LFU:online

Students will learn, starting from a traditional subject area of Christian theology

1. to deconstruct the subject-object dualism of the modern word-picture

2. assess the significance of the engagement with spiritual forces in the tradition of Christian spirituality 

3. to rediscover pre-modern sources of Christian spirituality and theology for our present time

In the last twenty-five years scientific research on embodied cognition has led to two groundbreaking insights: 1. emotions, volitions, thoughts, and memories are neither located in the brain, nor are in autonomous control over our mental movements. 2. Our mental activities are always embedded in an embodied, simultaneously natural and cultural environment that is charged with meaning. These insights are compatible with holistic, relational concepts of embodied intelligence in the premodern Christian tradition. What are the implications of this paradigm-shift for our understanding of ‘external’ spiritual forces such as angels and demons? This seminar will engage with this question starting from exemplary classical and contemporary primary text and related secondary sources on angels and demons in the biblical, patristic and medieval tradition.

Readings, discussion, paper presentations

essay (3000 words)

Serge-Thomas Bonino, Angels and Demons: A Catholic Introduction (Washington D.C.: Catholic University Press of America 2016)

None.