When the student becomes the teacher

When the student becomes the teacher Prof. Stephen Bullivant, director of the Benedict XVI Centre
Colm Fitzpatrick speaks with a professor passionate about theology

 

From once caricaturing religion as utter ‘nonsense’, one man is now teaching students about the role and relevance of theology in the world today.

Stephen Bullivant, Professor of Theology and the Sociology of Religion in Twickenham’s St Mary’s University, is an award-winning scholar, speaker and author, with book topics ranging from the salvation of atheists to the meaning of the Trinity. However, his devout Faith was not always a central factor in his life, but borne from a string of extended and formative experiences.

“Well I was brought up in North West England in Preston, so a town with quite a big Catholic Irish background, although I have no Catholic family. I wasn’t brought up with anything really – I wasn’t baptised,” Stephen explains, noting that he attended a Methodist youth club at one point but religion didn’t play an important role in his house.

Philosophy

By the time Stephen was in high school, he identified as an atheist, a status he jokingly puts down to thinking he was clever and reading philosophy, such as the works of Bertrand Russell.

When pursuing his A-Levels he attended a Catholic sixth-form as it was the only place he could study philosophy. Although there was no sectarianism in the area, he had never before associated with Catholics in an academic context.

“For the first time, I did kind of get to know Catholic people and had a great time studying philosophy and just enjoying the place,” he says.

Following his studies, he was accepted into Oxford and pursued an undergraduate degree in Theology and Philosophy, after transferring from his original preference, which exposed him to more Catholic environments.

“I ended up with Catholic friends, and I ended up going to Church every so often. I started drinking with a Dominican – there’s a boozy dinner at Blackfriars Hall, the Dominican College in Oxford, on a Sunday night and it follows on from Mass. In order to sort of be on time for dinner and not miss pre-dinner drinks, you obviously have to go to Mass. So that was probably the first Catholic Mass I ever went to, and just got to kind of know people.”

“So I’m going along from having thought that Christianity was kind of literal nonsense when I was 15-16, to thinking it wasn’t nonsense but wrong, interestingly wrong, to kind of thinking there’s actually something in this, all the while attending Church every so often,” he explains.

After studying “deeper and deeper”, Stephen ended up doing a Masters on Vatican II and the salvation of atheists, which was also the focus of his doctorate. In his early 20’s, after consistently thinking and writing about Catholic dogmatic theology, he saw himself becoming a Catholic at some point in the future.

During this period, Stephen had married a lapsed Anglican, and was still interacting with the religious in Blackfriars. He met an Australian Benedictine there, and after explaining his need to visit Rome the following year for research purposes, the Benedictine offered to house as well as receive Stephen into the Church.

“I spent three weeks in Rome in the archives and then at the end of it I was received and baptised at St Paul’s Outside The Walls,” he says, with his wife following suit a few years later. He completed his PhD, and now works in St Mary’s, which is the biggest Catholic university in Britain.

One his current interests is the social and scientific study of atheism and non-religiosity which was not a topic of concern for most academics. As a result of this lacuna there was very little data in this field of work, so he gradually pursued courses and was mentored by various people.

“So this became a much bigger and bigger part of my work so now, probably most of what I do is basically the sociology of religion.”

In 2015, the university approved the creation of the Benedict XVI Centre for Religion and Society in St Mary’s, to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the Pope Emeritus’ visit to the university – with the name being approved by the Holy See’s Secretariat of State in early 2016.

Through major publications, media activity, regular events and attracting research students, the centre seeks to make a major contribution to academic, ecclesial, and public debates concerning the place of religion (and non-religion) within contemporary societies.

“The idea was that this would bring together various colleagues working together at St Mary’s – those working in Catholic social teaching, bioethics, economics and also my kind of pastoral theology and sociology of Catholic life,” Stephen explains adding that it’s attracting PhD students, and has received all sorts of funding.

He is currently co-lead on the three-year Understanding Unbelief project funded by a £2.3 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation, which aims to advance the scientific understanding of atheism, agnosticism and other forms of so-called religious ‘unbelief’ as a global phenomenon.

Despite the stress from work and looking after his three children, Stephen says he is “very happy”, with a job that he loves, where he has “so much to write, and so much to enjoy”.