The Reconciliation Studies Program prepares students to live and serve in our complex multicultural world of rapid urbanization, changing rural landscapes, diverse religious voices, political conflict, gender inequalities, and a widening gap between the haves and have-nots. Students are encouraged to use the tools of practical theology, the social sciences, the arts, and practices emerging from multiple cultural and global contexts to meet these challenges through an informed Christian faith and thoughtful Christian perspectives.
The Reconciliation Studies Program engages this changing world by drawing upon multidisciplinary understandings of real-world concerns such as healthcare disparities, poverty, social injustice, and racism. Breaking down walls of division that separate us from God and one another and deepening relational connections that inspire peace, foster God’s love, nurture forgiveness, and promote justice undergird the core spirit of the Reconciliation Studies Program. We offer a major and minor in Reconciliation Studies.
Reconciliation Studies
Reconciliation Studies students critically engage with the centrality of Jesus, as a dimension of the Trinity, when they examine the biblical and theological basis for reconciliation. Multidisciplinary studies and practices also inform their understanding of reconciliation. The significance of co-building relationships across communities and exploring how the Trinity fosters partnership underscores the major. Through course work, internships, and involvement in study-abroad offerings, students discover how to participate in collaborative initiatives that tackle inequity, redress injustice, transform systems, and honor the human dignity of peoples. These preoccupations enable students to see the world from the viewpoint of community educators and contributors, the hurting, the despised, the oppressed, and people from various social backgrounds and cultures. By learning from community educators and contributors, students are presented with opportunities to reflect on how their own experiences and histories shape their outlook and interactions with diverse people. The Reconciliation Studies major also introduces students to contemplative practices that can enrich their relationships with others and God as they co-partner with communities to initiate social change and meaningful mutual connection for the common good.
RES 201 • Introduction to Reconciliation Studies 3 Credits
Overview of theory and literature in the field, contributing factors leading to the need for reconciliation, and paradigms for reconciliation praxis. Biblically-based principles and processes for moving toward societal reconciliation. Cultural and religious diversity, conflict resolution, spiritual disciplines, social and economic justice issues, and related subjects are covered.
Offered: Fall, Spring.
RES 207U • Fannie Lou Hamer, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Our Multicultural World 3 Credits
Compares and contrasts the lives and messages of Fannie Lou Hamer, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X. Considers how their teachings and practices address various forms of inequity within the context of African-American culture and religion, the cultural diversity of the United States, and the rest of the world.
Prerequisites: GES 130 (may be taken concurrently) or GES 244 (may be taken concurrently). Offered: Fall, Spring.
RES 215L • European American Experiences, Whiteness, and Reconciliation 3 Credits
Explores how family history and upbringing influence understanding of whiteness. Since ideological constructions of whiteness are linked to various injustices confronting people of color, students will wrestle with how to adopt practices within the spirit of reconciliation that break down walls of division for the greater good.
Prerequisites: (GES 130; GES 160 (may be taken concurrently)) or GES 244; Sophomore standing. Offered: Fall.
RES 220A • Hip-Hop, The Spoken Word, and Reconciliation 3 Credits
Engages Hip-Hop and the spoken word as our modern-day Psalms: raw, uncompromising, challenging, confrontational, and confessional. Explores how a conversation among Hip-Hop, the spoken word, and biblical stories cultivate a relationship with God as transparent as the Psalms and Jesus' own relationship with God and those He encountered.
Prerequisites: Sophomore standing. Offered: Spring.
RES 230Z • Justice and Reconciliation 4 Credits
How does Jesus engage the relationship between trauma, justice, and reconciliation? What contemplative practices can re-energize efforts to tackle inequity? Learning from Twin Cities leaders, churches, and community educators intent on co-creating systems and services that honor the marginalized, complements biblical interpretations of justice, scholarly analysis, and memoirs addressing injustice.
Offered: Interim.
RES 305 • Conflict Resolution and Mediation Skills 3 Credits
Provides practical peacemaking and reconciliation skills relevant to helping Christians resolve conflict in a healthy, balanced way. Focus on using experiential learning to develop negotiation and mediation skills.
Prerequisites: RES 201. Offered: Fall, Spring.
RES 320 • The Power of Story and Reconciliation 3 Credits
Explores complex stories that can nurture cultural humility and empathy. Includes readings of creative and biblical narratives with emphasis on listening deeply to others' experiences. Confronts a world divided by difference and explores how stories can foster understanding between peoples.
Prerequisites: Sophomore standing. Offered: Fall.
RES 340Z • Principles and Methods of Intercultural Leadership 4 Credits
Grounded in a cross-cultural experience, focuses on practical principles and methods for intercultural visioning, administration, training, and communication for cross-cultural work. Emphasizes developing intercultural competencies needed for collaborative and mutually beneficial outcomes in diverse environments (e.g., mission or ministry; profit and not-for-profit; governmental or agency work).
Prerequisites: RES 215L or RES 350G; Junior or senior standing or Consent of the instructor. Offered: Spring.
RES 350G • Racial Reconciliation 3 Credits
Racial divisions, systemic biases embedded in US structures, and violations of human dignity confronted by the disinherited emphasize the need for racial reconciliation. This course recognizes how African Americans, Asian Americans, Latinx, Native Americans, and European Americans create perspectives, develop knowledge, and initiate practices that can enhance an understanding of how to realize racial reconciliation.
Prerequisites: (GES 130; GES 160; L-course and U-course) or (GES 244 and U-course). Offered: Fall or Spring.
RES 481 • Internship in Reconciliation Studies 3-4 Credits
Practical learning experience to apply understanding and skills of reconciliation studies in a real-world setting.
Prerequisites: RES 201; Major in reconciliation studies; Junior or senior standing. Offered: Occasionally.
RES 499 • Senior Seminar in Reconciliation Studies 4 Credits
Prepares students to use the lenses of Christ-centered biblical “reconciliation” theology, critical thinking, multicultural perspectives, social-change analysis, and conflict resolution skills for leadership in the work of reconciliation in society. Students study theoretical underpinnings of reconciliation studies and leadership models of reconciliation practice.
Prerequisites: RES 201 and Senior standing. Offered: Fall.