Research Seminars

The Wesley House Research Seminars are open to all, with a particular focus on the presentation of work in progress by our postgraduate students and other scholars. They are held fortnightly and are available by Zoom for those who can not attend in person. If you wish to attend these seminars please email: office@wesley.cam.ac.uk

A list of forthcoming seminars can be found on our What’s On page.

Recordings of some past seminars can be found below.


Past Seminars

12 October 2023
Research Seminar with Ian McFarland, Robert W. Woodruff Professor of Theology, Candler School of Theology who presented on “The Problem of Christian Ethics”

9 March 2023
Research Seminar with Professor M. Fulgence Nyengele, Methodist Theological School in Ohio: “Cultivating Postcolonial Consciousness: Wesleyan Musings on African/Congolese Postcolonial Moral Suffering Using Insights from John Wesley, Frantz Fanon and Achille Mbembe”

26 January 2023
Research Seminar Dr Richard A. Davis, Director of Contextual Theology, Wesley House, Cambridge: “Decolonial Settler Theology: A Pakeha Theological Proposition”.

20 October 2022
Research Seminar
With Revd Dr Adam Ployd, Vice Principal, Wesley House – “A Methodology of Humble Listening: Entering another Theological Context” and Daniel Pratt Morris-Chapman, Research Fellow, Wesley House – “Newman Wesley and the Logic of Unity”

26 May 2022
Research Seminar
Book forum on the recent book, Young, Woke and Christian: Words from a Missing Generation (SCM Press 2022), edited by Victoria Turner. In this session we will hear from the editor and some of the chapter authors, including some Methodist authors:

  • Victoria Turner
  • Jack Woodruff
  • Anna Twomlow
  • Annika Mathews
  • Annie Sharples

28 April 2022
We were joined by The Revd Dr Richard Clutterbuck, Wesley House: “Not many of you should become teachers”: reflections on a lifetime in theological education.

24 February 2022
We were joined by Prof Anthony Reddie, Director of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture and a Fellow of Wesley House. Anthony will be presenting on “Reassessing the Legacy of James H. Cone: The Making of a Revolutionary Theologian”.

10th February 2022
Kim Cape, Fellow at Wesley House presented on “Global Methodist educational value: Is there such a thing in a world of competing values?”

Craig Wilson, PhD student, Wesley House presented on “Debating Baptism”.

27th January 2022
Dr Helen Cameron, Research Fellow, Wesley House presented on “Project Violet” 

Dr Medi Volpe, Director of Research, Wesley House presented on “Liberation Theology and Intellectual Disability: A Case Study”

2nd December 2021
Liyan Bai, Wesley House DProf student, presented on “Understanding the spirituality of local older adults who are positively engaged with life”>

Andrew Pickering, Durham University PhD student, presented on “Methodist Mission to the British Armed Forces from John Wesley to the Second World War”

18th November 2021
Dr Ryan R.Gladwin, Associate Professor of Theology and Ministry, Palm Beach Atlantic University, Florida, USA presented on “Faith Seeking Efficacy: Jose Miguez Bonino as a Wesleyan Theologian”

4th November 2021
Writing Book Reviews for Publication
Facilitated by Dr Richard A.Davis with contributions from two guest speakers: The Revd Dr Martin Wellings, Book Review Editor of Wesley and Methodist Studies and also The Revd Dr Richard Clutterbuck, Interim Editor of Holiness

21st October 2021
Obusitswe Tiroyabone, Wesley House PhD student “Context meets Context! Trajectories in African Biblical Interpretation”

Alison Waterhouse, Wesley House PhD student “An investigation of the transformative potential of spirituality in the lives of prisoners and ex-prisoners who self-identify as Christian”

7th October 2021
The Revd Dr Adam Ployd, Vice Principal of Wesley House, “The Rhetoric of Martyrdom”

The Revd Dr Paul Chilcote, Director of Global Wesleyan Theology, Wesley House “More than One Thing”

 

Thursday 23rd April 2020
Rolling dice with God: exploring theology through the lens of fantasy/sci-fi table-top gaming
As part of his sabbatical project, The Revd Tom Osborne explores ways of reflecting theologically on this hobby genre, both in terms of how theology might be expressed through gaming, and, more deeply, how gaming presents questions of substance to Christian theology.
Watch again on Vimeo

Thursday 27th February 2020
Christian doctrine without borders? Has postcolonialism undermined the concept of universal Christian teaching?
The Revd Dr Richard Clutterbuck presents a paper exploring how issues of postcolonialism impact the construction and teaching of Christian doctrine.
Watch again on Vimeo

Thursday 13th February 2020
Responsible Grace: supervision and the renewal of the body of Christ
In this seminar, The Revd Dr Jane Leach leads us through the qualitative methodology she used to research the impact of pastoral supervision in the British Methodist Church. While the research was written up into a book, A Charge to Keep, this seminar helps researchers understand how she reached her conclusions, modelling good academic, qualitative practice.
Watch again on Vimeo
Download a PDF of the presentation

Thursday 30th January 2020
Deep, Diagonal and Dynamic: visualising the theological research journey
The Revd Dr Andrew Stobart explores how to articulate what we think we are doing when we are doing theological research. While dealing with issues of methodology, the presentation particularly asks the question: ‘whose research is it?’ – what if theological research is an enquiry that God is making of us?
Watch again on Vimeo
Download a PDF of the handout

Thursday 16th January 2020
Redeeming Worship
In this seminar, The Revd Dr Stephen Plant (Trinity Hall, Cambridge) presents a section from his forthcoming book on the theology of international development. Dr Plant looks at the ways in which Christian NGOs typically connect with the worshipping life of the Church, often using liturgical resources as vehicles for fundraising and raising awareness. Instead, Dr Plant proposes reversing the polarity and using a theological understanding of worship to shed light on the work of Faith-based NGOs. Worship alone is able properly to structure the relation between time and eternity, reality and hope, in ways that reveal God’s realisation of human flourishing.
Watch again on Vimeo


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