Paradoxes of Community: New Discussions of an Early Christian Challenge

Conference and PhD course.

Programme

Thursday 24. September

Location: Room 6B-1-62

Time Activity
13.00-13.15 Welcome
13.15-13.30
Introduction and recollection

Head of Center for the Study of Paradoxes Johanne S. T. Kristensen
13.30-18.30
Young Scholars Programme including open call

We call for short PhD project presentations or short papers. For more information: jst@teol.ku.dk. 
13.30-14.15
Annette Hjort Knudsen, PhD student, Copenhagen University: “Pearl diving as a phenomenological approach to ancient narratives
14.15-15.00
Peter Jonescu, PhD student, Heidelberg University: “Possibility of the I: The Relative, Independent Subject in Judith Butler and Martin Luther.”
15.00-15.30 Coffee break
15.30-16.15
Gustav Græser Damgaard, PhD student, Copenhagen University: “The crisis of Scripture and Scripture as crisis – reflections on the question of Scripture in Lutheran theology today.”
16.15-17.00
Peter Buch Hvarregaard, PhD student, Copenhagen University: “Signification and Truth in Scholastic Theology of the Eucharist”
17.00-17.45

Andreas Alexander Ekkert, Independent scholar: ”Upstanding Citizens? Timothy Gorringe’s ‘Theology of the Built Environment’”
17.45-18.30

Sidsel Jo Faber Starklint, PhD student, Copenhagen University: Navigating the Narratives of MindShift: A Virtual Reality Intervention for Clinicians Prescribing Antipsychotics  
18.30
Summary and drinks

Friday 25 September

Location: Room 4A-1-69 and 6B-1-62

Time Activity
10.15-12.00
Open lecture (location 4A-1-69)

Anni Maria Laato, Senior University Lecturer in Systematic Theology, University of Åbo: “Following the Great Fish” – Baptism as the Basis for Christian Life in Tertullian.

Tertullian (d. c. 220), writing in a period when many converts entered the Christian faith as adults and therefore and needed instruction in their new faith, frequently took a stand on matters pertaining to the Christian community. He addressed both the theological self-understanding of the church and the practical questions of Christian lifestyles within a predominantly non-Christian society. For Tertullian, baptism signified a decisive transition into a new community and a transformed way of life. The baptismal questions and threefold immersion in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit expressed the Trinitarian character of the Christian faith. Tertullian’s interpretation of Christ as a fish was accompanied by an exhortation to radical ethics: the “little fishes” i.e. the baptized, must follow the “great fish” and remain within the baptismal waters in order to live. As a skilled rhetorician, Tertullian emphasized different ecclesiological dimensions depending on context, yet his thought consistently bore a pneumatological and eschatological orientation.
12.00-13.00
Lunch (all participants are invited)
13.00-17.30
Conference lectures (location 6B-1-62)
13.00-14.00
Jesper Tang Nielsen, University of Copenhagen: “Paradoxes of the Johannine Community”
14.00-15.00
Johannes Aakjær Steenbuch, Independent Scholar: “Abstraction, Communion and the Paradoxes of Sharing: Self-Sufficiency and Community According to Clement of Alexandria”
15.00-15.30
Coffee break
15.30-16.30
Bo Kristian Holm, Århus University: “Scripture, Reader, and Church. The Productive Tension of individual and community in Lutheran Scriptural Theology”
16.30-17.30
Sasja Emilie Mattiasen Stopa, Århus University: ”Citizens of Heaven or Heavenly Citizens? The Paradox of Community in Luther and Grundtvig”
17.30-18.15
Dan Siedell, Senior Lecturer, Stockholm University, “What Has the Museum to do with the Church? Tertullian, Lateness, and the Paradoxes of Community”
18.30
Conclusion and conference dinner

Location: Hotel Guldsmeden Islands Brygge (speakers are invited and other participants are welcome (own expense))

Registration

Sign up for the conference/PhD course no later than 1 September 2026.

For more information, please contact the organiser (jst@teol.ku.dk).