2009 Essay Contest Winners 2009 and Senior Hoonrs Essay Prize Winners.

In 2006, Bill Gallagher, a friend of the Department of Religious Studies, established a $25,000 endowment to allow the annual Gallagher Essay Prize to be awarded on a permanent basis.  Each year, a first-, second-, and third-place winner is chosen and given a monetary award that totals $1,000.  The quality of this year's submissions was very high, making the choice of just three essays for a prize very difficult.  That difficulty of choice, though, is a wonderful testimony to the strengths of our department and the thoughtfulness of our students. 

First Place and $500:

Cameron Bailey, a May 2009 graduate, for his essay “ The Buddhalogical Doctrine of Padmasmbhava, the Tantric Nirmanakaya”. With Paul Griffiths as a conversation partner, Cameron’s essay examines the doctrine of Buddhahood in Tibetan and Indian traditions. The committee found the essay to be exceptionally well written and the argument against a well known scholar of Buddhism, extremely thorough.

Second Place and $300:

Sarah Wilensky, a sophomore, for her essay “Reform and Renewal Theologies of Commandedness.”  Sarah’s eloquently written essay examines the relationship between divine commandment theology and the emergence of ritual observance in Jewish communities of Reform and Renewal.  She wrote the paper for R345- Modern American Jewish Thought, and revised it this semester with the help of Professor Magid.

Third Place and $200:

Robert Schoon, a May 2009 graduate, for his essay entitled “Blessed are the Meek: Kierkegaard’s Irony as Weak, Open and Closer to Faith than the Ethical.” Differentiating various forms of the Aesthetic stage, Robert’s paper makes a creative and convincing case that Kierkegaard’s Ethical stage is not necessarily higher than a particular form of the Aesthetic.

2009 Honors Thesis Paper Competition

Honors Thesis paper competition, in a rare occurrence the undergraduate affairs committee voted to give the recognition of best honors thesis to two students: Nick Marshall and Rob Schoon.

Nick’s thesis is titled “More a Butcher than a Priest: The Pagan Critique of Julian the Apostate. “ Nick’s thesis was supervised by David Brakke. In his essay, Nick attempts to show the pagan criticisms of Julian the Apostate by reconstructing and exploring plausible disagreements between the emperor and his fellow "Hellenists" in the spheres of philosophy, religion, and the liberal arts, religious and philosophical, between the emperor and his fellow Hellenists.

Rob’s thesis, which was supervised by Lisa Sideris, is titled “The New God of Evolution: Prospects for Theistic Evolution.”  Rob thoroughly exams a set of candidate thinkers and ideas, in search of a workable and convincing form of theistic evolution. Rob evaluates a variety of forms of theistic evolution according to clearly defined criteria.  The thesis is very well written and reasoned.