Bede Benjamin Bidlack

• TH 251 Sacraments
• TH260 Religions of the West
• TH261 Religions of Asia
• TH 286 Chinese Religion and Christianity
• TH 369 Interreligious Dialogue
• TH 350-ED 399 Catholic Schools in Today's Society
• TH401 Theology and Evolution Seminar
• HU 103 & 104 Conversatio

I am a systematic theologian who looks to Daoist thought to inspire new interpretations of Christian revelation. Two events attract my attention: Creation and resurrection. What are the theological implications of the world created good? What does Christian spirituality look like when we allow the Earth and the Cosmos into our lives with God? After Creation, the most remarkable event is the Resurrection. God found part of Creation, the body, important enough to resurrect and to promise humanity eternal life. How do we live the present in light of that future promise of bodily resurrection? What does the resurrection mean for our bodies now? These questions draw me into the areas of theological anthropology, as well as practical and sacramental theology, but my approach is comparative.

Students who conduct research projects with me have an interest in Asian religions, interreligious dialogue, or comparative theology. Such study is a response to the call of Vatican II to discover how the Holy Spirit might be working through other religions. In order to do so, students will have to approach their research in the spirit of the first command of the Rule of St. Benedict: "Listen." Students can expect that their studies will prepare them for a world where religions are meeting each other with great frequency and urgency.

In Good Company: The Body and Divinization in the Thought of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ and Daoist Xiao Yingsou. 2015, Leiden: Brill.

Brill Companion to Comparative Theology. Pim Valkenberg, ed., Marianne Moyaert, Kristen Johnston-Largen, James Fredericks, and Bede Benjamin Bidlack, co-eds. 2022. Leiden: Brill.

Refereed Articles:
“Attentiveness: A Benedictine Pedagogy for the Uncertain.” American Benedictine Review 70:4 (December 2019): 408-420

“Love in Creation: A Theology of God after Daoism.” 2017. Catholic Theology and Thought 79: 12-47.    

"Teaching Comparatively from an Institution's Mission." Teaching Theology and Religion 17, no. 4 (2014): 369-87.

"Divine Lives: Christ, Community, and Cosmos." Studies in Interreligious Dialogue 22, no. 2 (2012): 134-46.

"Alchemy and Martial Arts: Wang Yannian's Gold Mountain Daoism." Journal of Daoist Studies 5 (2012): 117-38.
 

Refereed Book Chapters:         

“Tradition, Language, and Christian-Chinese Comparative Theology.” 2022. In Brill Companion to Comparative Theology, edited by Wilhelmus Valkenberg, Leiden: Brill.

“Not for Myself Alone: Atonement and Penance After Daoism.” 2021. In Atonement and Comparative Theology, edited by Catherine Cornille, New York: Fordham University Press.

“Daoism and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Bioethics.” 2017. In Religious Perspectives on Bioethics and Human Rights, edited by Joseph Tham, Kai Man Kwan, and Alberto Garcia, 127-138. Advancing Global Bioethics Series. New York: Springer.

Panel Discussion (54 minutes): "Living Cosmology: The Influence of Teilhard de Chardin," Yale Divinity School, November 8, 2014