Alex Villas Boas (CITER - UCP) published the scientific article in the Swiss journal Religions, a journal classified as Q1 Scopus in the Religious Studies Area, entitled Spirituality and Health in Pandemic Times: Lessons from the Ancient Wisdom.

The goal of this paper is to analyze how the historical episode of the so-called Plague of Athens between the years 430 and 426 BC seems to have been the first phenomenon classified as an epidemic by Hippocrates, and the historian Thucydides described its cultural, social, political and religious consequences. However, such a crisis generated the need for a new culture, and consequently a new theological mentality, as a cultural driver that made it possible to transform the Asclepiad Sanctuary of Kos into the first hospital in the West to integrate spirituality and science as ways to promote the healing of culture in order to achieve the ideal of health.

The adopted method was a semantic analysis of the classic texts that help contextualize the Hippocratic view of the epidemic, spirituality, and health, and how these questions were received by Christianity at the time. The reception of this experience by Christianity, despite suffering some tension, also expands this Greek ideal and constitutes a true heritage of ancient wisdom that can be revisited in the time of the new pandemic, COVID-19. The perspective assumed here is interdisciplinary, putting in dialogue Theology and Health Sciences.

Religions is an open access journal, and the article could be accessed here.

CITER started the project «Common home and new ways of living interculturally»: Public theology and ecology of culture in pandemic times.

Common Home is a shared concept between the UN Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Encyclical Letter Laudato si’ about the care of the Common Home, published months earlier. The new scenario of COVID19 and humanitarian crisis demands even more the adoption of a public agenda for a collective political and social effort that overcomes the cultural contradictions of economic determinism and calls for shared responsibility, supported by a culture of solidarity.

In the words of Pope Francis, this moment reveals a humanity thinking that it would be possible to always be healthy in a world that is sick. At times like these, religions have a great potential for empathy and social cooperation with public agendas. The aim of the project is to offer public theological hermeneutics that incorporates the 2030 Agenda into religious culture, based on the notion shared with the Ls of Common Home.

The project has three phases: 1) Common Home´s Epistemology (2020-2021); 2) Common Home´s Languages (2021-2022) and 3) Common Home´s Practices (2022-2023). Among the 10 research tasks planned, two of them started with two weekly Seminars, namely: Common Home´s Epistemology and Laudato si 'Critical Analysis. The project also has more than 12 Research Centres partnering from Portugal, researchers from different countries and 14 areas of knowledge.

Know more here.

Alexandre Palma has a doctorate in Dogmatic Theology from the Gregorian University and is a member of the Board of the Faculty of Theology and Director of the UCP Centre for Research in Theology and Studies in Religion.

The President of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa (UCP) is delighted to announce the episcopal ordination of Alexandre Palma, a professor at the Faculty of Theology.

"The University is grateful for his extraordinary contribution to theological studies and the way in which he has created a community of knowledge that is also a spiritual witness to the Christian message. We joyfully wish him every success in his new mission," says Isabel Capeloa Gil in a note of greeting.

Read the full article in Patriarcado's website
 

See the message from D. Alexandre Palma:

Photo and video credit: Patriarchate of Lisbon

Professor at the Faculty of Theology and researcher at CITER, Joaquim Félix de Carvalho launches a new poetry book "Triságia" with the seal of the Seminary of Nossa Senhora da Conceição, the work has images of Joaquim Félix, Lisa Sigfridsson and Nelson Garrido. The postface was written by Father João Paulo Brito da Costa. 

Canon Joaquim Félix shows in "Triságia" the poetics in honor of Our Lady of Tenderness. Professor Alzira Fernandes confesses in the text presenting the book: "it is necessary to wait there, in peace, with empty hands and mind," and adds that the work asks for a contemplative look, "a look that sees without seeing, a look that lets itself be guided by the mystery of the unfinished," in order to enjoy "Trisagia. Only in this way can the reader allow himself to be led towards "the wisdom of fruition, of tasting, with open horizons of meaning".

“At the time we are living now, as war is waging, this is truly a symbolical event”, it was with these words that the Rector of Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Isabel Capeloa Gil greeted the new Chair of Jewish and Christian Biblical Studies | Isaac Abravanel - Damião de Góis at UCP, presented on March 29th, that she says she hopes will be “a bridge to be crossed by everyone. A bridge in times of war”.

The Rector congratulated the Faculty of Theology, the Centre for Research in Theology and Religion Studies (CITER) and in particular the director of Chair, Luísa Almendra for the “resistance and effort to really make this Chair possible, which she was determined to implement at Católica, succeeding in overcoming all the difficulties”.

Isabel Capeloa Gil said that we were facing “an essential mark for the study of theology and the university as a testament to Peace, which is what the university is about, to use knowledge for the pursuit and for the development and the betterment of human condition.".

Meanwhile, Luísa Almendra highlighted the “the need to strengthen inter-religious dialogue as a contribution to peace”", adding that “for many centuries, instead of being considered a common heritage, biblical texts were seen as a source of division”.

The step now taken “has a great potential to be an excellent contribution to the Jewish Christian dialogue, but also to the remarkable project of Católica, a great university energized by the ultimate goal of using science to build a better world and foster a dignified life for all”, added.

“Believe with us in the power of reliable knowledge and true dialogue as the most solid builders of humanity and peace", was the dare left at the end of the speech by Luísa Almendra.

Also present at the ceremony, Alexandre Palma, director of CITER, explained how the sacred scriptures are, for Jews and Christians "our meeting point"; "study is the way" and "dialogue is our method", reasons that culminate in the creation of the Chair that now "gives body to a greater and wider effort of CITER, an effort to bring Theology and the Studies of Religion, ever more, to the agenda of university research".

Regarding the reasons that make this Chair so important, guest-speaker Amy Jill Levine (Hartford International University for Religion and Peace), singled out four, “first, texts take on new meanings in the presence of the other.”; “second, when we Jews and Christians read together, we learn more about each other’s traditions even as we see new meanings in the texts that we share”; “third, when we Jews and Christians read together, we can correct common mistakes we make about each”; “finally, when we Jews and Christians read together, we can see not only how we read differently, but also why.”

Under the theme "Studying Together", the guest-speaker Etienne Vetö, (Pontifical Gregorian University), also pointed out that "a genuine knowledge of traditional Jewish history allows a renewed knowledge of Jesus and a better understanding of his teachings".

Confessing that his "students are often shocked to find out that almost all of Jesus’ teachings can be found in different forms in Rabbinic literature", he stressed that the joint study is "a stimulant for a more exact and complete Christian faith in Jesus Christ as Messiah" and that "the Church cannot exist and cannot be herself, without a present, living relationship to the present, living community of the Jewish people".

The session included a message from Cardinal D. José Tolentino Mendonça, archivist and librarian of the Holy See, who greeted those responsible for the creation of the Chair, wishing that if the sacred scripture is the soul of theology, then may the Chair "be the soul of theology as a science in Portugal, and that biblical studies may be a frontier place that inspires what theology can be today as a place of dialogue and meeting with other sciences.

Invited to this session, the students of the Faculty of Theology of UCP surprised those present with the interpretation of two songs in Hebrew, "Hine ma tov" and "Shomer Yisreal".

At the end of the presentation of the Chair, the High Chancellor of Católica, D. Manuel Clemente, celebrated this promise of joint reading, recalling the story of the Archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustige, who considered himself "one of those Jews who recognised Jesus as the Messiah."

"It is very good to foresee what will follow from here," concluded D. Manuel Clemente.

On 11 March, the Manuel Sérgio Chair - Sport, Ethics and Transcendence of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa (UCP-CITER), in partnership with the Portuguese Institute of Sport and Youth (IPDJ), paid tribute to Manuel Sérgio, highlighting the profound impact of his thought on the sporting and ethical universe. 

‘This posthumous tribute means continuity, it means giving life. Manuel Sérgio was a visionary. He was an outstanding figure in our academic panorama and the Chair he created, linking sport and spirituality, had the mission of creating cohesion, social impact, always bearing in mind the dignity of the person,’ said Isabel Capeloa Gil, President of UCP, at the opening of the session.

Lídia Praça, Member of the IPDJ Board of Directors, emphasised the importance of perpetuating Manuel Sérgio's legacy, highlighting his ‘holistic vision’ of sport in Portugal. 

The Programme Contract to support the Manuel Sérgio Chair was then renewed, reinforcing the ongoing commitment to promoting ethics in sport.

The session also included a screening of the documentary ‘Manuel Sérgio: Biography and Dictionary of Ethics and Sport’, curated by writer Gonçalo M. Tavares, and the presentation of the latest book in the Manuel Sérgio Chair - Sport, Ethics and Transcendence collection: ‘Sport, Freedom and Democracy’, published by UCP Editora.

The documentary and the new publication were the subject of a round table discussion, moderated by journalist Paulo Sérgio, with the participation of Alfredo Teixeira, coordinator of the Chair, José Carlos Lima, coordinator of the National Plan for Ethics in Sport and author Gonçalo M. Tavares. 

The session was closed by Pedro Dias, Secretary of State for Sport, who emphasised the way Manuel Sérgio thought about sport from the point of view of the person, in all its complexity and completeness.