Drew Theological School
3 Seminary Hall
Drew University
Madison NJ 07940
current contact: Laurel Kearns
Curriculum
Core Courses for M.Div students:
The following core courses at Drew Theological School contain sections that deal with conceptions of creation/nature, eco theology, and eco-justice/environmental issues: Hebrew Scriptures, New Testament, Religion and the Social Process, Systematic Theology, The Church at Worship, and Church History I
Several Cross-cultural courses, such as ones to Guatemala, the Four Corners, and Appalachia integrate environmental awareness and economic issues from a perspective of and eco-justice.
Elective courses, taught both for Theological School and Graduate Division of Religion students:
*Dr. Catherine Keller, Professor of Constructive Theology, users.drew.edu/ckeller/
author of Face of the Deep: A Theology of Becoming and Apocalypse Now and Then: A Feminist Guide to the End of the World , co-editor of Eco-spirit: Religions and Philosophies for the Earth, as well as many relevant articles, such as “No More Sea: The Lost Chaos of Creation” in Christianity and Ecology. She also has a sermon included in Earth and Word, ed. David Rhoads.
teaches several courses related to environmental issues, including Creation and Chaos, and In/Spirit: Trinity, Ecofeminism, and the Pneumatological Turn as well as several with relevant content: Process Theology, Feminist Theology, Pneumatology: Spirit Bodies Spirit Spaces, and Constructive Theology: Creation and Apocalypse
*Dr. Laurel Kearns, Associate Professor of Sociology of Religion and Environmental Studies, http://users.drew.edu/lkearns/
co-editor of Eco-Spirit: Religions and Philosophies for the Earth, as well as several articles, such as “ The Context of Eco-Theology” in Blackwell Companion to Modern Theology and "Saving The Creation: Christian Environmentalism in the United States," Sociology of Religion 57,1 (spring 1996):55-70 as well as a sermon in Earth and Word, ed. David Rhoads..
regularly offers several elective courses focused specifically upon environment and religion, such as Religion and the Earth and Christianity and Ecology, as well as relevant content in several other courses: Contemporary Theories in the Sociology of Religion, Religion and Social Change and US Religious Landscape.
Dr. Robert Corrington, Professor of Philosophical Theology,users.drew.edu/rcorring/
author of Nature and Spirit: An Essay in Ecstatic Naturalism, and Nature's Self: Our Journey from Origin to Spirit, and several others.
teaches courses such as Philosophies of Nature andNature, God, and the New Cosmology as well as relevant content in other courses.
The following faculty regularly have relevant material in their seminars.
Dr. Hyo Dong Lee
Dr Heather Elkins in Liturgical Studies
Dr. Stephen Moore in New Testament,
Camp & Retreat Certification courses:
Theology and Ecology of Common Ground
Developing Environmental Education and Resources
Biblical Foundations of Camp/Retreat Ministry
Drew also offers a Doctor of Ministry program on Environmental Ministries and Ecological Spirituality.
Graduate Division of Religion: a specific focus on ecological issues is possible in the Ph.D and M..A. programs. To date, 15-20 students have studied with Drs. Keller, Kearns, and Corrington.
Campus and Community Involvement
The Drew Theological School frequently hosts conferences and special speakers on topics related to the environment. These include the annual Ground for Hope conference, which is open to people within and without of the Drew community. This interfaith conference combines one or two key speakers with several seminars on topics of environmental concern as well as an interfaith worship service.
Conferences
Greening the Church for the Next Millennium, Oct, 1999. guest speakers: Bill McKibben, Cal DeWitt, Karen Baker Fletcher, John Cobb.
"Humanity on the Edge: Religion and Science in the Next Century" November 1999. (co-sponsored with Partners for Environmental Quality,
Ground for Hope 1, Sept-October 2005 co-sponsored with GreenFaith. Guest Speakers: Rosemary Radford Ruether, Jay McDaniel, Mary Evelyn Tucker.
--The volume EcoSpirit: Religions and Philosophies for the Earth is the result of the first 4.5 day Ground for Hope conference. For details go to http://depts.drew.edu/tsfac/colloquium/2005/ .
Ground for Hope II, April 2007. co-sponsored with GreenFaith. Guest speakers: Larry Rasmussen and Peggy Shepard.
Relevant Speakers at Drew since 1999.
Larry Rasmussen, author of Earth Ethics, Earth Community
Rosemary Ruether, author of Gaia and God, and Integrating Ecofeminism, Globalization and World Religions
MaryEvelyn Tucker, Forum on Religion and Ecology, author of Worldly Wonder, Religoins Enter Their Ecological Phase
Jay McDaniel, author of With Roots and Wings: Christianity in an Age of Ecology and Dialogue and Living from the Center: Spirituality in an Age of Consumerism.
John Hart, author of Sacramental Commons: Christian Ecological Ethics; What Are They Saying About...Environmental Theology?
Anna Petersen, author of Being Human: Ethics, Environment and Our Place in the World and Seeds of the Kingdom: Utopian communities in the Americas
Anne Primavesi, author of Sacred Gaia: Holistic Theology and Earth System Science, and Gaia’s Gift: Earth, Ourselves and God.
Dan Spencer, author of Gay and Gaia: Ethics, Ecology and the Erotic
John Grim, Forum on Religion and Ecology, author The Shaman: Patterns of Religious Healing Among the Ojibway Indians, and co-editor of Worldviews and Ecology
David Wood, author of Time after Time and Econstruction: The Implausible Convergence of Environmentalism and Deconstruction
Karen Baker Fletcher, author of Sisters of Dust, Sisters of Spirit: Womanist Wordings on God and Creation.
Mark Wallace, Finding God in the Singing River: Christianity, Spirit, Nature.
Bill McKibben, author of The Comforting Whirlwind, The End of Nature, and organizer of Step-It-Up
Cal DeWitt, former president of Au Sable Institute and author of Earth-Wise: A Biblical Response to Environmental Issues
John Cobb, author of Is it Too Late? , For the Common Good (with Herman Daly)
Matthew Sleeth, author of Serve God, Save the Planet
Rebecca Gould, author of At Home with Nature
Elizabeth Johnson, Quest for the Living God: Mapping Frontiers in the Theology of God
Sharon Betcher, author of Spirt and the Politics of Enchantment
Marion Grau, author of Of Divine Economy: Refinancing Redemption:
Anne Daniell, author of Incarnating theology in an estuary-carnival place: New Orleans in the Pontchartrain Basin
Gary Gardner-WorldWatch Institute, author of Inspiring Progress: Religions' Contributions to Sustainable Development.
Activist Speakers:
Fletcher Harper, exec director of GreenFaith
Mike Schut, formerly of Earth Ministry, author of Food and Faith, Simple Living…..
Tanya Barnett, formerly of Earth Ministry, author of Greening Congregations Handbook
Sister Miriam McGillis, Genesis Farm
Peggy Shepard, WE ACT, Harlem, NYC
Isabel Carvalho, “Lived Worlds: Self and Justice in the Brazilian Environmental Movement”
John Seed, Rainforest Information Centre, Australia
Randy Wilson, Coalfield Delegation to the UN and Kentuckians for the Commonwealth?
Michael Nelson, AME Zion Church representative to the National Council of Churches Eco-Justice Working Group.
Campus Sustainability Initiative
As part of a university wide initiative, Drew Theological School’s faculty, administration and students have always been actively involved on recycling, food, energy, grounds, buildings and purchasing issues related to sustainability. Dr. Kearns is on the steering committee for those efforts. Students and faculty specifically at Drew engage in environmental actions and awareness in multiple ways. These include recycling and printing assignments front-and-back on recycled paper or on the back of previously-used sheets of paper. The Theological School hosts a coffee shop/study area, the Cyber Café, which offers Fair Trade Certified coffee and ceramic mugs as a substitute for Styrofoam coffee cups. Every year the students and faculty put on an eco-chapel, usually in the springtime on or close to Earth Day. Students and faculty occasionally participate in local political actions, such as the Step It Up campaign of 2007, a nationwide campaign to demand that the U.S. legislature pay more attention to ecological issues.
Student involvement
Students have organized an extra-curricular student group on campus, TERRA, to raise awareness of and take action on ecological issues in the Theological School, in the churches, and in society. The blog is located at http://terrasagrado.blogspot.com. The Theological School occasionally collaborates with activities sponsored by the Drew College of Liberal Arts (the undergraduate program) student environmental groups and Environmental Studies faculty, such as showing the films “The Great Warming” and “An Inconvenient Truth” as well as the annual Fernfest, which plants native species on campus to return it to a more genuine forest-like state.
Drew Theological School is connected to GreenFaith, an interfaith organization based in New Brunswick, New Jersey. “GreenFaith inspires, educates, and mobilizes people from diverse religious backgrounds to deepen their relationship with the sacred in nature and to take action for the earth” (http://www.greenfaith.org/). Students are able to do an internship with GreenFaith, or with local “green” congregations.
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