Religion

Related Student Organizations

• Atheistic and Agnostic Association
• Canterbury Club
• Catholic Campus Ministry
• DiscipleMakers Christian Fellowship
• Gathering Ministries
• Hillel
• InterVarsity
• Latter-Day Saints Student Association
• Muslim Students Association
• Orthodox Christian Fellowship
• Rooke Chapel Congregation
• Voices of Praise Gospel Choir
• Young Life
• Zen Buddhist Meditation

Career Paths

Because of their broad liberal arts preparation, religion students have broad career choices. Professions of choice frequently include those in business, law, journalism, non-profit organizations, education, public service, communications and beyond. Recent alumni have secured the following positions:

• Computer Support Specialist, Mount Holyoke College
• Regional Director, Sigma Phi Epsilon
• Teacher's Aide, Brookline Public Schools
• Consultant, Vanguard Group
• Morning Producer, ABC 27 News

Recent Awards

Religion faculty members have recently secured grants and awards from:

• National Endowment for the Humanities
• American Academy of Religion
• American Institute of Indian Studies
• Brandeis University (Fellow, Israel Studies)
• Associated Kyoto Program (Visiting Faculty Fellowship)
• American Council of Learned Societies

Journal Publications

Recent faculty scholarship has appeared in the following journals:

• South Asia Research
• Religious Studies
• The Journal of the American Academy of Religion
• Religion Compass
• Journal of Religion and Society
• Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics
• International Journal of the Humanities
• Philosophia Africana

Quick Facts

Number of full-time faculty: 7

Average number of majors per class year: 20

Internships

Internships prepare students for career success through firsthand work in the field. Recently, religion students have secured internships at:

• Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center
• Center for Strategic and International Studies
• The Office of Senator Joseph Lieberman (ID - CT)

Graduate and Professional School

Many religion majors choose to pursue graduate and professional studies after they leave Bucknell. Recently, alumni have gone on to schools including:

• University of Pennsylvania
• New York University
• Loyola University Chicago
• Skidmore College
• Brooklyn Law School
• Harvard Divinity School

Program Details

• The study of religion at Bucknell explores the experiences, narratives and social expressions of individuals and groups as they strive to articulate meaningful lives.
• Minors in religion and Jewish studies are also offered.
• Selected students may undertake an Honors Program in religion by completing an honors thesis in their senior year.
• The study of religion helps students acquire the skills needed for reflection upon the human quest for transformation and meaning that persists even in modern, secular settings.
• A major in religion provides the context for historical and conceptual engagement with some of the most profound ideas, thinkers and questions that have challenged humanity.
• Increasingly, Bucknell students add religion as a second major that complements professional degree work by providing them with an academic setting for exploring broad cultural, conceptual, ethical and spiritual questions.

Faculty

Maria Antonaccio
B.A.Williams College; M.A., Ph.D. University of Chicago
Scholarly interests: Western religious ethics and moral theory, contemporary Christian ethics, environmental ethics, the ethics of biotechnology, the ethics of consumption.

Brantley W. Gasaway
Ph.D., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; M.A., Miami University; B.A. College of William & Mary
Scholarly interests: Religion in America; Religion & Politics; Religion & Law; Evangelicalism; Religion & Gender

Paul Macdonald
B.A.Wheaton College, Ill.; M.A. Yale University; Ph.D. University of Virginia
Scholarly interests: philosophical theology, Christian theology, Christian philosophy.

Karline McLain
B.A. University of Iowa; M.A., Ph.D. University of Texas-Austin
Scholarly interests: South Asian religions.

Rivka Ulmer
M.A., D. Phil., J.W. Goethe Universität, Frankfurt am Main
Scholarly interests: Rabbinic literature (Midrash, Talmud and Responsa) and medieval Hebrew manuscripts using semiotic, linguistic and cultural theory methods, comparative literature, Jewish history and thought, Jews in Egypt, Jewish magic, Jews in Germany.

Carol Wayne White
B.A. Loyola College; S.T.M. Harvard Divinity School; M.Div. Andover Newton Theological School; Ph.D. Iliff
School of Theology and University of Denver
Scholarly Interests: philosophy of religion, process theology and philosophy, poststructuralist and feminist philosophies, critical theory and religion, religious naturalism, science and religion

Stuart Young
Ph.D., Princeton University; M.A., SOAS, University of London; B.A., Claremont McKenna College
Scholarly interests: East Asian religions; Buddhism; Daoism; religious biography; Buddhist material culture; religion, economics, and industry.

Undergraduate Research

Religion professors regularly mentor students in honors degree work, as well as students who are Presidential Fellows and teaching assistants. Recent examples of research and honors projects include:

• "Searching the Flexibility in Hinduism"
• "Apocalyptic Religious Thought, the End of Days and the Afterlife: Relating Christian and Jewish Beliefs"

Recent Faculty Scholarship

Maria Antonaccio is the author of Picturing the Human: The Moral Thought of Iris Murdoch (Oxford, 2000) and of numerous journal articles on topics in moral theory and religious ethics.

Paul Macdonald is the author of Knowledge and the Transcendent: An Inquiry into the Mind’s Relationship to God (Catholic University of America Press, 2009). He also has published articles in Religious Studies, Modern Theology and The Thomist.

Karline McLain is the author of India’s Immortal Comic Books: Gods, Kings, and Other Heroes (Indiana University Press, 2009) and of several journal articles on Hinduism and Indian media/popular culture.

Rivka Ulmer’s three-volume edition of Pesiqta Rabbati, a midrashic work, was republished in paperback; her articles focus upon cultural issues relating to rabbinic literature (Queen Cleopatra, Egyptian gods, homosexuality) in Henoch, Harvard Theological Review and other journals, as well as in encyclopedias and Festschriften.

Carol Wayne White is the author of Reverberations of a Mystical Naturalism: Revitalizing the Legacy of Anne Conway (1631-1679) (SUNY Press, 2008) and of numerous articles on topics in philosophy of religion and the intersections of critical theory and religion.

Courses Offered

Bioethics: Issues in Ethics
Buddhism
Catholicism
Christian Ethics
Christianity
Comparative Ethics
Contemporary Religion: Race, Gender and Sexuality
Environmental Ethics
Epic India: Comics, Films and Text
Essentials of Christian Thought
God and Morality
God, Nature and Knowledge
God, Suffering and Evil
Hebrew
Hinduism
Hinduism and Film
History of Western Religious Thought
Honors Thesis
Individual Studies in Religion
Introduction to Asian Religions
Introduction to Ethics
Introduction to Judaism, Christianity and Islam
Introduction to Religion
Introduction to Religion in America
Introduction to the Bible
Islam
Israel: Land, People and Tradition
Issues of Religion and Culture
Judaism
Major Religious Movements
Major Religious Thinkers
Perspectives in Religion and Science
Philosophy of Religion
Post-Biblical Literature
Religion and American Politics
Religion and Constitutional Law
Religion and Ecology
Religion and Literature
Religion and Popular Culture
Religion and the Loss of Traditional Faith
Religion Capstone
Religions of China
Religions of East Asia
Religions of Japan
Religions of South Asia
Theories of Religion
Topics in American Religion
Topics in Religion and Law
Women in Judaism

Study Abroad

Religion majors are encouraged to pursue off-campus study either abroad (e.g., the School for International Training, the Friends World College program in Comparative Religions or Semester at Sea) or in other approved international or domestic programs to broaden their understanding of religious pluralism both in the United States and globally. Recently, students have studied in:

• Florence
• India
• England
• New Zealand