[pt] A presente pesquisa se propõe a investigar o modo como o problema do Mal é abordado em grande parte do chamado Catolicismo Midiático brasileiro. Este conceito abarca as expressões do movimento carismático que, nas últimas décadas, começaram a se utilizar dos meios de comunicação para ampliar o raio de alcance da sua ação evangelizadora. A partir desse alcance, essa vertente do catolicismo brasileiro oferece consolo e uma proposta de Salvação diante dos males experimentados por milhões de brasileiros e de brasileiras. Além disso, tendo presente a atual conjuntura eclesial, a pesquisa leva em conta o momento novo vivido pela Igreja Católica com o pontificado do Papa Francisco. Este deseja fomentar uma reforma da Igreja em chave missionária, a fim de que a instituição eclesiástica redescubra, como sua função primordial, o anúncio e o testemunho da Salvação integral em Jesus Cristo. Sendo assim, após uma análise históricosociológica do processo de modernização do campo religioso brasileiro (o que permitiu o surgimento do Catolicismo Midiático), bem como dos textos selecionados produzidos por essa religiosidade e que são objeto da pesquisa, o estudo pretendeu também analisar criticamente o material coletado à luz da teologia do Papa. O objetivo é investigar as contribuições e contradições do Catolicismo Midiático para a proposta de Salvação anunciada pelo Papa Francisco, além de apresentar alternativas que permitam uma maior colaboração com o seu pontificado. / [en] This research focus on investigating the way that the problem of Evil is conducted in the largest part of what is called Brazilian Media Catholicism. This concept embraces the expressions of the charismatic movement that, in the last decades, have begun to use the means of communication to expand the reach of its evangelizing action. From this point of view, this aspect of the Brazilian Catholicism offers comfort and an idea of Salvation against the evils experienced by millions of Brazilians. Furthermore, according to the current ecclesial situation, the research takes into account the new moment experienced by the Catholic Church with the pontificate of Pope Francis. This man wishes to encourage a reform of the Church in a missionary way, so that the ecclesiastical institution can rediscover, as its main role, the proclamation and witness of whole Salvation in Jesus Christ. Therefore, after a historical-sociological analysis of the modernization process of the Brazilian religious field (which allowed the emergence of Media Catholicism), as well as the selected texts produced by this religiosity and which are the object of research, the study also intended to critically analyze the material collected in the light of the pope s theology. The goal is to investigate the contributions and contradictions of Media Catholicism to the Salvation proposal announced by Pope Francis, besides presenting alternatives that allow for greater collaboration with his pontificate.

A study of Imāmī Islamic law, gender and soteriology; marriage and divorce as technologies of the self. / This dissertation explores marriage in Muslim Imāmī juristic law as an embodiment of a set of practices that are aimed at cultivating the pious and virtuous self. As a ritual practice for mainstream Imāmī jurists, marriage (and its corollary activities, e.g. sex) was a mode of pietistic self-fashioning and hence a technology of the self. When faced with the strong possibility or inevitability of marital breakdown, and the sexual sins that may have come about as a result of this breakdown, Imāmī jurists opted for creating a space for women’s prerogative to divorce in which the marriage could end whilst still upholding Islam as a program for the circumvention of sin and the production of īmān. Divorce, in this sense, can be thought of as a safety mechanism and extension of marriage’s program for the nurturing of a pietistic psychology in men and women. The textual and gendered discourse of juristic law was therefore aimed at creating a legal program for individuals so as to maintain the normative Muslim’s ontological bond with God through a series of regulations, disciplines, bodily practices and juristically permitted gendered power inversions that promoted soteriological success. This study argues that the primary concern of Imāmī jurists was not to maintain a gendered hierarchy as the current dominant scholarship holds, but to prevent sin, especially zinā, the corruption of the qalb (metaphysical heart) and ultimately avoid damnation in the Hereafter. For Imāmī jurists, marriage was not just a procedural practice of rights and duties, but a mode of self-development and a platform through which an eschatological battle against sexual sin and the Devil took place in. When patriarchy, or more specifically, asymmetrical power relations between (actual/potential) wives and husbands (or guardians) conflicted with the soteriological aims of juristic discourse, the former was inverted. The study concludes that maintaining gender hierarchy was not integral to the cosmology of juristic practice (even in its premodern discourse); it was maintaining the normative believer’s ontological bond with God and saving him/her, as well as the believing community, from damnation. Theological concerns for salvation - and the cultivation of the pious self that made salvation possible – is what animated Imāmī juristic discourse and not patriarchy whether it was obtained from the source-texts (Qur’an, ḥadīth) or social custom (ʿurf). This study undertakes this task by observing six key areas in the Imāmī tradition where notions of salvation and spiritual ontology in marriage/divorce figure the most prominently: juristic preliminaries on marriage and zinā, interfaith marriage, prepubescent marriage, temporary marriage with zānīyahs, nushūz and khulʿ divorce. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

Thesis advisor: Christopher R. Matthews / Thesis advisor: Matthew Monnig / Much previous scholarship approaches Luke’s narrative of God’s salvation in Jesus as either salvation history or practical-apologetic history. Some Lukan scholars, like Robert C. Tannehill, Ernst Haenchen, Ben Witherington III, and Jack T. Sanders, argue that Luke offers an anti-Jewish interpretation of the gospel. They say that the inclusive nature of the gospel of Christ narrated in Luke-Acts implies a discontinuity with the Jewish origins of early Christianity. The problem under view in this study is the neglect in Lukan scholarship of the portrayal of diversity, universality, and inclusion among the Christ-believers in Luke-Acts. The literary approach to studies of Luke-Acts has not given enough attention to Luke’s implied audience as an ethnically diverse and inclusive Christ-believing group. This study asks how one navigates the relationship between ethnicity and inclusivity in the Lukan narrative of early Christian groups in Luke-Acts. This work performs a literary analysis of key pericopes—Luke 1:46-56, 67-79; 2:8-14, 29-32; 4:16-30; 7:1-10; and Acts 2:1-13; 10:1–11:18; 15:20, 29; 28:1-31—to discover Luke’s theological views regarding an ethnically diverse and inclusive Christ-believing group. My dissertation argues, from a literary perspective, with attention to ethnic reasoning and the Greco-Roman context of the late first and early second centuries CE, that Luke’s implied audience offers a good fit with an ethnically diverse and inclusive Christ-believing group that nurtures continuity with the God of Israel’s saving plan for all peoples, Jews and non-Jews alike. Luke’s narrative theology of God’s saving plan for the inclusion of Gentiles into the people of God connects with a/the “Jewish” story that is shown in Luke’s continuing interest in things “Jewish.” In this way, Luke shares a “Jewish” faith in that the God of Israel offers salvation to everyone by giving each a place in Christ as they relate together and fellowship in love. It demonstrates that Luke’s Christ-believing theology is a cosmopolitan Jewish “Christian” theology that is inclusive of Jews and Gentiles. It shows that in Luke-Acts, Jesus and the witnesses to his gospel are employed by Luke to build and consolidate a Gentile-inclusive Hellenistic Jewish Christ-believing theology. The rivalries among particular Jews and their fellow Jewish Christ-believers, and between Jewish Christ-believers and people of other ethnicities within the fold of Christ-believers, are expressions of sibling rivalries that reflect different perspectives of the Jewish way of life and other social, cultural, and ethnic differences. This does not create a structural dichotomy between positive early Christ-believers and negative non-Christian ethnic groups. This is important because, through Luke’s narrative, my work demonstrates the interconnection between ethnic diversity and inclusion among Christ-believers in Luke-Acts. In addition, this kind of separation is dubious because this dissertation does not presume a split between Judaism and Christianity at the time of Luke. My contribution shows that Luke’s indicators of a universalistic theology of ethnic inclusion do not deny interest in “Jewish” practices throughout Luke-Acts. My main point is that, for Luke, early Christ-believers were ethnically diverse and inclusive. Although some were Jews in the diaspora, they were also Greeks or Romans; they spoke like devout Gentiles who interacted with them. There were also Gentile Christ-believers who upheld and practiced the Jewish faith in Christ and recognized Jesus as the Spirit-anointed Messiah. It is precisely in this that Luke establishes his universalistic and inclusive theology of Hellenistic Jewish “Christian” faith in Jesus, the Lord and Messiah. This study concludes that Luke’s universalistic theology is grounded in Jewish ethnicity. Luke portrays in literary terms a form of Jewish Christ-believing ethnicity that constructs access for Gentiles to become part of the “Jewish” people of God. Therefore, Luke’s literary portrait of ethnicity can be viewed as broad, constructed, and ever-changing. The issue of Jewish identity in Luke-Acts can be seen from a constructivist perspective that opens up the Jewish ethnicity to include people of other ethnicities. Thus, Luke constructs his Jewish Christ-believing ethnicity universally and inclusively without ascribing negativity to particular ethnic heritages. An attractive hypothesis is that Luke writes in the context of a group that mirrors the mixed believers of the narrative. Contrary to some scholars, this work insists that Luke’s stories do not portray an anti-Jewish interpretation of the gospel and its spread. It affirms that a mere narrative analysis of Luke’s two books is insufficient to understand Luke’s theological narrative and rhetoric in Luke-Acts. Paying attention to the social context and situation portrayed within the narrative, Luke’s work shows that his Christ-believing way is participating in some form of “Jewishness.” When one considers the social framework of ethnic diversity and inclusion, however, one finds that it is precisely in the inclusion of Gentiles that continuing interest in things “Jewish” is upheld and legitimated. In this way, Luke demonstrates through his narrative a relationship between Christian origins and ethnic diversity. Based on my findings, the idea of a Lukan replacement theology is untenable because Luke’s theological narrative and rhetoric of sharing the gospel with Gentiles shows a continuous participation in Jewish life and practice. Furthermore, the scholarly dichotomy between Christian universality and Jewish particularity should be discarded because it is inattentive to the complex process of social belonging and identity construction. Using subtle rhetoric, Luke’s universalistic and inclusive perspective is expressed in literary and rhetorical terms without communicating that non-ethnic “Christian” universality is better than ethnic “Jewish” particularity. This implies that scholarly investigation into Jews and Jewish things, as well as other particular ethnicities in Luke-Acts, requires considering Luke’s theological narrative, literary and rhetorical interests, and social situation. This study proposes a way of reading Luke-Acts that considers the complexities and social circumstances reflected in the narrative of the two books and their intertextual connection. / Thesis (STD) — Boston College, 2024. / Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry. / Discipline: Sacred Theology.

This thesis will focus on the oppression and genocide towards the ethnic minority of the Rohingya in Rakhine state of Myanmar. The interest is upon the ways in which Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) utilizes discourse around national liberation, security and vulnerability to communicate with the international community about the oppression that the ethnic minority in Myanmar faces. In order to explore and understand the ways in which ARSA has communicated with the international community the social media platform X is utilised for a discourse analysis. The findings of the thesis are that the most common discourses that can be found in ARSA’s X output is connected to national liberation and identity.

Die vorliegende MTh-Dissertation ist eine missionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung, welche ausge-hend von primären Quellen die Anfangsgeschichte der Heilsarmee und deren Mission im Basel-biet von 1887 bis 1901 erforscht. Die Heilsarmee war eine Bewegung, die missionarisch ausge-prägt offensiv tätig war. Im ersten Hauptteil wird ihre Anfangsgeschichte chronologisch in drei Phasen dargestellt: Pionier-, Repressions- und Etablierungsphase. Im zweiten Hauptteil wird sys-tematisch deren Mission analysiert und erörtert. Der Fokus liegt einerseits auf der konkreten Mis-sionspraxis, gefragt wird aber auch nach den missionstheologischen Überzeugungen, welche den missionarischen Aktivitäten zugrunde lagen. Die Dissertation zeigt die Hintergründe einer offen-siven, anfänglich primär auf das ‚Seelenheil‘ zielenden Missionspraxis der Heilsarmee und auch die damit verbundenen Probleme, welche sich in Ablehnung, Widerständen und staatlicher Re-pression äußerten. Es wird auch gezeigt, wie die Heilsarmee zunehmend ein ganzheitliches Heils-verständnis und eine Missionspraxis entwickelte, welche den ganzen Menschen vor Augen hat: Seele und Leib. Dieser ganzheitliche Ansatz von Mission verhalf der Heilsarmee zu zunehmender Akzeptanz / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M.Th. (Missiology)

Die vorliegende MTh-Dissertation ist eine missionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung, welche ausge-hend von primären Quellen die Anfangsgeschichte der Heilsarmee und deren Mission im Basel-biet von 1887 bis 1901 erforscht. Die Heilsarmee war eine Bewegung, die missionarisch ausge-prägt offensiv tätig war. Im ersten Hauptteil wird ihre Anfangsgeschichte chronologisch in drei Phasen dargestellt: Pionier-, Repressions- und Etablierungsphase. Im zweiten Hauptteil wird sys-tematisch deren Mission analysiert und erörtert. Der Fokus liegt einerseits auf der konkreten Mis-sionspraxis, gefragt wird aber auch nach den missionstheologischen Überzeugungen, welche den missionarischen Aktivitäten zugrunde lagen. Die Dissertation zeigt die Hintergründe einer offen-siven, anfänglich primär auf das ‚Seelenheil‘ zielenden Missionspraxis der Heilsarmee und auch die damit verbundenen Probleme, welche sich in Ablehnung, Widerständen und staatlicher Re-pression äußerten. Es wird auch gezeigt, wie die Heilsarmee zunehmend ein ganzheitliches Heils-verständnis und eine Missionspraxis entwickelte, welche den ganzen Menschen vor Augen hat: Seele und Leib. Dieser ganzheitliche Ansatz von Mission verhalf der Heilsarmee zu zunehmender Akzeptanz / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / M.Th. (Missiology)