The Rev. Travis Bott, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Old Testament and Hebrew will see his forthcoming book Praise and Metonymy in the Psalms published by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht at the end of 2020. Fr. Bott’s recent sabbatical project and second book, Reflections of Genesis in the Book of Ruth, will be published by Baker Academic in 2021. Fr. Bott received a Conant Trust Grant for his sabbatical leave during the 2019–2020 academic year. He and his family lived in Virginia and carried out research at The University of Virginia and The Center for Christian Study.

The Rev. Thomas L. Holtzen, Ph.D., Professor of Historical and Systematic Theology received the Conant Grant of the Domestic and Foriegn Missionary Society for creating a course on the spirituality of minimalism. The proposed course is titled The Spirituality of Minimalism: Exploring the Intersection of Spirituality and Minimalism through Apophatic Theology and Ultralight Backpacking. This is a grant request for the development of an innovative seminary course on the spirituality of minimalism. The proposed course has been approved by the Provost to be taught during the summer residential session of 2021. Fr. Holtzen plans to develop this course during his Fall 2020 sabbatical from Nashotah House, where he has taught Historical and Systematic Theology for the last seventeen years. Student feedback will be included in his report to the Conant Fund. The grant request covers the costs for a three-day trek that will be part of the curriculum: ultralight backpacking equipment for students’ use, trail fees (Ice Age Trail), and a stipend for a colleague who will assist in leading the trek. 

Elisabeth Rain Kincaid, J.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Ethics and Moral Theology has received a three year Christ and Being Human Pedagogy Fellowship through the Yale Center for Faith and Culture. The Pedagogy of Christ and Being Human project is aimed at evaluating and developing the existing version of the course as taught by Miroslav Volf and Drew Collins at Yale Divinity School, but it is also intended to produce key insights and constructive feedback about its structure and potential for dissemination and proliferation in a broader network of Christian higher educational institutions. Her article titled “Professional Ethics and the Recovery of Virtue” in the Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics Vol. 40, issue 1 (Spring/Summer 2020) will be published this summer.

Dr. Kincaid was also jointly awarded a Conant Grant of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society with the Rev. Ross Kane of Virginia Theological Seminary.  The grant will provide funding for Dr. Kincaid and Fr. Kane to develop a course on Anglican Social Justice in a world-wide perspective for masters and doctoral level students. The course will be a joint offering of Nashotah House Theological Seminary and Virginia Theological Seminary.

The Rev. Matthew S. C. Olver, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Liturgics and Pastoral Theology; Director of St. Mary's Chapel has several publications forthcoming, including, from the Task Force on Liturgical and Prayer Book Revision (TFLPBR), “Containing the Uncontainable: An Analysis of Expansive Liturgical Language in the Episcopal Church, 1987-2018,” Anglican Theological Review.

Fr. Olver delivered a paper titled “When Praying Does Not Shape Believing: Ambrose and Chrysostom as Test Cases for the Tension between Liturgy and Theology,” at the XVIII International Conference on Patristic Studies, Oxford. The paper has been accepted in Studia Patristica, forthcoming. 

As a contributor to the fourth revised edition of The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church , Fr. Olver has completed work on a range of articles on various liturgical matters. The publication is due Summer 2020, Andrew Louth, ed. Further publications include “A Classification of a Liturgy’s Use of Scripture: A Proposal,” Studia Liturgica, (2019), vol. 49, no. 2, 220-45.

In the near future, Fr. Olver also anticipates the publication of his paper, “Jewish Roots of Christian Worship: Its Most Missed and Misunderstood Legacy,” in The Jewish Roots of Christianity, ed. Gerald R. McDermott (Lexham Books, 2020). The paper was delivered at the second Annual Anglican Theology Conference Jewish Roots of Christianity hosted by Beeson Divinity School.