Rice Early Christianity
Research Seminar
Graduate students who are working with me at Rice participate every semester in the Rice Early Christianity Research Seminar. This seminar is a research work group that collectively studies the literary and material remains of the ancient Christians, attempting to reconstruct an accurate history of Christian Origins. To do so, the Seminar knows no canonical boundaries and lends no ear to Christian apology.
We study Christian history within various geographical locations, mapping its diversity and its interaction with indigenous religions and populations. Foremost, the Seminar acknowledges the normative struggle through which Christianity formed, a struggle that marked some early groups as "heretics" (who were not so in their time) and drew boundaries to limit Christian religiosity. To understand the complexity of the origins of Christianity, the heretic must be resurrected alongside those who defined the normative.
Seminar members work to publish quality work collaboratively as well as individually.
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| Orthodox Icon of Thomas, Photo by DeConick |
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