Sarah Coakley, the Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity at Cambridge University, will deliver three lectures during the School of Theology’s 2015 DuBose Lectures. On Sept. 23 and 24, Dr. Coakley will present "Return to Sacrifice? Reconsidering Sacrifice in Systematic Perspective," in the University of the South’s Guerry Auditorium.
The DuBose Lectures are open to the public and are free of charge, made possible by the DuBose Lecture Fund.
Dr. Coakley is a systematic theologian and philosopher of religion with wide interdisciplinary interests. She is currently engaged in the writing of a four-volume work in systematic theology, the first volume of which (God, Sexuality and the Self: An Essay 'On the Trinity') was published in 2013. Her related apologetic work spans the divides between natural science, social science, and philosophy of religion. In her writings for the church she is especially concerned with the tight connection of spiritual practice, asceticism, and contemporary theories of gender and race.
In addition to her systematic theology, her recent publications include Powers and Submissions (2002), Re-Thinking Gregory of Nyssa (2003), Pain and Its Transformations (2008), Re-Thinking Dionysius the Areopagite (2009), The Spiritual Senses (2012), Evolution, Games and God (2013), and The New Asceticism (2015). The second and third volumes of her systematics are in progress as a diptych that covers the topics of theological anthropology, sin, and atonement.
The 2015 lecture schedule is as follows:
Sept. 23, 9–10:30 a.m., Lecture 1: "Return to Sacrifice? Biblical and Historical Mandates for a Messy Metaphor"
Sept. 23, 1:45–3:15 p.m., Lecture 2: "Repressing Sacrifice? Freudian and Feminist Critiques in a Modern Era"
Sept. 24, 9–10:30 a.m., Lecture 3: "Rescuing Sacrifice? The Irreducible Significance of Sacrifice in a Théologie Totale"
The annual DuBose Lectures, hosted by the School of Theology, feature prominent theologians from around the world and are based on the lectures given by William Porcher DuBose in 1911. Beginning in 1871, DuBose served the University of the South for more than 37 years in various positions and is widely regarded as being the most influential American theologian of the Episcopal Church.