teaching world religions

Summer Workshop 2006
Teaching the World's Religions
July 1 (evening) to July 6 (noon)
Cathedral College
Washington National Cathedral, Washington D.C.
A workshop for teachers of world religions or history

Muhammad and the Hadith (one full day and two half days)
Carl Ernst, PhD
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Carl W. Ernst, Ph. D., is Zachary Smith Distinguished Term Professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is author, co-author, or editor of a number of books and articles including Sufi Martyrs of Love: Chishti Sufism in South Asia and Beyond (with Bruce Lawrence), Teachings of Sufism, Ruzbihan Baqli: Mysticism and the Rhetoric of Sainthood in Persian Sufism , and Words of Ecstasy in Sufism. His Guide to Sufism (1997) has been translated into several languages. Ernst's most recent book is Following Muhammad: Rethinking Islam in the Contemporary World (2003).

A Jewish Literary and Theological Reading of Selected Hebrew Bible Narratives
Marc L. Raphael, Ph.D.
The first of Raphael's half-day presentations will use medieval Jewish and modern Jewish biblical commentators, and narratives from I and II Samuel and I and II Kings, to demonstrate that the biblical narrators were just as sophisticated as any contemporary author of fiction .

The Origin, Development, and Differences Among Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox Judaism
Marc L. Raphael, Ph.D. The second of Raphael's presentations will examine how all three major branches/wings/sectors of American Judaism are responses to the Enlightenment and Emancipation, and how little understood their development and differences are. Put differently, questions will be raised like "How many reforms did it take to make a synagogue Reform?"

Religious Texts / Ethical Questions
Tom Collins
Palmer Trinity School
In this session, Collins will present important Chinese and Indian religious texts that raise universal ethical issues. Teachers will gain greater familiarity with texts that can be used in the secondary school classroom, and with a method of presentation to engage students.

Buddhism: Quick Basics and a Look at Structure
Terry Ward
This presentation will use a combination of lecture, discussion, and short videos to take a quick look at the basic of Buddhism, and then a deeper look at the structures of Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana, as major developments out of the Buddha's teachings.

About the Presenters
Carl Ernst, Ph.D.
Carl W. Ernst, Ph. D., is Zachary Smith Distinguished Term Professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is author, co-author, or editor of a number of books and articles including Sufi Martyrs of Love: Chishti Sufism in South Asia and Beyond (with Bruce Lawrence), Teachings of Sufism, Ruzbihan Baqli: Mysticism and the Rhetoric of Sainthood in Persian Sufism , and Words of Ecstasy in Sufism. His Guide to Sufism (1997) has been translated into several languages. Ernst's most recent book is Following Muhammad: Rethinking Islam in the Contemporary World (2003).

Marc L. Raphael
Marc Lee Raphael is the Nathan and Sophia Gumenick Professor of Judaic Studies, Professor of Religious Studies, and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at The College of William and Mary, and Rabbi of Congregation Bet Aviv in Columbia, Maryland. He just completed a twenty-year term as Editor of the quarterly journal American Jewish History, and is now editing The History of the Jewish People in America for Columbia University Press. He is author of Judaism in America (2003), and co-editor of When Night Fell: An Anthology of Holocaust Short Stories.

Tom Collins
Collins is a CSEE curriculum consultant and frequent workshop presenter, and is one of the most progressive and best known secondary school teachers of religion in the United States. He is co-director of Religious Studies in Secondary Schools, and director of the secondary school project for the Forum on Religion and Ecology. He is currently head of the religion department at Palmer Trinity School in Miami, Florida.

Terry Ward
Ward is former Head of the Upper School at Brooklyn Friends School in New York, and co-author of CSEE's Compendium of World Religions.

Lodging Info, Registration
Cost: $975 (includes meals, lodging, and all workshop materials). Participants from the D.C. area, or who wish to arrange their own lodging: $425 (includes dinner the first evening, and lunches other days). Lodging at Cathedral College will be in single rooms, with shared bathrooms in the halls.

Note: Times, topics, or presenters may change due to unforeseen circumstances.
For a pdf version of the registration form for this event, click here.

Note: Times, topics, or presenters may change due to unforeseen circumstances.