New Divinity School Courses Study Women and the Church

This year for the first time the Divinity School is offering courses which examine in depth the problems of women in the church and religious education.

Krister Stendahl, dean of the Divinity Faculty, has recently announced a series of appointments specifically designed to broaden the school's coverage of these two areas.

Rosemary Ruether of Howard University, and Alice Hageman, who has worked with the Campus Ministry Women's Caucus, will be the Lentz Lecturers on the Ministry of Women.

Rev. John H. Westerhoff III, editor of Colloquy, a religious education magazine, will be the Lentz Lecturer on Education in the church.

Ruether will give two courses on classical images of women in the church, in religion and culture. She will also be giving a course with Harvey Cox, Professor of Divinity, On liberation movements in the Third World and the Christian promotion of Western imperialism.

Hageman will teach two courses on women, religion and the ministry. She will also coordinate programs in women's studies at the School, including a series of Lentz Lectures on the problems of women in the church.

"This is about the first time that there have been women teaching at this school," Ruether said She added that she felt that the focus of women's studies in religion should be complete re education since -- according to her view -- the oppression of women is similar to other kinds of domination.