Religion and pragmatism
- Public reasoning in democracies
- Theologies of forgiveness in political contexts
- Religious freedom and the law
