In September 2024 an international and interdisciplinary Summer School on Nature and Religion in the Anthropocene will take place at the University of Sant’Anselmo in Rome.

The massive impact of human behaviour on the balance of the ecosystem has reached epochal dimensions in the 20^th/21^st century which has been designated by the terminus Anthropocene. The seminar uses this concept as a discursive framework to approach the interdisciplinary and intercultural question of how to manage the urgently needed “great transformation”.

In discussing these issues, a special focus is put on the role of religion, especially on the resources of Christianity to rethink the relationship between the human and the non-human.

In the seminar we offer philosophical, biblical, ethical, and systematic-theological perspectives on nature resp. creation. We combine these theoretical reflections with the examination of pastoral practices, of religious and civil aesthetics and architecture, comparing different Christian spiritualities – with a special focus on Benedictine provenance – with current ecological/green spiritualities.

The participants will profit from the richness of Rome’s religious, artistic, and institutional heritage. We will undertake excursions to significant sights which manifest the symbolic interrelation of spirituality and nature in an artistic way. Discussions with relevant Catholic ecclesial institutions such as the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development will complete this manifold overview.

The International Summer School “Nature and Religion in the Anthropocene” is organized by the University of Sant’Anselmo Rome (Prof. I. Bruckner), the University of Augsburg (Prof. J. Ostheimer), the University of Graz (Prof. S. Trawöger), the University of Passau (Dr. J. Blanc) and LUMSA Rome (Prof. S. Biancu). It is carried out as an Erasmus Blended Intensive Programme (BIP).

The Summer School invites in particular students of theology, philosophy and the environmental humanities. Other backgrounds might be considered upon application. The working language will be English. The maximum number of participants is 25. The participants will be accommodated directly in the University of Sant’Anselmo.