Title
Pentecostalism and the Academy
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2005
Abstract
The main thesis of our book Scholarship and Christian Faith: Enlarging the Conversation(Oxford University Press, 2004) is that the work of research, writing, creative activity, and teaching undertaken by Christians in the academy connects to faith in many different ways. There is no one model that works for everyone. Instead, each of us will develop his or her own style of Christian scholarship based on the life questions our experiences have encouraged us to ask, the specific faith traditions that have informed our Christian confession, the ways we have been mentored into our different academic disciplines, and the varied places where we teach or present our work as scholars, artists, and experts in our fields.A subsidiary theme is that Christian scholarship should be characterized by hope rather than by pessimism. This is God’s world, and we as scholars have the awesome and wonderful task of trying to understand God’s good creation. Our first job is not the drudgery of defending Christian faith from the attacks of the secular academy. Defense and debate may be needed on occasion, but our first task is constructive: How do we as Christians participate as hopeful peers alongside others in the scholarly effort to make sense of, manage, and enjoy the world in which we live?Christian faith calls us to be hopeful, and so does the present state of higher education, which is more open to questions of meaning, purpose,faith, and spirituality than has been the case for many years.
Recommended Citation
Jacobsen, D. and Jacobsen, Rhonda Hustedt, "Pentecostalism and the Academy" (2005). Psychology Educator Scholarship. 16.
https://mosaic.messiah.edu/psych_ed/16
Comments
Originally published as:
Jacobsen, D., & Jacobsen, R. H. (2005). Pentecostalism and the academy. Pneuma, 27(1), 106–109. https://doi.org/10.1163/157007405774270374