Conferences

For those who missed the recent conference:  Receptive Ecumenism and Ecclesial Learning: Learning to Be Church Together, Ushaw College, Durham, 11th-15th January 2009, a virtual conference has now been posted on the web.  Follow the link by clicking here, or alternatively go to the conference page and click on the right had tab entitled Receptive Receptive Ecumenism and Ecclesial Learning: Learning to Be Church Together. 

A full program of the events is given, downloads of many of the parallel papers, and a limited number of audio links for the pleanary speakers.  Full recordings of the plenary lecutures are available from www.agapeministries.co.uk

Receptive Ecumenism and Ecclesial Learning: Learning to Be Church Together

Just short of 200 church leaders, theologians, national and international ecumenists, church officers, organisational experts, and local church practitioners gathered together at Ushaw College, Durham, last week, 11-15th January, to embrace and take forwards a new contribution to the ecumenical movement that has been developed by staff of the Department of Theology and Religion at Durham University.

The department was recently ranked as the top department for research in theology and religion in the UK, according to the recent Research Assessment Exercise.

Building on the work of an acclaimed originating conference in January 2006 and complemented by a major innovative regional comparative research project in Receptive Ecumenism and the Local Church, the Receptive Ecumenism and Ecclesial Learning conference drew representatives of fifteen different ecclesial traditions together, accompanied by a Jewish philosopher, Prof. Peter Ochs of the University of Virginia, to focus on the explicitly self-critical, receptive question as to ‘What can we and what need we learn with creative integrity from our others?’

This second Receptive Ecumenism International, held in conjunction with the annual gathering of the Ecclesiological Investigations International Research Network, was again organised and jointly hosted by the Centre for Catholic Studies, Durham University and Ushaw College, the Roman Catholic seminary for the north of England.  Alongside an anonymous trust, other partner bodies and sponsors included: Churches Together in England, the Diocese of Durham, the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle, the Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches, the Jerusalem Trust, the Northern Synod of the United Reformed Church, One in Christ, the Society for Ecumenical Studies, and The Tablet and The Pastoral Review.

Amongst the delegates from four continents and twenty-one countries were eight Roman Catholic bishops, including the new Bishop-elect of Hexham and Newcastle, Canon Seamus Cunningham, in his first public engagement as such, two Anglican bishops, a Greek Orthodox Metropolitan and Archimandrite, the Directorate of the Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches, the Directorate of Churches Together in England, and official representation from the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity bearing an endorsing opening message from the Council’s President, His Eminence Cardinal Walter Kasper.

In his opening message, read by Monsignor Mark Langham, Cardinal Kasper spoke for the fourth time in public of Receptive Ecumenism as offering ‘a new way forward on our ecumenical path.’  For their part, Rev. Dr David Cornick, General Secretary, and other staff members of Churches Together in England spoke enthusiastically of their desire to integrate the thinking and strategy behind Receptive Ecumenism into their core activities, even extending to the possibility of producing both a practical handbook for Receptive Ecumenism and the Local Church and a scripture-based small group resource pack to promote the practice of breaking the Word together as a privileged place for encountering and receiving of one another’s gifts in our own respective brokenness.  Similarly, Dr John Gibaut, Director, and Dr Tamara Grdzelidze of the Faith and Order Commission, spoke of the significance of Receptive Ecumenism as a complementary strategy in service of their common aims and of their intention to present the strategy to the next plenary assembly of the Faith and Order Commission in Geneva in October 2009 with a view to incorporating it into their work.

In due course, Receptive Ecumenism and Ecclesial Learning: Learning to Be Church Together will issue in a second major volume of essays to complement that deriving from the originating January 2006 colloquium, Receptive Ecumenism and the Call to Catholic Learning: Exploring a Way for Contemporary Ecumenism, Paul D. Murray (ed.), (Oxford: OUP, 2008).

The Program of the event can be accessed here.
 

Abstracts for the Parrallel Paper/Workshops can be accessed here.
 
 
Recording of the plenary papers can be purchased from Agape Ministries.

A collection of photos can also be viewed at Flickr

From 11th-15th January 2009 the second international Receptive Ecumenism conference will take place, Receptive Ecumenism and Ecclesial Learning: Learning to Be Church Together.  As in 2006, this by invitation event is being organised and jointly hosted by the Centre for Catholic Studies and St. Cuthbert’s Seminary, Ushaw College, Durham and will again take place at Ushaw.  This is being done in association with Churches Together in England, the Ecclesiological Investigations International Research Network, the Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches, One in Christ, the Society for Ecumenical Studies, and Focolare UK (tbc).  Sponsoring assistance has thus far been received from Churches Together in England, the Diocese of Hexham and Newcastle, Durham University, the Jerusalem Trust, the Northern Synod of the United Reformed Church, One in Christ, Ushaw College, and an anonymous trust. 

The core aims of the conference are:

1. to focus attention on the fresh ecumenical strategy that Receptive Ecumenism represents in order to subject it to critical scrutiny and to explore its potential for further development;
2. to explore the implications of the receptive ecumenical question – ‘What can we and what need we learn from our others for the sake of our further flourishing?’ – in relation to a broad range of Christian traditions;
3. to explore the on-the-ground relevance of Receptive Ecumenism at the level of local church life. 

The January 2009 conference will issue in a second major volume of essays to complement that deriving from the January 2006 colloquium: Receptive Ecumenism and the Call to Catholic Learning: Exploring a Way for Contemporary Ecumenism, (Oxford: OUP, 2008).  The event will gather 200 invited church leaders, ecclesial officials, theologians, and ecumenists (both those operating at national and international levels, and those operating at the level local church) from across the world.  Should you be interested in receiving further information about this event, please contact Dr Marcus Pound, Deputy Director of the Centre for Catholic Studies, at m.j.p.pound@durham.ac.uk

A colloquium in dual celebration of the establishment of the Durham Centre for Catholic Studies and the Bede Chair of Catholic Theology

8th-10th May, 2008
Department of Theology and Religion
Durham University

Speakers include: Tina Beattie, Gavin D’Costa, Eamon Duffy, David Ford, Paul Griffiths, Karen Kilby, Michael Kirwan, S.J., Paul Lakeland, Nicholas Lash, Gerard Loughlin, Andrew Louth, John Milbank, Francesca Murphy, Paul D Murray, Peter Phillips, Marcus Pound.

For details of the recent event, including the opening speeches, a selection of papers, program of events, and photographs, please click here.