Topics: The History, Beliefs and Practices of Christianity

Catalog description

This course is designed to provide an introduction to the history, beliefs and practices of Christianity. Special attention will be paid to Christianity in its contemporary context as a global religion. The organization of the semester will be historical. By locating Christianity in its historical and cultural contexts, we will be able to ask, throughout the class, what have been the continuities in Christian belief and practice, and what has changed over the centuries? How have Christians responded to new contexts, new pressures, and new privileges through history? In the focus on global Christianity, we will consider how Christians have adapted to quite different cultural contexts and how Christians in very different positions of political power have responded to the great issues of the modern world.