With a majority of the undergraduate body identifying themselves as Catholic, Boston College is introducing a program that will allow students to minor in Jewish Studies. The program, among the first for American Catholic institutions, will launch this semester.
"The fundamental focus of the program is to provide a rigorous academic approach to Jewish studies," said Dwayne Carpenter, co-director of the program. "It's not advocacy, it's an intellectual academic discipline, and we expect it to broaden students' horizons."
Approximately 70 percent of BC undergraduates are Catholic, while about one percent are Jewish. Carpenter said he is anxious to see the results that this mix will provide.
"There haven't been organized Jewish studies courses on campus, and it is interesting given the Jesuit nature of BC to see how this can bring new dimensions and perspectives to students," he said.
Students will be able to minor in Jewish Studies by taking six courses from at least three different academic departments. With 14 faculty members spanning nine different departments, the minor is one of the most interdisciplinary minors.
Students must first take an introductory, team-taught course titled Mapping the Jewish Experience, which is set to debut in the fall 2006 semester. Students can then choose from four electives in at least three different departments, ranging from Propaganda Film to The 10 Commandments: A Jewish Perspective.
A capstone course is then required, which will summarize the concepts taught in the minor.
Donald Fishman, who will teach the capstone course, sees the new program as an opportunity to assemble students of a variety of backgrounds. "I think it will bring together some people who ordinarily wouldn't have contact, and it will bring together some things that might have been overlooked in the past," he said.
The first student to sign up for the program is Ariel Goldberg, A&S '08. The Newton native said being surrounded by Christians at BC has given her Judaism a deeper meaning, and that it made "perfect sense" to dedicate six classes to further exploration of her religion.
Goldberg added, however, that you wouldn't need to be Jewish to appreciate the minor. "I had a teacher in high school tell me that you didn't need to be an animal in order to be a good veterinarian, just as you don't need to be Jewish in order to study Judaism," said Goldberg. "If you learn a lot and broaden your horizons in any discipline, it will help you in a variety of ways."
The creation of the minor comes at a significant time for Judeo-Christian relations worldwide. Pope Benedict XVI's visit to a synagogue in Cologne, as well as John Paul II's legacy of warmth toward Judaism, has fostered positive relations between the two religions.
It is a trend started over 40 years ago with the Second Vatican Council teachings of acceptance of non-Christian religions. The trend began at BC even earlier, said John Michalczyk, chairman of the fine arts department and professor of two courses in the Jewish Studies minor.
In the 1950s, Richard Cardinal Cushing planted the seeds for constructive Judeo-Christian interaction both at BC and in Boston, said Michalczyk. He created a Catholic-Jewish committee and helped to develop interest in the Jewish community before it became more widely accepted.
It was his initiative that helped BC catch on "very early" to the humanism of the 1960s, said Michalczyk.
"Even though we are a Catholic institution we have been very outgoing in working with the Jewish community," he said. "We have come together to learn more about their traditions, and we have come out of this very enriched."
It is something that few other universities with Catholic affiliations can claim. The University of San Francisco launched a similar Jewish Studies program 20 years ago, and Fairfield University in Connecticut has offered students a Judaic studies minor for the past nine years.
Carpenter hopes within a few years the program can flourish like the one in San Francisco. He said the current media attention, including a front page article in The Boston Globe and a possible story in Newsweek, will help in the effort.
"The response has been overwhelming; normally the appearance of a minor doesn't generate this amount of attention, but it has been pleasantly surprising," he said. "It is good for the program, good for BC, and it's something they can be proud of."
The minor will be formally established on Oct. 2 with a special event honoring the fall exhibit at the McMullen Museum in Devlin Hall, The Power of Conversation: Jewish Women and Their Salons.
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