ICSST Welcomes Theology and Science Scholar, Jamie Boulding

Immaculate Conception Seminary School of Theology is pleased to welcome Jamie Boulding, Ph.D., as an assistant professor of systematic theology with a specialization in theology and science, starting in Fall 2024.

Boulding joins Seton Hall as an innovation hire, a position created by the Office of the Provost to help promote interdisciplinary research, teaching, and service across Seton Hall.

Boulding most recently served as the associate director of the Witherspoon Institute in Princeton, New Jersey, where he worked on interdisciplinary academic programs for Princeton undergraduate and graduate students. Prior to that, he served as a postdoctoral fellow in theology and science at Samford University in Alabama. His fellowship was part of the University of Edinburgh’s "God and the Book of Nature" project, which was supported by the Templeton Foundation and encouraged constructive engagement between theology and the natural sciences.

Boulding earned his Ph.D. in Theology and Science from Corpus Christi College at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. His dissertation brought Plato, Thomas Aquinas and Nicholas of Cusa into dialogue with modern cosmology and was titled "The Multiverse and Participatory Metaphysics." It was published by Routledge in 2021. He also earned a Master of Science (M.Sc.) in Science and Religion from the University of Edinburgh and a B.A. and M.Phil. in Theology from Cambridge.

"Our Seminary School of Theology and larger University is very blessed to have Dr. Boulding join the faculty. He is a scholar of great promise working at the intersection of theology, philosophy and natural science," commented Father Joseph R. Laracy, S.T.D., associate professor and chair of systematic theology. Professor Boulding will teach graduate courses in systematic theology as well as undergraduate Core classes. He will begin developing a new class at the intersection of theology and science.

Seton Hall University has a long history of scholarly engagement in the science and religion field. The first professor of theology at Seton Hall, Father Januarius De Concilio, D.D. (1836-1898), authored Harmony Between Science and Religion. More than a century later, Seton Hall became the academic home of Father Stanley L. Jaki, O.S.B., S.T.D., Ph.D., who served on the physics faculty from 1965-2009. With a prolific output comprising more than 50 books and more than 350 articles, he held prestigious positions such as the Gifford Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh and the Fremantle Lecturer at Balliol College, Oxford. Father Jaki received the Templeton Prize in 1987.

Most recently, the University hosted the Stanley Jaki International Congress on April 24, 2024, which marked the centenary year of Father Stanley Jaki’s birth in 1924, bringing together scholars from across the United States as well as Australia, the United Kingdom, Italy, Norway, and Hungary. The conference was sponsored by the University’s Departments of Physics and Catholic Studies, Immaculate Seminary School of Theology, Core Curriculum Program, Center for Catholic Studies and chapter of the Society of Catholic Scientists, in collaboration with the Stanley Jaki Foundation. A collection of peer-reviewed papers from the conference is expected to be published by Gracewing Ltd.

Categories: Education, Faith and Service, Science and Technology