Religious Studies Resources
- Campus Pride in FaithCPF is a national coalition that aims to provide resources, support, and guidance to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and ally (LGBTQA) students who seek to build welcoming environments, LGBTQA student organizations, and/or all inclusive non-discrimination policies at their faith-based colleges or universities. CPF affirms that many LGBTQA students are persons of faith, and that all people are entitled to the dignity and respect that is God-given. CPF embraces faith, gender identity, and sexuality where they holistically intersect.
- Ethics Code CollectionThe Ethics Codes Collection (ECC) is the largest database of codes of ethics and guidelines in the world. It contains over 2,500 individual codes from around 1,500 different organizations, and collects both current and historical versions of these documents. The ECC seeks to provide practitioners, students, scholars and the public access to codes of ethics and guidelines and in this way inform ethical decision making in professional, entrepreneurial, scientific, and technological fields.
- United Nations End Poverty GoalThe United Nations has made ending poverty a sustainable goal. This site gives statistical data about people in poverty around the globe. Poverty entails more than the lack of income and productive resources to ensure sustainable livelihoods. Its manifestations include hunger and malnutrition, limited access to education and other basic services, social discrimination and exclusion as well as the lack of participation in decision-making. Various social groups bear disproportionate burden of poverty.
What are Open Educational Resources (OER) and how do they differ from Open Access (OA)?
Definition of Open Educational Resources (OER)
OER are freely and publicly available teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others. For example, instructors may download the material, tailor it to one’s course, save a copy locally to share with one’s students and share it back out with attribution. OER can include textbooks, course materials and full courses, modules, streaming videos, tests, software, and any other tools, materials, or techniques used to support access to knowledge. An open source (or open) textbook is a textbook which is OER.
Definition of Open Access (OA)
Open access refers to teaching, learning and research materials that are available free online for anyone to use as is, but they may not be revised, remixed, or redistributed. This terminology is typically used for scholarly works (journals, books, etc.), but can also refer to other class materials. Examples of OA materials include government documents, articles from open access journals, reports from think tanks.
- Digital Quaker CollectionDQC is a digital library containing full text and page images of over 500 individual Quaker works from the 17th and 18th centuries.
- Early Christian WritingsLinks to the full text of writers from the first two centuries of the Christian Church. Creator: Peter Kirby.
- Early Jewish WritingsCollection of Jewish documents from antiquity with translations, introductions, and links. Creator: Peter Kirby.
- General Commission on Archives and HistoryThis site provides some research tools. From here, you can view the full text archive of the Methodist History Journal and search the Index to the Conference Journal Memoirs and much more.
- Project Muse: ReligionProject MUSE offers open access (OA) books and journals from several distinguished university presses and scholarly societies
- Rapture and ReasonAccounts of Evangelical conversion in Georgian Britain.
- Vatican: Holy See ArchivesOfficial website of the Holy See. Provides links to a wide variety of papal and primary source documents relevant to the Catholic Church. Plans are underway (as of March 2013) to digitize and make freely available the entire Vatican library.
- World Digital Library: ReligionA digital library of primary materials from countries and cultures around the world.
- AtheismThere is not a lot of reliable data on these people. Most people remain very private about their non-religious beliefs. In many countries, it is still a crime to be an atheist or non-believer. Europe is the most open about this and the data suggests non-religious belief systems are growing.
- Gallop: ReligionKnown for their Gallop Poll, Gallop is a global analytics and advice firm that helps leaders and organizations solve their most pressing problems.
- Global Religious LandscapeWorldwide, more than eight-in-ten people identify with a religious group. A comprehensive demographic study of more than 230 countries and territories conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life estimates that there are 5.8 billion religiously affiliated adults and children around the globe, representing 84% of the 2010 world population of 6.9 billion.
- Pew Research Center: ReligionRecent research and insights on Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Non-Religion and Secularism, Religious Freedom and more
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.-1st Amendment of the United States Constitution
- CIA World FactbookThis resource provides information on the history, people and society, government, economy, energy, geography, communications, transportation, military as well as transnational issues for 267 world entities. The Reference tab includes: a variety of world, regional, country, ocean and time zone maps; Flags of the World; and a Country Comparison function that ranks the country information and data in more than 75 Factbook fields.
- The NonesIn many countries around the world, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of people who are nonbelievers or unaffiliated with any organized religion, so-called “nones.” Explore the full series in an immersive presentation here.
- How religious commitment varies by country among people of all agesPEW Research Center
- Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World AffairsThe Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs seeks a more just and peaceful world by deepening knowledge and solving problems at the intersection of religion and global affairs through research, teaching, and engaging.
- International Peace InstituteThe International Peace Institute is an independent, international not-for-profit think tank with a staff representing more than 20 nationalities, located in New York across from United Nations headquarters. IPI is dedicated to promoting the prevention and resolution of conflicts between and within states by strengthening international peace and security institutions.
- Jewish Voice for Peaceewish Voice for Peace is the largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization in the world.
We’re organizing a grassroots, multiracial, cross-class, intergenerational movement of U.S. Jews into solidarity with Palestinian freedom struggle. - Network of Christian Peace OrganisationsThe Network of Christian Peace Organisations (NCPO) is a UK-based ecumenical network committed to peace as central to the meaning of church community.
- Peace and Hope InternationalPeace and Hope works in Latin America alongside individuals, families and communities in poverty, so that they can live with dignity, free from violence and injustice.
- Peace ConvoysThe Muslim Council of Elders’ most important project is the largest international Islamic effort and the most influential in terms of communicating with Muslim youth and with many Muslim and non-Muslim organisations and universities across the world.
- Religions for PeaceReligions for Peace is committed to leading effective multi-religious responses to the world’s pressing issues. We believe ambitious goals and complex problems can best be tackled when different faith communities work together.
"Pause for Peace" Ceremony
Thoughts/Feeling about Peace and War
The following insights are from the attendees of the "Pause for Peace" Ceremony by members of the UMU Community who came together to share their common goal for peace in the Middle East.
"Peace feels supportive and safe. We can choose to value relationships over being right."
"God loves us whether we are at war or peace."
"War is division and causes dangerous misunderstanding."
"Union with the one who loves us."
"War is a response to not walking in another's shoes."
"There IS no peace without justice."
"Defeated & sad" "Peace is comfort. Peace is love. Peace is unity."
"Unnecessary & lives are lost...terrible" "Peace is happiness." "War is greed." Peace is: "Happiness. Hope. Love."
"War is pain and suffering." "Peace is accepting everyone for who they are."
"In the midst of war, there is a peace waiting to be born."
"War is ineffective." "Peace is Life." War is: "Sadness. Helplessness. Grief. Hope?"
"It'll only happen if we change inside first."
"Trading lives for money & power."
"Peace is security." "Love is at the heart of peace."
"Devastated" "Violence begets violence-we have to stop the cycle with a nonviolent response."
"Hopeful" "Peace is calm."
"Unsettled grief" "Peace is safe." "Let not war define us."
"War is not the answer to real results/resolution to our problems."
"Peace makes me feel understood & understanding of those around me- objective in the pursuit of justice."
"The price for peace is way much cheaper than the price of war."
"War is something to divide those of our world. Let us come together as one to bring an end to a war of hate."
"Peace is being comfortable with the uncomfortable."
"Peace is love. We need love."
"War is the world being afraid of something different."
"War provokes fear & anger and I'm sick of fear and anger." "Peace makes us free."
Peace is: "Needed at all times."
- What Works? Evaluating Interfaith Dialogue ProgramsA United States Institute of Peace Special Report
Interfaith dialogue is an increasingly popular response to religious conflict and religious nationalism. While practitioners employ a variety of approaches, the underlying purpose of all interfaith dialogue projects is to enhance religious tolerance and promote peaceful coexistence. Despite the increasing popularity
of interfaith dialogue, rarely are these dialogue projects subjected to rigorous efforts to evaluate their impact and effectiveness. . To help address this
gap, the Religion and Peacemaking Initiative of the U.S. Institute of Peace commissioned a study that resulted in this publication.
- PBS: Timeline of Events Related to ReligionTimeline of events from the birth of Ibrahim, Abraham, or Abram to 2002 C.E.
- Abrahamic ReligionsBritish Library compares the three major monotheistic religions.Introductions to the Qu'an, the Torah, and the Christian Bible are included.
- Abrahamic Religion Similarities and DifferencesPew Research Center explores views of religious similarities and differences as well as perceptions of religious minorities in the U.S.
