MA in Church History by Distance Learning

This module introduces the skills and resources students will need for academic work at postgraduate level, and introduces students to methodological and theoretical issues which arise in many areas of theology and religious history. Topics to be covered include the critical use of sources, academic presentation, essay writing and research methods approaches. The assignment will require students to discuss developments in scholarship in one particular time period of church history over the last 30 years.

The module will be a close reading of four or six of the earliest Christian documents of various lengths in their entirety. The concerns of each text will be given priority rather than viewing them as sources for other thematic concerns. This will lead to an examination of how these documents bring before us the history of the earliest churches, and exhibit both their theological concerns and styles of theology. There will be close attention throughout the module to how these texts have been used in theology in the past and how they can be used in theological understanding today.

This module will examine those factors in early Christianity which led to certain documents being given special status within the communities’ worship, memory, and theological perception; how this collection of documents expanded and evolved in theological significance until it became generally accepted to be a body of ‘sacred scripture’ which was the Christian analogue of the inherited ‘scriptures’. The module will also explore the impact of the emergence of a Christian canon of theology and its significance for Christianity as a ‘lawful religion’ within the Roman empire.

This module seeks to develop core skills in historical and systematic theology with reference to a particular topic: namely, Christian doctrine and devotion concerning the Virgin Mary. The module will study the historical development of the Marian cult in Eastern and Western Christian traditions, with emphasis on its spiritual, doctrinal, and liturgical importance. It will show how Christian interest in the Virgin Mary increased in the course of the first five centuries of the Church, especially with regard to three main aspects: her central role in the incarnation of Christ, her status as a model of virginal asceticism, and her capacity to act as protector or intercessor for Christians.

This module offers students the opportunity to read most of the important Italian poet and lay-theologian Dante Alighieri’s works in translation, as well as his sources in medieval theology, philosophy and mystical writings. The cultural background in music, art and politics of the period will also be addressed. Primary texts will include the V ita Nuova (his poetic autobiography) Convivio (invitation to a philosophic banquet), Commedia (his journey to hell, purgatory and heaven) and Monarchia (political theory), and writings by Bonaventure, Thomas Aquinas, Hugh of St Victor, Bernard of Clairvaux, Mechtild, Aristotle and Dionysius the Areopagite, as well as contemporary scholarship.

Richard Hooker (1554-1600) is the great theologian of English Anglicanism. This module considers how he has helped shape the development of the Church of England’s self-understanding over the centuries. Particular attention will be paid to Hooker’s own writing – not simply the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Polity – but also his sermons, and to the many and varied ways in which these have been interpreted. The module will conclude by offering a reading of the ways in which Hooker’s work speaks directly to modern theology.

This module investigates the twin themes of revivalism and institutional ecclesiastical reform in Britain and America, with some reference to European parallels. The period covered is from the outbreak of evangelical revival in the 1730s, to the last major transatlantic revival of 1859–60. Topics include: the roots of global evangelical revival; consolidation, development and renewal within the evangelical tradition; national variations of evangelicalism, with particular reference to England, America and Wales and Catholic revivalist movements. The final units of the module are concerned with the institutional reform of the established Churches in Britain from 1730 to 1860, with a consideration of the extent to which this can be viewed as a process of revival.

This module investigates differing Christian perspectives on social questions in Britain from the end of the Napoleonic Wars to the beginning of the twentieth century. The structure is chronological, and topics include: the legacy of Malthus: Sumner, Chalmers and other political economy theologians; mid-nineteenth century crises and responses: Chartism, Irish Famine, early Christian Socialism and the Condition-of-England question; Jesus as a social reformer: nineteenth century perspectives; Christian social critique and action: Andrew Mearns, Charles Booth, William Booth; Lux Mundi and its legacy; Fin de siècle social Christianity: Cardinal Manning and the Nonconformist Conscience.

This module investigates mainland British Christianity over the course of the twentieth century. The structure is chronological, and topics include: new century, old faith: 1900–1914; the First World War and beyond: 1914–1939; disruption and revival: 1939–59; reinvention and renewal?: 1960–1975; the millennium ends: 1975–2000.

There is an emphasis on attempting to understand religion’s regional varieties in England, Scotland and Wales, but this module does not include Ireland.