Villanova University Theology and Religious Studies Dept.

03/02/2026

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Jennifer Jackson!

For this we celebrate Jennifer Jackson, ThD, associate teaching professor of Theology and Religious Studies, for receiving the Grace Adolphsen Brame Trust award. This award is given for excellence in teaching Christianity in history, spirituality studies, and/or women in religion and society—a recognition Dr. Jackson describes as deeply meaningful.

“Dr. Adolphsen Brame’s life and work reflect deep and abiding commitments to the reintegration of theology and spirituality and to transformative teaching marked by inclusive pedagogies,” says Dr. Jackson. She adds that the award, designated through a gift from the Adolphsen Brame Trust, truly reflects the values of Villanova, a community she is proud to teach and learn in.

Dr. Jackson’s scholarship centers on friendship studies, which she sees as at the heart of spiritual life. In her course Spirituality of Friendship, she engages students with friendship as a lens that stretches from popular culture to rigorous interdisciplinary scholarship.

This year, Dr. Jackson also received a fellowship through Villanova’s McNulty Institute for Women’s Leadership for her project “Integrative Friendship: Retrieving and Illuminating Women’s Contributions, Past and Present.”

“It is a collaborative interdisciplinary project that retrieves and illuminates women’s contributions to understandings and practices of friendship across historical, cultural and disciplinary lines,” explains Dr. Jackson. This spring, she looks forward to inviting colleagues across the University to share their insights and contributions to this ongoing work.

02/16/2026

The fifth Annual Graduate Student Peace & Justice Symposium, co-sponsored by the Center for Peace and Justice Education, was held from February 12-13, 2026.

The event featured 43 graduate students from 23 universities across North America, Europe, Asia, and Africa. The program began on Thursday with a fascinating plenary presentation from Dr. Stephanie Wong who discussed her research on the Catholic Church in wartime China. Friday included a full day of student panels, which focused on interfaith bridgebuilding, care for creation, concepts of peacebuilding, resistance and hope, vulnerability, women’s empowerment, youth, responsibility, racial justice, and interpretations and translations of peace.

Over one hundred and twenty attendees participated in the symposium, both in-person and virtually. Other contributing faculty included Dr. Kerry San Chirico, Dr. Mark Graham, Dr. Vincent Lloyd, Dr. Kathryn Getek Soltis, and Perdian Tumanan. The graduate student presenters included Hoa Nguyen, Guinevere Keith, Kate Giancatarino, and Sam Odidi.

The sixth Annual Symposium, which will again be co-sponsored by the Center for Peace and Justice Education, the Catholic Relief Services Partnership, and the Augustinian Institute, is tentatively scheduled for February 2027.

02/03/2026

The department gathered in Picotte Hall on Friday to celebrate their outstanding accomplishments in 2025 including books, chapters, published articles, invited lectures and awards.

Let's congratulate this special group on a tremendous year!

01/12/2026

We are so happy to have everyone back on campus today!

12/18/2025

A little Throw Back Thursday as BOUNDLESS brings us back to last Fall when our students and faculty took a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Rome. Little did they know, they would be face-to-face with our future Pope!

12/16/2025

Best wishes to Augustin Kassa, SMA who completed his PhD in Theology this month!

“My doctoral research at Villanova culminates in a comprehensive vision of catholicity as cosmic reality – a framework enabling us to live as mystical Christians and conscious citizens of an interconnected universe,” says Augustin. “By integrating ancient wisdom (Ma’at), African cosmo-philosophy of Ubuntu, contemporary science, and diverse religious traditions, my studies and research in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies allowed me to articulate, and develop an intellectual and spiritual resource for addressing fragmentation – theological, philosophical, epistemological, ecological, and social – that threatens human flourishing in the 21st century and beyond.”

12/11/2025

We are proud to announce two PhD students will be graduating this month. Today we highlight Jillian Langford.

Jillian's research explored the relationship between youth formation, process theology, and the evolutionary spirituality of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Her dissertation developed a Teilhardian pedagogy and a full curriculum for middle school youth that integrates faith, science, and reflective consciousness in the learning process. Jillian had the special opportunity to use her curriculum with young people in New York City before the colloquium, seeing the opportunities and limits of her work.

After graduation, Jillian will continue her ministry as the Associate Director of Education and Formation and the Minister for Children and Families at The Riverside Church in New York City, where she develops programs, curriculum, and spiritual formation opportunities for young people and their families.

Congratulations, Jillian! May your future be filled with happiness and success!

11/25/2025

PhD students Paola Pruett-Vergara and Angela Lopez-Egea Vives joined TRS faculty Dr. Héctor Varela Rios and Dr. Tim Brunk in Rome this fall for the conference "Refugees & Migrants in Our Common Home: Mobilizing Academic Communities for Action." The conference reunited more than 200 participants who discussed the role of Catholic higher education in immigration and refugee support. Dr. Stephanie Wong participated virtually at the conference as well.

During the conference the group attended a private audience with Pope Leo XIV, where he discussed the challenges of refugees in higher education and the important role of the conference. This was the first Villanova group to meet with Pope Leo!

11/06/2025

We live in a synthetically contrived world. From our lived environments, to the foods we eat, to the air we breathe, to the water we drink – all bear witness to the remarkable ways in which we can synthesize compounds that improve the quality of our lives. Yet they also bear witness to the dark side of our technological ingenuity, as they often are tainted by invisible environmental toxicants, which contaminate the bodies of everyone, especially the most vulnerable. William Kuncken, who is currently writing a major work on environmental toxicants, will provide an exposé of this dark and disquieting world as well as a Christian moral analysis of this phenomenon.

10/30/2025

With the support of a four-year, $1.25 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc., Theology and Religious Studies faculty the Rev. Christy Lang Hearlson, PhD, and Timothy M. Brunk, PhD, lead the Children, Liturgy, Ecology and Renewal (CLEAR) Project, an initiative that gathers scholars, musicians, church leaders and school leaders to spark important work on children, worship and ecology.

As part of the project, musicians from diverse Christian traditions composed 18 original songs designed to be suitable for children and sung by congregations. On Oct. 7, 2025, the CLEAR Project presented Singing with Creation, a free concert for the community at the John and Joan Mullen Center for the Performing Arts featuring these new hymns and gospel songs written and performed by David and Laura Ash, Gene and Fatima Burke, and Phil McMillan, and liturgical dancer Betsey Beckman.

The event invited the audience to lift their voices in group singing, celebrating faith, ecology and connection through music.

Listen to the Singing with Creation album:

https://clearproject.bandcamp.com/album/singing-with-creation

10/29/2025

The Fall 2025 TRS Graduate Colloquium was a success!

We were fortunate to have Iconographer, Nick Papas join us and create an icon during his visit which he has generously donated to the university. We also welcomed Matt Milliner from Wheaton College for our keynote lecture.

Thank you everyone who was in attendance and those who participated in the planning.

Watch the icon come to life here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOO49A6LjuU

10/28/2025

This month, the Villanova TRS department convened a Synodality Symposium, bringing together 15 distinguished scholars. Facilitated by Dr. Jaisy Joseph and Dr. Stephanie Wong, the group delved into the Final Document of the Synod on Synodality, "For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, Mission," with rich discussions exploring the legacies of Vatican II and culminating in a focused look at paragraph 67, which discusses the theologian's role in a synodal church. Our heartfelt thanks to Dr. Catherine Clifford and Dr. Massimo Faggioli for their powerful insights and to Dr. Kathryn Getek Soltis for leading a meaningful Conversation in the Spirit.