Photo – C of I academic Rev Dr Robert Heaney
The Director of the Centre for Anglican Communion Studies at the US-based Virginia Theological Seminary, Rev Dr Robert Heaney, has been promoted to Professor of Theology and Mission.
Dr Melody Knowles, Vice President of Academic Affairs at VTS said that move came about as the result of the unanimous recommendation of the faculty, which was confirmed by the Board of Trustees. Professor Heaney is a member of the Lambeth Conference Design Group.
In his role as Director of the Centre for Anglican Communion Studies, he has “worked to define and clarify the centre’s purpose as ‘promoting and practicing better community for the Communion’”, Dr Knowles said. “He is an engaging and academically rigorous teacher and a colleague who can be trusted upon to speak with honesty and wisdom. Robert now takes his place as a senior member of the VTS faculty, and we congratulate him and look forward to his future accomplishments.”
Background brief – The Rev. Robert Heaney, Ph.D., D.Phil.
The Rev. Robert S. Heaney, Ph.D., D.Phil., is the Director of the Center for Anglican Communion Studies and Professor of Theology and Mission. He joined the faculty in 2013. Dr. Heaney’s areas of expertise include intercultural theology, mission theology, and World Anglicanism. Before coming to VTS, he was director of Postgraduate Studies and Research at St. John’s University of Tanzania, where he was also Senior Lecturer in the School of Theology and Religious Studies.
Dr. Heaney holds the D.Phil. in Theology from the University of Oxford; the Ph.D. in Philosophical Theology from Dublin’s Milltown Institute of Theology and Philosophy; a Master of Theology from the University of Oxford; and a Bachelor of Arts (Hons.) in Theology from the London School of Theology.
Heaney has experience in teaching and ministry on three continents. He continues to travel extensively and is often invited to lecture, consult, and preach throughout the Anglican Communion. Widely published, his books include: From Historical to Critical Post-Colonial Theology (Wipf & Stock, 2016); Post-Colonial Theology: Finding God and Each Other Amidst the Hate (Cascade, 2019); and, with William L. Sachs, The Promise of Anglicanism (SCM, 2019). He is senior editor of Faithful Neighbors: Christian-Muslim Vision and Practice (Morehouse, 2016) and senior editor of God’s Church for God’s World (Church Publishing, 2020).
His contributions to collected volumes include: The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to the Anglican Communion (Wiley-Blackwell, 2013); Great Awakenings: Evangelical Engagements with Postcolonialism (IVP, 2014); The Oxford History of Anglicanism, Volume V: Global Anglicanism, c.1900–2000 (Oxford University Press, 2018); Preparing for Lambeth 2020: Witnessing Together: Global Perspectives on Evangelism and Witness (Anglican Communion Office, 2019); The SPCK Study of Ministry (SPCK, 2019); and The T&T Clark Handbook of Modern Theology (T&T Clark, forthcoming).
His research and teaching at VTS focuses on the development of a critical missiology that provides students with a passion for the field that does not shy away from difficult issues in thought and practice, nor result in ministries characterised by missiological isolationism or reductionism. As a theologian of culture, he seeks to nourish theological imagination that is ever cognisant of social location and the theological inevitability and necessity of contextualisation and inter-contextualisation. As an Anglican theologian, he has a particular interest in modern World Anglicanism and the emergence of a renewed Anglican Communion.
Heaney was ordained a priest in the Church of Ireland in 2002, and has been active in parishes in Ireland, England, Tanzania, and the United States of America. He is married to Dr. Sharon E. Heaney, and they have one son, Sam.
Publications
The Promise of Anglicanism. Co-authored with William L. Sachs. London: SCM Press, 2019.
Post-Colonial Theology: Finding God and Each other Amidst the Hate.
Eugene: Cascade, 2019. Reproduced by permission of Wipf and Stock Publishers. Download –
[[] https://www.vts.edu/academics/faculty-and-vice-presidents/the-rev-robert-heaney-phd-dphil ]
“Missiology and Ministry” The Study of Ministry
Edited by Martyn Percy, Emma Percy, and Ian Markham. London: SPCK, 2019, 279–291. Reproduced by permission of SPCK. Download [[] https://www.vts.edu/academics/faculty-and-vice-presidents/the-rev-robert-heaney-phd-dphil ][read chapter]
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