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Interfaith Fellows Engaging Religious Diversity Certification Program
Earn up to four micro-credential badges: Interfaith Scholar, Interfaith Practitioner, Interfaith Leader, and Interfaith Champion
The Jay Phillips Center is dedicated to advancing Interreligious Studies (IRS) and fostering Interfaith Engagement (IFE) by providing students with opportunities to grow as scholars, engage with religious diversity on campus and in the community, and develop the skills to be leaders in various civic, professional, and community contexts. The Interreligious Research Grants and Interfaith Fellows Engaging Religious Diversity Certification Program are two such opportunities, among others.
The Jay Phillips Center offers two robust programs for students to study interreligious relations & engage with religious diversity while building their skillset to lead in a religiously diverse world.
Earn up to four micro-credential badges: Interfaith Scholar, Interfaith Practitioner, Interfaith Leader, and Interfaith Champion
100-hour paid research grant to investigate interreligious relations and encounters
Key Personnel:
Dr. Hans Gustafson, IRF Cohort Coordinator, Director of the Jay Phillips Center and Adj. Professor in Theology, College of Arts & Sciences, hsgustafson@stthomas.edu
Laura Bru, Program Manager, Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP), Center for Student Achievement, laura.bru@stthomas.eduListening to Love: An Inquiry into Interreligious Racial Justice Work Occurring within the Twin Cities
Majors: Psychology and Justice and Peace Studies, Minors: Family Studies and Interfaith Leadership
Project: Utilizing storytelling as a powerful tool for social change, this projects strives to listen to the stories of various religious leaders working towards racial justice within the Twin Cities and document the collective narrative of the city. Mentor: Michael Klein (Justice & Society Studies)
The Coronavirus Pandemic and Religious Engagement: Mapping Interfaith Leadership in the Cedar-Riverside Neighborhood
"Ye krik? Ye krak!" A Narration of Caribbean Identity through Interreligious Stories
Key Personnel:
Dr. Hans Gustafson, IRF Cohort Coordinator, Director of the Jay Phillips Center and Adj. Professor in Theology, College of Arts & Sciences, hsgustafson@stthomas.edu
Laura Bru, Program Manager, Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP), Center for Student Achievement, laura.bru@stthomas.eduInfluence of Muslim Philosophers on Duns Scotus' Christian Philosophy of God
Majors: Philosophy and Classical Languages, Minors: Theology
Project: This project examines the influence of Muslim philosophers Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) on the Scholastic Christian thinker John Duns Scotus, with a special focus on his philosophy of classical divine attributes. Mentor: Gloria Frost (Philosophy)
Editing for the Abrahamic God: An Ethical and Religious Case for using CRISPR at the Embryonic Stage
Majors: Biology, Minors: Chemistry
Project: This project investigates how Jewish, Christian, and Muslim thinkers and scientists utilize their tradition’s sacred texts in determining ethical approaches and responsibilities for the use of gene editing tools such as CRISPR on adults, children, and embryos. Mentor: Kerri Carlson (Biology) and Paul Wojda (Theology)
A Religious Rendezvous: The Encounter of Jamaican Hindus and Early Rastafari
Majors: Actuarial Science, French, Minors: Interreligious Studies and Comparative Theology
Project: This project explores the contact and exchange of the long-standing Hindu community in Jamaica with the early Rastafari movement and how its spiritualities contributed to the historical formation, and contemporary actualization, of the Rastafari concept of IyanI (“I and I”). Mentor: Ted Ulrich (Theology). Dissemination: paper presented at Regional American Academy of Religion Virtual Conference (4 Apr 2020).