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Embodied Everyday

Click here to view 'Filled to the Brim', a booklet and outcome of the above project, led by Dr Wren Radford.

THE SAMUEL FERGUSON LECTURE
 
Inaugurated in 1976, the lecture, given annually, provides an opportunity for a senior theologian to present on a theological or philosophical topic of their choice. An international event, to date three continents have been represented.
To watch the 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2023 lectures, click here.

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2025 Samuel Ferguson lecturer: Prof. J. Kameron Carter (University of California Irvine)
 
PRESENTATION: “Beyond Idolatry (Political and Otherwise)”

The core crises of our time — from political despair to economic and ecological collapse — are fundamentally theological in nature. With the 20th century African American social theorist W. E. B. Du Bois and his contemporary the German Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin as my muses, I resuscitate a language of ‘idolatry’ to get at the theological dimensions of these crises. I also consider the kind of fugitive or anarchic hope, if we can even call it that, that Du Bois and Benjamin propose for a world reimagined beyond the idols of our time.

Date 6 March 2025, 12-1 PM, followed by lunch
Venue: Manchester Cathedral
 
LECTURE: "Authoritarianism; or, Theology and the Strongman"

While a growing body of literature is looking into the nexus of authoritarianism, resurgent fascism, (ethno-) nationalism and runaway capitalism, often under the rubric of the problem of “the Strongman,” such analyses rarely consider the theological dimensions of this contemporary problem. Building on the work of W. E. B. Du Bois and black feminism’s critique of the “patriarch form,” this talk begins to address the specifically Christian theological dimensions of the ideology of the Strongman by locating it within a long history or genealogy or race, gender, and political theology.

Date: 6 March 2025, 4 PM-5.30 PM, followed by a reception
Venue: University of Manchester, Ellen Wilkinson Building, conference room C1.18
 
Both events are free to attend, with no ticket required. 
 
 
2026 Samuel Ferguson lecturer: Prof. Maureen Junker-Kenny (Trinity College, Dublin)
Date: 5 March 2026, 4 p.m., and earlier at Manchester Cathedral
Venue: Manchester Cathedral/University of Manchester

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SAMUEL FERGUSON LECTURERS:
 

1976       Wolfhart Pannenberg

1977       David Martin

1978       Enda McDonagh

1979       John Mbiti

1980       John Cobb Jr

1981       Nikos Nissiotis

1982       Stewart R. Sutherland

1983       Edward Schillebeeckx

1984       Gordon Kaufman

1985       Eileen Barker

1986       Alistair Kee

1987       John Robertson

1988       R.R. Niebuhr

1989       Jürgen Moltmann

1990       Schubert M. Ogden

1991       Maurice F. Wiles

1992       Rosemary Radford Ruether

1993       Raymond Plant

1994       Harvey Cox

1995       Ingolf Dalferth

1996       David Jenkins

1997       Sarah Coakley

1998       Edward Farley

1999       Willem B. Drees

2000       Marjorie Suchocki

2001       Peter Hodgson

2003       John Atherton

2004       James Macmillan, Ben Quash, Sara Maitland

2005       Leonie Sandercock

2006       Kenneth Leech

2007       Anthony Reddie

2008       Stephen Pattison

2009       Terry Veling

2013       George Newlands

2014       David Fergusson

2015       Hans-Peter Grosshans

2016       Janet Martin Soskice

2017       David F. Ford

2018       John Milbank

2019       Kathryn Tanner

2021       Rowan Williams

2022       Catherine Keller

2023       Willie James Jennings

2024       Niels Henrik Gregersen