The Collaborative Inquiries in Christian Theological Anthropology project is guided by the conviction that contemporary theologians have much to gain from rigorous engagement with recent developments in the life and social sciences. Theologians have longstanding interests in questions concerning human flourishing that contemporary sociologists, psychologists, anthropologists, neuroscientists, and geneticists have addressed extensively—including topics like human agency and freedom, the relationship between mind and body, the development of human virtues and vices, and the unity or disunity of character.

Our goals for this three-year project are to nurture ambitious, science-engaged scholarship in theology, build a research team that cultivates rich intellectual community, and form scholars who will exercise lasting leadership in their fields. By means of a $3.9 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation and significant additional funding from Villanova University, Notre Dame University, and a dozen other partner institutions, we’ve assembled a collaborative team of more than 30 fellows, mentors, and educational advisers. Each theologian on the team has identified an expert in the sciences to serve as a conversation partner throughout the three years of the grant. In addition, our team of theologians will further engage with scientists through a series of six intensive workshops.

We expect this vibrant community of mentorship and collaboration to generate research in theology that challenges the still widespread notion that religion and science are intrinsically at odds. We aim to promote deep and sustained engagement between theology and the sciences, which ultimately will prove to be mutually enriching. Theologians have the potential not only to learn from the sciences but to bring perspective, conceptual clarification, and theoretical frameworks to bear on the empirical study of human nature and behavior. Through this project, theologians will be formed as knowledgeable commentators who offer new ways to think about the scientific findings they engage—and who may even propose new avenues for future empirical research.