Member of the Global Network for Public Theology
Founded May 2007 at the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton, New Jersey, the Global Network for Public Theology includes members from North America, South America, the United Kingdom, Oceania, Australia and Africa.
Prof. Bedford-Strohm is the only German member of the network. His research activities connected to Public Theology will be focused in the new Dietrich-Bonhoeffer-Research-Center for Public Theology, which will be opened with a ceremony at the Great Hall of Bamberg University in January 2008.
What does Public Theology stand for? One consensus among the members of the Global Network for Public Theology is the belief in the contextual form of theology's public responsibility. Public theology in Stellenbosch, South Africa, necessarily differs from public theology in Manchester, UK - yet both approaches are united in their awareness for theology's mandate in and for society.
Public Theology shares the stress on theology's contextuality with liberation theology, and especially the South American and African members of the Global Network for Public Theology emphasized this heritage on the founding conference of the Global Network.
At the end of the conference in Princeton, the founding protocol was signed by all members. As Prof. Bedford-Strohm had to return to Bamberg already in order to teach, his research assistant, Dr. Eva Harasta, who from January to June 2007 was Bonhoeffer Visiting Teaching Fellow at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, signed on behalf of the Bamberger protestant theology.
Further information about the Global Network for Public Theology may be found on the website of the Centre of Theological Inquiry: here.