Board Members
Dr. Elizabeth Harris (ENBCS President)
Hope University, Liverpool, Great Britain.
Dr Elizabeth Harris, President of ENBCS, is a Senior Lecturer in the Comparative Study of Religion within the Department of Theology, Philsophy and Religious Studies at Liverpool Hope University in England.
Prior to working at Liverpool Hope, she was the Executive Secretary for Inter Faith Relations for the Methodist Church in Britain, whilst also teaching within the Graduate Institute of Theology and Religion of the University of Birmingham and, as a Visiting Lecturer, at the University of Lund. Previous to this, she was a Research Fellow at Westminster College, Oxford. She spent over seven years in Sri Lanka studying Buddhism and completed her Doctorate in Buddhist Studies there in 1993. For two years during this period, she was Research Assistant to Dr Aloysius Pieris s.j. She has published in a wide number of areas but has a particular interest in Theravāda Buddhism, Buddhist-Christian encounter and Buddhism in Sri Lanka.
Her publications include: Buddhism for a Violent World: A Christian Reflection (London: Epworth, 2010); Theravāda Buddhism and the British Encounter: Religious, missionary and colonial experience in nineteenth century Sri Lanka, (London & New York: Routledge, 2006); What Buddhists Believe (Oxford: Oneworld, 1998); Ananda Metteyya: The First British Emissary of Buddhism (Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1998); Violence and Disruption in Society: A Study of the Early Buddhist Texts (Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society,1994)
harrise@hope.ac.uk
Current Board Members:
Prof. Dr. Perry Schmidt-Leukel
Professor of Religious Studies and Intercultural Theology at the University of Münster/Germany
Director of the Institute for Religious Studies and Inter-Faith Theology (http://egora.uni-muenster.de/rwit/index_en.shtml).
After studying Theology and Philosophy of Religion (Emphasis on Buddhist Philosophy) in Munich, he taught at the Universities of Munich, Innsbruck and Salzburg. From 2000-2009 he was Professor of Religious Studies and Systematic Theology at the University of Glasgow.
His main interest is in the fields of inter-faith relations, Buddhist-Christian dialogue, pluralist theologies of religions and – most recently – inter-faith theology. He published more than 20 books in different languages. Among his more recent publications are:
Understanding Buddhism, Edinburgh: Dunedin Academic Press 2006. (ed.) Buddhist Attitudes to Other Religions, St. Ottilien: EOS Publisher 2008. Transformation by Integration. How Inter-faith Encounter Changes Christianity, London: SCM Press 2009. (ed.) Buddhism and Religious Diversity, London – New York 2012.
perrysl(at)uni-muenster.de
Br. Josef Götz, OSB
Benedictine Abbey, D-86 941 St. Ottilien, Germany
josef(at)erzabtei.de
Dr. Sybille C. Fritsch-Oppermann
research in religious and cultural science, theologian, studied protestant theology, social science, musicology and comparative culture in Göttingen, Frankfurt/M, Munich and Tokyo, PhD (religious studies): Christian Existence in a Buddhist Context/Katsumi Takizawa and Seiichi Yagi, Reverend of the Church of Southern Hesse, special internship Ec. Institute Bossey, taught ecumenical theology and philosophy of religion at Hamburg university, several guest lectureships and classes (Heidelberg, Göttingen, Wuppertal, Paderborn, etc), Director of Studies and Director of Protestant Academies in Germany (Loccum, Rheinlande), work as political and cultural advisor, author/writer/journalist.
Special fields of interest: philosophy of religion, religious science, Buddhist-Christian dialogue, Jewish-German relations, Islam in Germany, Human Rights and International Rights, security politics and peace ethics, migration, religion and science, religion and ethics/of economics
Recent publications on interreligious/intercultural hermeneutics and Buddhist-Christian studies: Kühler Kopf und weiches Herz. Frauen in den Religionen der Welt, Hamburg 2005, Sybille Fritsch-Oppermann (Hg.), Letters to Sybilla. Ausgewählte Briefe von Mitwirkenden am interkulturellen EXPO-Projekt der Evangelischen Akademie Loccum, Loccumer Protokolle 00/99, Rehburg-Loccum 2000, Christliche Existenz im buddhistischen Kontext. Katsumi Takizawas und Seiichi Yagis Dialog mit dem Buddhismus in Japan, LIT Verlag Hamburg, Münster, London 2000 (in: Beiträge zur Missionswissenschaft und Interkulturellen Theologie, hg. von Theo Sundermeier und Dieter Becker, Band 12), Sybille C. Fritsch-Oppermann, Von der Unvernunft des Seins, der Vernünftigkeit des Handelns und der klärenden Kraft der Sprache. Erwägungen zu einer Ästhetik des Urteilens bei Levinas und Derrida, in: Benjamin Simon, Henning Wrogemann, Konviviale Theologie, Frankfurt am Main 2005, Seite 269-279, Christian Existence in a Buddhist Context. The Theology of Yagi as a Contribution to an Interreligious Hermeneutics of the Other, in: Studies in Interreligious Dialogue 13/2003/2, Seite 215-239, Trikaya and Trinity: Reflecting some Aspects of Christian-Buddhist Dialogue, in: JES Vol.30, No.2, Spring 1993, page 245-261
sybillefritschoppermann(at)web.de
Prof. Dr. Karl Baier
Professor for the Study of Religions. Institute for the Study of Religions, Vienna, Austria.
1954 Born in Landshut, Bavaria, Germany. 1976-1987 Studies at Vienna University: Ethnology and Philosophy. 1986-1993 Study of Catholic Theology at the University of Vienna. 1987 Dr. phil. (Dissertation on Romano Guardinis phenomenology and philosophy of values). 1987-1999 Assistant and later Assistant Professor at the Institute for Christian Philosophy, University of Vienna. Since 2003 Member of the Network of Buddhist Christian Studies 2000-2005 Designer and Head of a Postgraduate Course in interreligous Spirituality, University of Salzburg (Austria). Since 2004 Board Member of Polylog. Journal for Intercultural Philosophy. 2009 Habilitation at the Institute for the Study of Religions, University of Vienna (habilitation thesis “Meditation und Moderne”, “Meditation and Modernity”). Since 2009 Ao. Univ. Prof. at Vienna University (Study of Religions). Since 2010 Member of the Advisory Board of Dilatato Corde. A Journal of the Dialogue of Religious Experience issued by Monastic Interreligious Dialogue (DIMMID).
Recent Publication:
Yoga auf dem Weg nach Westen. Studien zur Rezeptionsgeschichte. Würzburg 1998.
Meditation und Moderne. Zur Genese eines Kernbereichs moderner Spiritualität in der Wechselwirkung zwischen Westeuropa, Nordamerika und Asien. zwei Bände, Würzburg: Königshausen und Neumann 2009.
Buddhistische Entsprechungen zum christlichen Auferstehungsglauben, in: gem. mit Markus Riedenauer: Die Spannweite des Daseins. Philosophie, Theologie, Psychotherapie und Religonswissenschaft im Gespräch. Festschrift für Augustinus Karl Wucherer-Huldenfeld OPraem,, Vienna University Press. V&R unipress: Göttingen 2011, 391-407.Modern Yoga Studies. Ergebnisse und Problemzonen eines jungen Forschungsbereichs, in: Bernd Jochen Hilberath; Clemens Mendonca (Hg.): Begegnen statt importieren? Zum Verhältnis von Religion und Kultur. Festschrift für Francis Dsa, Ostfildern: Matthias Grünewald 2011 (in print).Lesen als spirituelle Praxis in der Gegenwartskultur, in: Hödl, Hans Gerald, Futterknecht, Veronika (Hg.): Religionen nach der Säkularisierung. Festschrift für Johann Figl zum 65. Geburtstag, Münster: LIT 2011, 243-278.Spiritual Authority. A Christian Perspective, in: Buddhist-Christian Studies 30 (2010) 107-119 Meditation and Contemplation in High to Late Medieval Europe, in: Eli Franco (Hg.): Yogic Perception, Meditation and Altered States of Consciousness, Wien: Verlag der österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften 2009, 325-349.
Karl.Baier(at)univie.ac.at
Dr. Rose Drew
Lecturer in Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Glasgow, UK.
Since completing her doctorate in 2008, Rose has taught inter-faith studies and Buddhism at the University of Glasgow, UK, and in 2011 held a research scholarship at Uppsala University, Sweden. In addition to her academic work, she has been involved in practical inter-faith work for a number of years, working part-time for the Scottish Inter Faith Council from 2004-2006.
Rose’s research interests are predominantly in interreligious dialogue (especially Buddhist-Christian dialogue) and the theology of religions. Her recent monograph, Buddhist and Christian? An Exploration of Dual Belonging (Routledge, 2011), focuses on the question of whether, and to what extent, it is possible for an individual to be both an authentic Buddhist and an authentic Christian. Drawing on interviews with reflective individuals in the vanguard of this important and growing phenomenon, the book explores the theological and practical dimensions of this question.
Recent publications ‘Theological Truth and Dialogue: A Buddhist Christian Perspective’, forthcoming in Depoortere and Lambkin (eds.), The Question of Theological Truth: Philosophical and Interreligious Perspectives (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2012). Buddhist and Christian? An Exploration of Dual Belonging (London and New York: Routledge, 2011). ‘Christian Self-Understanding and the Question of Dual Belonging’, Current Dialogue, 51 (2011): 60-69. A German translation appears as ‘Christliches Selbstverständnis und die Frage der doppelten Religionszugehörigkeit’ in Roloff, Weise, and Zimmermann (eds.) Buddhismus im Westen (Waxman, 2011): 109-122.
rose.drew@glasgow.ac.uk
John O’Grady
teacher and part-time lecturer, (assistant webmaster of the Network), Dublin, Ireland.
Kurt Krammer
Teacher, inspector and in-service-teachers-trainer for Buddhist Religious Instruction at Austrian schools. Part-time lecturer in a cooperative course of University of Vienna and Pali and Buddhist University of Colombo. Lecturer on Buddhism at Catholic Academies in Austria and Bavaria. As the Chair of “Institut zum Studium von Buddhismus und Dialog der Religionen”, Kurt Gakuro has been involved in practical inter-religious activities for over two decades. He has been a practicing Buddhist in the Japanese Zen-tradition and over the years held a number of offices in local, national and European Buddhist organizations.
Prof. Dr. Aasulv
Lande, Lund, Sweden
Dr.Martin Rötting
Secretary of the Network
Born 1970, Martin Rötting studied religion pedagogic in Munich (Eichstätt University) and Ecumenism in Dublin (ISE, Trinity College Dublin). He worked as a religion teacher and pastoral worker in Germany and Ireland. Zen-Studies and Contempaltion in South Korea 1996/1997, PhD in religious studies 2006 at Munich Ludwig-Maximilian-University. Founder and Chairman of OCCURSO, institute for interreligious and intercultural encounter , Munich, Germany. Since 2009 referent of international and interreligious affairs at the students chaplaincy at Munich Ludwig-Maximilian-University.
Martins’s research interests are predominantly in interreligious dialogue and the theology of religions, interreligious spirituality and interreligious learning.
Recent Publications:
Religion in Bewegung. Dialog-Typen und Prozesse im interreligiösen Lernen, Lit-Verlag, Münster, 2012. Treffpunkt Weltreligionen. Praxisbuch interreligiöse Jugendarbeit. Don Bosco, München, 2010. Interreligiöse Spiritualität, Verantwortungsvoller Umgang der Religionen, EOS-Verlag, St. Ottilien, 2008. Interreligiöses Lernen im buddhistisch-christlichen Dialog, Lerntheoretischer Zugang und empirische Untersuchung in Deutschland und Südkorea, EOS-Verlag St. Ottilien 2007, zugleich Diss. LMU München 2007.
Interreligious Learning: Shaping of interreligious identity in pluralistic Europe In: Interreligious Hermeneutics in Pluralistic Europe. Between Texts and People. Cheetham, David, Ulrich Winkler, Oddbjørn Leirvik and Judith Gruber (Eds.) Amsterdam/New York, NY, 2011, X, 449 pp. Link to Rodopi.
roettingm(at)occurso.de
Raquel BOUSO GARCÍA
Junior lecturer at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona, Spain), Raquel Bouso currently teaches Philosophy of Religion at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra and is a member of the Research Group Bibliotheca Mystica et Philosophica Alois M. Haas. She obtained her PhD in Humanities with a dissertation on the notion of emptiness in the Religious Philosophy of the Japanese thinker Nishitani Keiji. She has written on Japanese Religions and the Kyoto School.
Areas of interest and research: Eastern Thought, particularly Japanese Intellectual and Spiritual Traditions; Zen Buddhism, Kyoto School, Intercultural Philosophy and Mysticism.
Recent Publications: El zen (Barcelona, Fragmenta, 2008); co-editor with James W. Heisig, Frontiers of Japanese Philosophy, 6. Cross-currents and Confluences (Nagoya, Nanzan Institute for Religion
and Culture, 2009), “La literatura japonesa en España”, Diccionario histórico de la traducción. Edited by Francisco Lafarga and Luis Pegenaute (Madrid: Gredos, 2010; pp. 620-622).
Prof. Dr. Jacques Scheuer sJ
Professor (retired) of history of religions (Asian religions), Université Catholique de Louvain,
Louvain-la-Neuve,Belgium.
Recent publication: Un chrétien dans les pas du Bouddha (coll. L’Autre et les autres, 11). Bruxelles, Lessius, 2010. 205 p.
jacques.scheuer(at)uclouvain.be
Martin Repp
Massimo Rondolino
Massimo Rondolino is a PhD Candidate in Religious Studies at the University of Bristol, UK. Born a Catholic in Italy, and now a practising Buddhist in the Tibetan tradition, he began is academic life studying philosophy, in particular Philosophy of History, Philosophy of Science and History of Science. He then journeyed, lived and worked in Nepal and in India for a few years before engaging with the academic study of Buddhism. Currently, as part of a PhD programme, he is working on a comparative study of the early hagiographies of St. Francis of Assisi and Milarepa.
Massimo’s primary interest is the study of religions as a human phenomenon and as an expression of human cultures. At present he particularly focuses on historical and literary parallelism in different religious traditions, places and times. He also cultivates a more meta-critical interest in the study of the different scholarly approaches to religions.
http://www.bristol.ac.uk/arts/gradschool/pgrdirectory/theology.html
http://bristol.academia.edu/MassimoRondolino
m.rondolino@bristol.ac.uk