MCU Conference 2006

Passion for Justice:

Global and Faithful Perspectives on Human Sexuality

Tuesday 11 - Friday 14 July 2006
High Leigh Conference Centre
Hoddesdon, Herts, UK

Organized in collaboration with the Centre for the Study of Christianity and Sexuality and the Student Christian Movement.

Conference Chair: Prof Elaine Graham

Samuel Ferguson Professor of Social & Pastoral Theology,

University of Manchester

The conference aims to provide new resources and opportunities for a wide-ranging debate on the challenges facing Christian sexual ethics in to­day's world.

• How can the biblical tradition be retrieved from fundamentalism?
• How can the institutional church be more inclusive?
• What are the implications of the commercialization of sex?
• How should relationships be forged in the 21st century?
• What of the global context and the HIV pandemic?

The 2006 MCU conference will address these issues with the help of keynote speakers and guided group discussion.

Befriending the Tradition

Christian sexual ethics has to be conducted in a dialogue between contemporary experience and the discoveries of the human sciences on the one hand, and the insights of Scripture and tradition on the other. Is it possible to reclaim the resources of Christian teaching in ways which enable them to be founts of wisdom for faithful living today?

High Leigh Conference Centre

A little philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.

Francis Bacon (1561-1626)

Sex in Global Context

Recent debates within the Anglican Communion reflect a growing diversity in approaches to matters of sexuality. To what extent are constructions of human sexual identity and beha­viour shaped by cultural context? How far should Western preoccupations with human sexuality take note of such cultural pluralism, even when it challenges our deeply-held assumptions? For many of the peoples of the two-thirds world, AIDS/HIV represents a demographic catastrophe: but has our theological and ethical thinking kept pace with the challenges of such a global pandemic?

Sex for Sale?

Any consideration of sexual ethics needs to untangle the troubled relationship between sex­uality and economics – but often our discussions of sexuality ignore this crucial issue. At home, sex appears to have become increasingly commodified in a consumer society, with explicit images and messages directed to an ever-younger audience. In the two-thirds world, the bodies of vulnerable women and children are bought and sold in the sex industry in another manifestation of global economic injustice. How can the Church contribute a coherent critique of such trends, mindful of its own failure to attract credibility in the world at large?

The Speakers:

Elaine Graham Conference Chair

Samuel Ferguson Professor of Social & Pastoral Theology, University of Manchester

Her major publications include:

Making the Difference: Gender, Theology and Personhood (1995)
Representations of the Post/Human (2002)
(with M. Halsey, ed.) Life Cycles: Women and Pastoral Care (1993)
(with H. Walton and F. Ward) Theological Reflection: Methods (2005)

 

Marilyn McCord Adams

Regius Professor of Theology at Oxford University

The Revd Professor Marilyn McCord Adams is an American philosopher of religion, a theologian and a writer on medieval philosophy.

Publications include:
William Ockham (2 volumes)
Horrendous Evils and the Goodness of God (Cornell UP)

Trevor Dennis

Vice Dean of Chester Cathedral

Publications include:
God Treads Softly Here (SPCK, 2004)
Keeping God Company (SPCK, 2002)
Imagining God: Stories from Creation to Heaven (SPCK, 1997)
Speaking of God: A Collection of Stories (Triangle,1992)

Martin Pendergast

Martin Pendergast is a Roman Catholic who has worked on issues of sexuality and sexual health for the past 30 years. He has been involved in Catholic responses to the HIV pandemic, nationally and internationally, developing training and support/care models, on which he has written extensively. He has a professional social work background, as well as having commissioned HIV, Sexual Health, and Substance Misuse Services in the NHS, in East London. He was, until recently, a member of the Government's Independent Advisory Group on Teenage Pregnancy, with a particular remit for faith issues.

Adrian Thatcher

Professorial Reseach Fellow in the Department of Theology at Exeter University

Publications include:
Truly a Person, Truly God (SPCK, 1990).
Liberating Sex – a Christian Sexual Theology (SPCK, 1993).
Marriage after Modernity – Christian Marriage in Postmodern Times (Sheffield Academic Press, 1999).
Celebrating Christian Marriage (ed.), (Continuum and T&T Clark, 2001).
Living Together and Christian Ethics (Cambridge University Press, 2002).
The Daily Telegraph Guide to Christian Marriage and to getting married in church, (Continuum, 2003).

Amy Lamé

TV presenter, writer and performer