Thesis advisor: Jane E. Regan / Internet-mediated communication is undoubtedly shaping our culture, especially the way we access, gain, produce, share and understand information. The Internet, a vast resource of content is also taking form as a social communication network, where online content mediates the presence of people animating this network, who are accessing, contributing to, sharing and connecting over information. This movement toward the social web has significant implications for the way we go about communicating, sharing knowledge and making meaning as a whole, giving way to an overall more participatory culture, both on and offline. Commissioned to go and proclaim the Good News to the world, the Church continues to hold the communication of the faith as one of its essential tasks. This cultural shift in communication thus demands the attention the Church, presenting new opportunities and challenges for its evangelizing mission, while inviting a greater dialogue between evangelizing faith and digital culture. This dissertation engages the Church in this dialogue, focusing especially on what the present cultural shift wrought by Internet-mediated communication may mean for the theological foundations of communication in divine revelation, and the practice of the transmission of revelation in the context of the catechetical ministry. The dissertation offers a theological and ministerial foundation for exploring Internet-mediated communication, and the ways it may continue to evolve and shape our culture. To narrow in scope my investigation of the Church's dialogue with Internet-mediated communication, the dissertation approaches the Church's evangelizing mission as an expression of the theology of revelation concretely exemplified in catechesis, the religious education process concerned with facilitating conversion to Jesus Christ. This process of catechesis fueled by the theology of revelation encounters the socio-cultural phenomenon of Internet-mediated communication as its context. For the greater dialogue between the evangelizing faith and digital culture, all three of these elements, the theology, the ministerial process and the socio-cultural context receive careful analysis. After exploring each of these three constitutive elements, the dissertation suggests new directions and possibilities for revelation and catechesis in light of this dialogue. Chapter I introduces Internet-mediated communication and describes its relevance both from an ecclesial and socio-cultural perspective, focusing especially on the Church's clear intention to take social communications media seriously, as articulated through a series of ecclesial documents. Chapter II investigates the theology of revelation and Chapter III examines catechesis, and both of these chapters highlight the particular dynamic of communication operative in both revelation and catechesis as one that emphasizes both relational presence and informational content. Chapter IV on Internet-mediated communication also continues to address this dynamic of communication, offering both revelation and catechesis a new model for integrating the relational and the informational in one process of communication. Chapter V concludes the dissertation by exploring the theological and ministerial implications of this integrated model of communication that the Internet as social network offers, while suggesting new directions especially for the practice of catechesis. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2011. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Theology.

Thesis advisor: James T. Bretzke / Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2014. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Sacred Theology.

Speakers: Michael Buckley, SJ, Michael Himes, Mary Ann Hinsdale, I.H.M.; Convenor: Nicholas Lash

Thesis advisor: Thomas Stegman / Thesis advisor: Liam Bergin / Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2014. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Sacred Theology.

Thesis advisor: André Brouillette / Thesis advisor: Margaret Eletta Guider / Modern Rwandan history is indubitably linked to the history of the Catholic Church in Rwanda. Contemporary historians agree on the fact that Bishop Classe is an indispensable historical figure in that shared history. They differ however when it comes to the interpretation of his role. This thesis aimed to show the impact of Classe’s decisions on the Catholic Church in Rwanda and above all its indigenous clergy, as an entity that belonged to the pioneers of modern Rwandan intelligentsia which was likely to influence the rest of the people. It has also sought to understand the influence of Catholic clergy, on traditional Rwandan society, colonial Rwanda, and Rwanda as an emergent, independent nation. / Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2018. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Sacred Theology.

本文嘗試分析馬克斯·舍勒在現象學視野之下對於天主教神學和社會思想的詮釋來探索天主教會在資本主義和世界大戰等現代性文化的壓力之下真正有效的自我更新方式。舍勒運用現象學的思維方法，通過強調經驗的自身性特徵，論述發生式的意義生成和反應-對抗式的意義生成之間的差別，恢復了天主教在批判精神和確證精神之間的平衡，這與新經院體系、圖賓根天主教學派、新托馬斯主義等流派在純然適應或純然對抗的極端思維中理解天主教會與現代社會關係的做法非常不同，也幫助天主教會克服了"保守-激進"的二元論思維的束縛。具體而言，本文將從以下四個方面論述舍勒的天主教思想：1）從知識社會學的角度分析舍勒對宗教更新的本質、宗教知識的文化學特徵以及宗教世界觀的情感結構的論述，總結出公教精神以自身性的原初性思維對抗實證性思維的過程，以及天主教的整體性文化特徵和貴族主義的情感基調；2）從政治現象學的角度分析舍勒的基督教民主、基督教社會主義、基督教自由等理念，尤其是他以態度民主代替情緒民主、以先知性論述社會主義的原始精神、以意志自由和能力自由的區分來論述宗教自由絶對意義的做法，從而用天主教的宗教視角審視了現代政治文化的弊端；3）從社會學的角度分析舍勒以共感而不是以同情為基礎的宗教集體主義，並將之作為天主教在一戰之後乃至於整個現代社會中帶有尖銳批判性的社會學貢獻，並依此建構天主教會戰後理想的和平理念和社會建設的任務；4）從倫理學的角度分析舍勒如何從時常被鄙棄的情感性、身體性等直觀生命經驗中找出先驗的價值奠基力量，並以之作為與在禁慾和縱慾的極端力量牽引之下的現代資本主義倫理殊為不同的自然倫理學的基礎。最後，本文還將比較舍勒與二十世紀中期的天主教新神學運動和梵二神學的論述，指出舍勒的現象學方法中所體現出來的現實主義和人類學轉向，是與天主教神學從梵一會議到梵二會議的歷史演變邏輯一致的，因而會為天主教會未來的發展帶來更多潛在的借鑒意義。 / This thesis mainly focuses on how German philosopher Max Scheler applied his special phenomenological perspective to penetrate into the self-renewal of the Catholic Church and its social teachings under modern society context, including capitalism and World War etc. Scheler, who emphasized the self-given and realistic characters of experience, distinguished the original-given mode from the counter-react mode in the process of constructing meanings, and rehabilitated the balance of introspective self-criticism and extrovertly instructive confirming of catholic spirit. This phenomenological perspective of Scheler is regarded as a sharp distinction from other Catholic schools like the Catholic Tübingen School, the Scholasticism in the 19th century and later, the Neo-Thomism, as their understandings of the self-renewal of the Catholic Church were somehow guided under the extremism-oriented romantic idealism or authoritarian ideology. To some sense, Scheler’s method actually gave an end to the ongoing historical debate of the "conservatism-liberalism" or "nominalism-realism" dualism, and widened the horizon to approach the understating of real "one": ecumenism. For details, this thesis will analyze Scheler’s phenomenological method in understanding the self-renewal of the Catholic Church with four sections: 1 ) from the dimension of sociology of knowledge, an analysis of Scheler’s interpretation of the essence of the evolution of religious knowledge, its social cultural characters and "its inherent emotional structure as well; an comparing study of religious self-givenness with positivism, and also an comparing study of Ganzheit knowledge and Sammlung knowledge, with which the Christian aristocratism will be drawn and discussed; 2) from the dimension of political phenomenology, an analysis of Scheler’s conceptions of Christian democracy, Christian socialism and Christian freedom, from which the difference with electoral democracy, Marxist socialism, and left-wing liberalism and the special religious narratives of the Catholic Church in political fields will be given; 3) from the dimension of sociology, an analysis of Scheler’s religious collectivism on the basis of empathy rather than sympathy, this kind of collectivism was saturated with phenomenological intentional theory and was carried forward in the proposing the after-WWI re-construction tasks for the Catholic Church by Scheler; 4) from the dimension of ethics, an analysis of Scheler’s percipient contentions on the a-priori ethical value of some long-disdained conception, like body and emotion, by giving a laudatory reconsideration to which, Scheler criticized asceticism or the erotic-individualism-oriented capitalistic ethics. In total, Scheler concentrated the unique value of the Catholic Church in breeding the personal and social ethos with its special religious spirit which is quite similar to the orient wisdom from China. Lastly, this thesis will also draw a comparison between Scheler and the theologians in the Nouvelle Théologie Movement in the middle of the 20th century in order to conclude that the realistic and anthropological turn in Scheler’s phenomenological method was actually identical with the theological development from the Vatican I council to the Vatican II council, so Scheler’s phenomenological understanding of self-renewal of the Catholic Church and its social teaching would potentially shed more light on its future development. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / 李晶. / Parallel title from added title page. / Thesis (Ph.D.) Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2016. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 195-210). / Abstracts also in English. / Li Jing.

The thesis sets out to examine the debate on national identity and immigration in Italy. It analyses whether Italy, in reacting to immigration, is following any classic model of integration of foreign citizens following the example of countries such as Britain and France, or whether it has developed an alternative long-term strategy more adequate to its own situation. It also questions whether the debate on immigration has triggered a discussion on the renegotiation of the meaning of national identity, in order to make it more inclusive of minority identities within the country. The thesis traces the debate as it emerges in the public sphere. It identifies the main actors involved, and analyses the rhetoric used by the leading voices to put forward their respective views and claims. It aims at providing a picture of the discussion within each group as well as investigating the relationship between different actors, their alliances and the dissent they express. The role of three main actors taking part in the discussion is explored in detail, namely Italian intellectuals, the Catholic Church and the Northern League. It addresses their role in shaping public opinion and influencing the state policy-making on immigration. Through the final analysis of Italian legislation, the thesis concludes that Italy is moving towards the construction of a highly exclusive identity, where the idea of integration does not feature.

While a woman’s identity is constructed on multiple sites, it is the Catholic Church which constructs, regulates and ascribes meaning to the life of the Catholic Nun. In this thesis, which adopts a Foucauldian and feminist approach, an examination of six important Church texts relating to Nuns‟ lives identifies three dominant discursive constructions of Nun, namely the Nun as called by God, to sacrifice her life, and to work for the Church in its mission. Individual and focus group interview data from a sample of 43 Nuns in Australia and New Zealand is examined for ways in which Nuns negotiate such constructions in their experience of being Nuns. The Church’s discursive truths of what it is to be Nun, learnt during the process of subjectification of the Novitiate or training process, continue to be taken up by Nuns in this study. Functioning as the Institutional Self, they position themselves as docile Church women, loyal to the Church and its mission. However, they also resist the Church’s truths and material practices for their lives, functioning as the Individuated Self, a self refusing to be regulated by such truths and material practices laid down by the Church. Nuns in this study show evidence of adopting fluid positioning, functioning neither wholly as Institutional Self nor as Individuated Self, since they give accounts of both taking up and resisting the Church’s constructions of Nun. However, it is in the position of resistance that they contribute to the creation of new notions of what it is to be ‘Nun’, namely the Nun as an autonomous woman, exercising personal agency in her life, and working not necessarily for the Church, but for the poor and the marginalised in the world. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This research is documented in three volumes, and is the study of a series of three Doctoral exhibitions. The first of these, Australian moon over Cumbria and the procession of life, evolved from a series of watercolours based on the biblical figures of Eve and the serpent.The volume contains images and a critique from Australian moon over Cumbria. Also included are images that influenced the work, essays, and information on relevant minor exhibitions. The second, Sisters and spinsters, the Misses Swann of Elizabeth Farm, was designed and executed as site-specific.The Misses Swann were nine sisters, and the exhibition focused on the sisters' working lives, their contribution to their local communities, and their personalities.Needlepoint and damask table napkins were used as vehicles for the storytelling.Critical writings and extensive reference material are included. The third in the series, Constructing identity within Catholicism, was based on the hypothesis that images of the culture of Catholicism have the capacity to influence personal identity. All of the work was designed to complement the design and spiritual meaning of the chapel. Included along with the essays are supporting images and documentation. / Doctor of Creative Arts

Thesis (J.C.D.)--Catholic University of America, 1918. / "Indice de materias": p. [3] p. bound between p. 96-97. "Bibliografia": p. [89]-90.