Description

Aiming to advance understanding of religion and theology, the Luce Foundation’s Theology Program currently gives special attention to work that rethinks what theology is and reimagines its contemporary significance; to research that creatively examines received assumptions about religion, secularity, and public culture; and to projects located at the intersections of theological inquiry and the multidisciplinary study of religion. While not every funded project attends in equal measure to these broad programmatic emphases, many of the program’s recent grants have focused in some fashion on one or more of them, and we anticipate that work being conducted with support from recent and current Theology Program grants will substantially inform strategic refinements of the program’s core emphases and specific goals.
 
The proposed special grant to Harvard Divinity School would support a project crossing all three of the emphases outlined above. The project begins with a dual recognition: over the last few decades, the study of the secular has blossomed as a transdisciplinary field of scholarship; and, at least in part in conjunction with this intellectual and institutional growth, there has been increased interest in the study of religion, and in practices of theological inquiry, on the part of scholars working in a wide variety of fields and disciplines. Attention to the place of theology in the university is not new, but the topic is being pursued with renewed vigor and creativity in some parts of the academy today. Deepening understanding of a rising academic interest in the study of the secular is one way to grapple with the current place of—and future prospects for—theological inquiry and religious studies in American research universities.
 
With the express promise of informing contemporary debates and scholarly possibilities, the proposed project is decidedly historical in orientation. Based at HDS, its work will cross multiple units at Harvard and draw in leading scholars from a range of institutions. Two conferences will be held, leading to the production and publication of an edited volume. The project enjoys the solid support of HDS Dean David Hempton, and will be led by a trio of more junior scholars, with guidance and engagement from senior scholars at Harvard and elsewhere. 
 
Harvard Divinity School was among a small number of institutions invited to submit a full proposal in the 2018 round of the Luce Fund for Theological Education. The Luce Fund proposal submitted by HDS will be formally declined this month. It is unrelated to the special grant proposal currently under consideration.