Growing Understanding
Religious Perspectives of Disability Inclusion and Sustainable Education for Persons with Disability in Uganda View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Masiga Simon
The religious discourse on disability and inclusive community shapes the perceptions of the society and the debates on inclusive development and sustainable education. This paper interrogates the African religious texts and ritual practices on disability inclusion and their influence on sustainable education for persons with disability. The paper examines the historical narratives that form the religious perspectives of disability inclusion among Ugandan communities. It employs a historical critical method, interpretative phenological approach and survey method to collect and analyze data from both the field and archive sources. Historicising the religious perspective of disability inclusion is significant for the liberation, inclusion, and empowerment of people with disability to actively participate in the society. The research reveals the ways how theological and religious interpretations of disability can contribute to academic debates on inclusive education and advance the knowledge of inclusive development and sustainable education for persons with disability. It also has implications on transforming cultural perceptions and community perspectives on inclusive education.
Faith and Rhetoric in John Henry Newman: Students in the Public Forum
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Luke Patrick O Connell
This paper asserts that the primary source for opinions in the contemporary age is derived from unmediated access to popular culture we develop our first premise: that the contemporary religious student takes in facts in a fundamentally esoteric setting. An American secondary school may contribute to the fundamental and grounding elements that eventually make possible John Henry Newman’s idea of a university education, but religious, political, and literary opinions are now composed principally of ideas gleaned from the internet or social media: In a country which does not profess the faith, it (the educational institution) at once runs, if allowed, into skepticism or infidelity; but even within the pale of the Church, and with the most unqualified profession of her Creed, it acts, if left to itself, as an element of corruption and debility. If many norms established in contemporary American culture are not principled in a Jesuit manner, or faithful in the traditional sense, and if students are more pluralistic in direct proportion to growing student bodies and societal norms, then Jesuit institutions find themselves in the situation described above. The externality of ends to which a contemporary student is being fashioned is strikingly contradictory to her purpose according to John Newman and Jesuit principles of Cura Personalis. This paper seeks to establish the most effective modern pedagogical method of Eloquentia Perfecta in the tradition of educating the whole student and heart speaking to heart or Cor ad Cor Loquitor by drawing on Newman’s historical rhetorical curriculum.
The Contribution of the First Christian Preaching (1st Cor. 15, 3-5) to a New Christian Identity: A Theological Approach View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Alexandra Palantza
Paul’s presentation in Corinth is closly connected not only to the Christian preaching at the capital of the province of Achaia, but also to different religious parties in it, which claimed, that they were the unique representative of Jesus Christ. The present text of ours tries to see the first-Christian preaching in its further meaning: a) as a common base, which expresses the constant faith to Jesus Christ. He, and no one else sacrificed himself and died for people’s sins and was resurrected from the dead according to the Holy Scriptures, b) this constant faith makes a new people, not the old people of God, who were waiting to be restored among the nations, but those one, who as a whole of Gentiles and Jewish people, has been saved through Jesus’ sacrifice. This base creates a new life for anyone, who joins the Christian faith and keeps away from diversities of any kind, c) from an another point of view the Christian preaching gives the orientation of a peaceful life, full of the fruits of love, justice and Christian tolerance could offer, not the military possession under the roman troops (pax romana).
The Neglected Agents: Individuals in the Protestant Churches and the Associated Institutions in Hong Kong during the Latter Half of the Twentieth Century
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Haocheng Chen
This paper points out that the Protestant churches in Hong Kong can be regarded as a kind of special community place in Hong Kong in the latter half of the twentieth century. The study shows that normal attendees held various non-religious activities in the churches and these normal attendees obtained their self-satisfaction through their own ways. By showing the cases, this paper proves that many normal attendees were not passive but active in the Protestant churches in Hong Kong during the concerned period. Additionally, this paper finds out a special social pattern called the cultural nexus of power of the local Protestant churches to interpret the above facts appeared in the history of twentieth century Hong Kong. This cultural nexus of power made its continuous influences in the local community in Hong Kong. As such influences were very diffused by different ways, for example by the active normal attendees in the churches or by the kindergarten held by the Protestant church, it was easy for many local residents to get access to this cultural nexus of power in Hong Kong in the concerned period. And this paper also points out that such cultural nexus of power tried to influence not only the daily life of the residents in the communities in Hong Kong but also the local policy in the concerned period.
