November 2022 Conference

A Little Lower than Elohim: Philosophical Explorations of Human Nature

Date: November 17th, 2022

Venue: Hampton Inn & Suites Denver-Downtown - 1845 Sherman Street, Denver, CO 80203

James J. Londis & Family Lecturer: Dr. Linn Tonstad (Associate Professor of Theology, Religion, and Sexuality at Yale Divinity School)

8:30: Welcome and Introductions

8:45 – 10:15: Session 1: The Ideal Human Nature

“Becoming Human: Re-reading Genesis 2–3 in the Era of Posthumanism” — Mathilde Frey

“Healing the Fragmented Self: A Philosophical Study in Human Identity, Arrival, and Belonging” — Adelina Alexe

10:30 – 12:00: Session 2: The Implications of Creatureliness

“Receiving vs. Grasping: Rosenzweig and Levinas on the “Creaturiality” of the Human Subject” — Abi Doukhan

“Made in the Image of Dis/obedience: Reclaiming Rebellion As God’s Intended Human Nature” — Matthew Korpman

12:00 – 1:00: Lunch

1:00 – 3:20: Session 3: Human Nature and Sin

"Reinhold Niebuhr and the Complexities of Sin" — Richard Rice

“Of Monsters and the Human: Frederick Douglass, Ida B. Wells-Barnett and the Monster” — Jasper St. Bernard

"Either Chaste or Lost: So Sayeth the Church" — Mark Carr

3:30 – 5:00: Session 4: Londis & Family Lecture 

Presentation: “Theological Anthropology in a Different Key” — Linn Tonstad

Response: Yi-Shen Ma