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Sarum Summer School 2023: Texts and the Christian Tradition

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About|Details|What our students say|Tutor(s)|Related short courses

Home Short Courses Bible & Sacred Texts Contemporary Spirituality Theology, Imagination & Culture Sarum Summer School 2023: Texts and the Christian Tradition

About the Sarum Summer School 2023: Texts and the Christian Tradition course

Come to Sarum College for a week of deep exploration of a specific text as it relates to the Christian Tradition.

This is an opportunity to have a week study break in the beautiful Salisbury Cathedral Close, where residential participants enjoy full board, access to the library and to the pattern of liturgy at Salisbury Cathedral. During the week, you will engage critically with the text using particular lenses to enable deeper consideration of its meaning, significance, impact and longevity for the Christian spiritual tradition, its adherents, and/or the wider cultural context.

In 2023, the module will focus on ‘The Life of St Francis’ by Bonaventure (also known as the ‘Major Legend’) composed in the first years of the 1260s.

This course will examine this specific text, the lives of Francis and Bonaventure, and their impact in the following eight centuries.

This course will focus in-depth on events and theologies present in ‘The Life’ and examine how such themes can inform theological conversations today.

Our lecturing team, and the topics covered, includes:

Dr Michael Hahn on the lives of Francis of Assisi and Bonaventure, the construction of the ‘Lives’ or ‘Legends’ about Francis, and methodologies of how to work with medieval hagiographies (or ‘Legends’) as theological sources.

Dr Hahn on key themes in ‘The Life’ such as conversion, visual re-creation of Christ’s life such as the creche at Greccio, and Francis’s reception of the stigmata

Br Samuel Double, co-author of Seeing Differently and frequent lecturer on Franciscan spirituality, teaching on themes of nature in ‘The Life’ and other early Franciscan texts, and how this relates to Franciscan approaches to ecology today

Professor Donna Trembinski of St. Francis Xavier University, author of the award-winning Illness and Authority, will be teaching on the themes of disability and trauma in Francis of Assisi’s life and in a range of the early legends about him

Dr Eleanor McLaughlin will be leading sessions on academic skills and on writing essays for this module

Dr Joost Joustra, the Howard and Roberta Ahmanson Research Curator at the National Gallery and Visiting Lecturer in Theology and Religious Studies at King’s College London is the curator of many exhibitions, including the 2020 exhibition Sin – which led to his book Sin: The Art of Transgression, and the 2023 (May-July) exhibition St Francis of Assisi. Dr Joustra will be leading sessions on Francis and art, the role of ‘The Life’ in Giotto’s famous frescoes, and the creation of the 2023 National Gallery exhibition.

 

Sarum Summer School auditors are participants who learn alongside postgraduate students but are not required to complete an essay or earn academic credit.

What does it mean to audit a course? 

Joining this course is an opportunity to have a study break in the beautiful Salisbury Cathedral Close, where residential participants enjoy full board, access to the library and to the pattern of liturgy at Salisbury Cathedral.

Whether it’s cultural events, sightseeing (Stonehenge is nearby for example) or shopping — there’s plenty to do if you’d like to extend your stay the weekend before and after the course. For ideas, visit Salisbury Cathedral Close attraction websites to see what’s on Sarum’s doorstep. Visit the Wiltshire Creative website to view events at nearby Salisbury Playhouse and the Salisbury Arts Centre. The Experience Salisbury website has an excellent city-wide listing of forthcoming events around the city.

Need financial assistance? View our list of grantmaking trusts

Enrolled students also may attend teaching weeks for modules in addition to the modules which they are studying for credit, by permission of the Programme Leader. Student rates for hospitality costs during a teaching week in 2022 were: £250 (en-suite), £200 (standard) and £60 (non-residential), along with an educational fee of £125 per booking. The audit fee and hospitality prices are reviewed annually with any changes effective from 1 July.

Details

Dates & Times

10 - 13 Jul 2023
Day 1 - Starts at 2pm, Day 2 & 3 - Full days, Day 4 - finishes 2:30pm

Location

Sarum College

Category

Bible & Sacred Texts
Contemporary Spirituality
Theology, Imagination & Culture

Tutor(s)

Dr Eleanor McLaughlin
Dr Michael Hahn
Guest Tutors

Course code

2779

Other Notes

Sarum Summer School is an opportunity to enjoy the Salisbury Cathedral Close setting while you immerse yourself in the selected text. In 2023, the text is The Life of Francis of Assisi by Bonaventure.

Tickets will be available in early 2023.

What our students say

Netflix, Theology and Pastoral Practice

Peter Butchers on his MA in Theology, Imagination and Culture student experience

How do cultural tropes, like those found in Black Mirror, help bridge the gap between what academic theology espouses and what the everyday Christian believes? In his research as a student on the MA in Theology, Imagination and Culture, Peter Butchers explored platonic philosophy, digital theology and eschatology, and pastoral practice around death and dying.

Read more 

Rewarding Sabbatical Stay

The Revd Greg Syler, is Rector of Ascension & St. George’s, Resurrection Parish in the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, DC USA, spent part of his ministry sabbatical at Sarum College in spring 2022.

His account of the experience begins: ‘I loved spending nearly three weeks of my ministry sabbatical at Sarum College earlier this year.

Not only did I rest, and rest well in the comfortable care of the Sarum College staff, I experienced very significant renewal and fresh insights.’

Read more

The Road Not Taken

Sarum Graduate Mike Truman

January 2022

Five years ago, I told my Warden of Readers that I would not be renewing my licence when it expired in 2019, as I thought my faith was becoming too unorthodox for a Church of England licensed lay minister. As someone who knew me well, she challenged me to actively explore what I did still believe. Thus started the journey that ended last August with the dissertation completing my MA in Theology Imagination and Culture (MATIC) at Sarum College.

Read more 

Clergy Study Breaks

The opportunity for clergy to get away occasionally from their own context, to have an overnight stay in the beautiful setting of Sarum College and all that the Salisbury Cathedral Close offers is hugely valuable. All the clergy I have suggested who have spent 24hrs at Sarum College have benefit greatly from the experienced mentoring where they can talk, reflect, think, plan and pray.

The support and encouragement they receive is excellent and has a positive on their on going ministry. This is something the Diocese of Rochester encourages and supports financially in preparation for their clergy preparing for Extended Ministerial Development Leave (Sabbatical).

— Canon Christopher Dench, Diocese of Rochester Director of Formation and Ministry

Retreats and Private Stays

When I arrived, exhausted and sensitive, I was grateful not to be asked by Reception were I came from, whether I had had a good journey etc. That was the kind of hospitality I needed: a non-intrusive welcome that was found in ancient cultures and still survives in some societies today, where the host asks questions about a stranger and his journey only when the visitor has rested and been given food and drink.

— guest on a private stay

Biblical Study Breaks

I just found it very refreshing – as a leader of a church I don’t get as many opportunities to step out and do courses (my fault, not the church!) and so I loved it. I think it was run really well online – which is a difficult medium to work with.

Pádraig Ó Tuama (pictured) was outstanding in his balance of getting us to engage and sharing his learning. Also the quick availability of resources provided by Sarum College Librarian Jayne Downey was excellent.

— course participant, Story Theology: Narrative Approaches to Scripture

Tutor(s)

Eleanor-McLaughlin

Dr Eleanor McLaughlin

Programme Leader for Postgraduate Programmes in Theology, Imagination and Culture

Dr Michael Hahn

Programme Leader for Postgraduate Programmes in Christian Spirituality

Guest Tutors

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