{"id":1194,"date":"2020-04-02T15:54:36","date_gmt":"2020-04-02T14:54:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pobalde.ie\/?page_id=1194"},"modified":"2020-04-02T19:28:57","modified_gmt":"2020-04-02T18:28:57","slug":"1994-speaker-sr-geraldine-smyth-op","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/1994-speaker-sr-geraldine-smyth-op\/","title":{"rendered":"1994 Speaker Sr Geraldine Smyth OP"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sr Geraldine Smyth OP<\/strong> is from Belfast\u00a0 One of a family of\u00a0 six\u00a0 brought up\u00a0 off the Falls Road she went to St Dominic\u2019s High School where Mary McAleese was a few years behind her.<\/p>\n

Geraldine spent more than six years with the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts in England\u00a0but eventually found the draw of the Dominican charism\u00a0 irresistible including\u00a0 \u201dits liturgy and its\u00a0 rootedness in history and tradition\u201d<\/em>.\u00a0 She was finally professed in the Dominican Convent Falls Road on the Feast of St Dominic in 1976.<\/p>\n

She enrolled for a Masters at the the Irish School of Ecumenics (ISE) \u00a0which became a TCD doctorate. Dr Smyth became Director of the ISE in 1994 and in the late 1990s, she led the negotiations which resulted in the integration of ISE from Milltown into Trinity College Dublin. The ISE at TCD now offers full time and part time Masters and PhD degrees in peace studies, conflict resolution and reconciliation. It has a second centre in Belfast and students can study in either city. \u00a0AS a member of the Dominican Order, living in a Dublin community, she was Prioress of her international congregation (1998-2004).<\/p>\n

She holds a first in English from University of Ulster; Masters and Ph.D degrees in Theology from Trinity College Dublin; an Honorary Doctorate from Queen\u2019s University Belfast; and a Diploma in Transpersonal Psychotherapy and Psychosynthesis, Dublin. A member of the Board of Directors of\u00a0Healing Through Remembering, Northern Ireland; formerly Chair of the International Advisory Group of the Institute of Conflict Research (INCORE) University of Ulster, and has acted as theological consultant to the World Council of Churches (projects on Justice, Peace and the integrity of Creation, and Theology of Life) and the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity (Ecumenical Formation).<\/p>\n

Martin O’Brien<\/a> from The Irish Catholic Newspaper<\/strong> January 30, 2014 wrote an article called The Church has to begin to listen to women\u2019interviewed Geraldine Smyth wherein \u00a0he stated:-<\/p>\n

“Geraldine is one of those exceptionally gifted persons who barring accidents would always have risen to the top of any organisation and left a legacy of achievement. \u00a0\u00a0Gospel-centred, articulate, eloquent, clear thinking, and highly intelligent both emotionally and intellectually (they don\u2019t always go together) Dr Smyth was once described in my hearing by a senior Protestant Churchman as \u201cone of the cleverest figures in the [Irish] Catholic Church\u201d.<\/p>\n

“Were Dr Smyth a man there can be little doubt that all other things being equal she\u00a0would be widely known as one of the most powerful voices in the Irish hierarchy if not an influential figure in the\u00a0 Roman Curia….. Educationalist, passionate bridge-builder, with an enviable research record in inter-Church relations, ecumenism and peace-building…”<\/p>\n

“Dr Smyth says the type of issues that need to be addressed include \u201cthe sin of clericalism, the sin of patriarchy”. \u00a0<\/em>\u00a0 She added that she did not think the reasons for not ordaining women \u201cstood up theologically though I think they may stand up in terms of Church discipline<\/em>\u201d. \u00a0 \u00a0 Dr Smyth said the teaching was on \u201cvery shaky anthropological and theological foundations<\/em>\u201d and was \u201ceffectively saying there are two different levels of human being\u201d. \u00a0\u00a0\u201cYou are essentialising women and essentialising men into roles that have been culturally and socially determined and you are saying that God and the Holy Spirit while working through cultural and historical dynamics and patterns and realities has to stay stuck in one particular configuration of those.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

She added: \u201cI think that is heresy<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Dr Smyth warned that reformed governance would not work if it meant \u201ctaking lectures from organisational theory and slapping it on ecclesial structures<\/em>\u201d. \u00a0\u201cIt doesn\u2019t work if there isn\u2019t a more profound self-reflection and self-critique in the light of the Gospels and in the light of what we know about the human condition and the mystery of the human person<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was also a need to explore \u201cwhat is missing from the Church, from culture and society if female experience and female approaches to pastoral care to children, to marriage are actually excluded a priori from the theologising. We are still at the level of tokenism<\/em>.\u201d \u00a0 \u00a0Dr Smyth said\u00a0 the Church \u201cis still operating out of old biological mind sets and social constructions of the human person that are highly dualistic and deeply excluding of the inherent irreducible dignity of women as created by God<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

She is deeply committed to reconciliation in the North \u2013 recognised by Queen\u2019s University with the conferral on her of an honorary doctorate as far back as 2003.<\/p>\n

Her own family have known the pain of that division, a cousin was murdered by the UDA in 1972.<\/p>\n

—————-oOo—————–<\/p>\n

Research Involvements<\/strong><\/p>\n

Member of Research Project,\u00a0Formative Childhoods for Peace<\/em>, (School of Medicine, Yale Child Study Centre, Yale, ACEV Initiative, Turkey; Ernst Struengmann Forum, Fetzer Institute).<\/p>\n

Founding Member (2009-) Ara Pacis Foundation: Council of Dignity, Forgiveness and Reconciliation; International Charter of Forgiveness and Reconciliation (in partnership with the Fetzer Institute and Guerrand-Herm\u00e8s Foundation for Peace, and the Nishkam Centre Birmingham; and University of Birmingham, 2014).<\/p>\n

Select Publications:<\/strong><\/p>\n

A Way of Transformation: A Theological Evaluation of the Conciliar Process on Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation<\/em>,\u00a0WCC 1983-1991<\/em>, (Berne, 1995).<\/p>\n

Co-editor (with Andrew Pierce,\u00a0The Critical Spirit: Theology at the Crossroads of Faith and Culture<\/em>, Dublin, 2003.<\/p>\n

Glimpses of God<\/em>, with Lesley Carroll, (Dublin 2010).<\/p>\n

\u2018What Lies Beneath: From Purity and Power to Crisis and\u00a0Kairos<\/em>\u2019, in P. Claffey, J. Egan and Marie Keenan (Eds.),\u00a0Broken Faith: Why Hope Matters<\/em>, Bern, 2013.<\/p>\n

\u2018Forgiveness between the Theological and the Social\u2019, in T. Eggensperger, U.Engel, A.F. M\u00e9ndez Montoya (Eds.),\u00a0Edward Schillebeeckx: Impulse f\u00fcr Theologien – Impetus Towards Theologies<\/em>, Gr\u00fcnewald, Verlag,<\/em>\u00a02012.<\/p>\n

\u2018Wisdom to Know the Difference: Reconfiguring a Theological Paradigm in the Transition to Peace in Ireland\u2019 (with Lesley Carroll) in John O\u2019Grady and Peter Scherle (Eds.),\u00a0Ecumenics from the Rim: Explorations in Honour of John D\u2019Arcy May<\/em>\u00a0(M\u00fcnster: LIT Verlag, 2007).<\/p>\n

Forthcoming: \u2018Body of Christ, Body of Life\u2019 in Andrew Pierce & Oliver Schuegraf (ed.), Den Blick weiten: Wenn \u00d6kumene den Religionen begegnet. Ecumenism Encounters the Religions. Proceedings of the 17th Academic Consultation of the\u00a0Societas Oecumenica<\/em>\u00a0(Beihefte zur \u00d6kumenischen Rundschau 99), Leipzig 2014).<\/p>\n

She has contributed papers at Interfaith and Ecumenical Symposia in India, Iran, Israel, USA, Australia, Argentina, South Africa and Zimbabwe, and many European Countries on the renewal of intra- and inter-religious epistemologies and ethical traditions of overcoming violence and building theologies of peace in a plural world. Currently she is on the Editorial board of the journal,\u00a0One in Christ<\/em>.<\/p>\n

—————-oOo—————–<\/p>\n

Back<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sr Geraldine Smyth OP is from Belfast\u00a0 One of a family of\u00a0 six\u00a0 brought up\u00a0 off the Falls Road she went to St Dominic\u2019s High School where Mary McAleese was … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1194","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1194","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1194"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1216,"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1194\/revisions\/1216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pobalde.ie\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}