St. Andrew’s in 2008

2008 was a challenging year with many important events. It was a difficult but fruitful time for all our staff, faculty and students.

Interconfessional and International Cooperation

This year we celebrated the 800^th anniversary of translating St. Andrew’s relics from Constantinople to Amalfi, and the highlight was a large interconfessional conference St. Andrew the Apostle and the Christian Oecumene: Theological, Cultural and Historical Significance of St. Andrew for Contemporary World and Christian Unity organized by St. Andrew’s in cooperation with the Catholic Committee for Cultural Collaboration (CCCC, Rome) and a number of other church and public organizations and institutions from many countries (Freising, Germany, 7-11 June).

Russian Sophiology in European Culture (Moscow, 1-5 October) was the sixth conference on Russian religious philosophy and Western thought held in cooperation with Ostkirchliches Institut, Regensburg and with support of CCCC. And the conference Sobornost, Conciliarity and Communion: from Khomiakov to Zizioulas (Bose, Italy, 23-26 October) continued our cooperation with the Monastery of Bose and contributed to the theological dialogue between the Orthodox and Catholic Churches.

The conference Theological Perspectives of Contemporary Culture (Moscow, 14-15 November) held in cooperation with Catholic and Protestant organizations marked publication in Russian of the book by a famous Dutch theologian Anton Houtepen, “God, an Open Question.”

Our popular monthly public lectures culminated with the 13^th St. Andrew’s Readings on contemporary theological issues on 12-13 December.

St. Andrew’s rector and other faculty members participated in many international events including annual conferences of Journées d’Arras dedicated to Christian-Muslim dialogue and Oikosnet-Europe, a meeting of leaders of ecumenical laity centers, conferences on science and theology dialogue, CEC Future Conference and many others.

Summer Theological Institutes (STI)

We continued our highly successful Summer Theological Institutes, organizing several sessions in Moscow: the 7^th STI and Summer School on 23 June – 5 July and the 4^th Summer Institute on Theology and Science on 18-30 August. These were vibrant meetings with very intensive studies and active communication between students and teachers. Over 100 students came from all over Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and other countries and represented all major confessions. Many of them were established specialists and university professors. Teachers were St. Andrew’s best professors. And we continued our cooperation with St. Cyril and St. Methodius Theological Institute (Minsk) in organizing the 10^th STI in Belarus under blessing of Metropolitan Philaret.

Publishing Program

St. Andrew’s is a recognized leader in academic theological publishing and our books are in demand at Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant seminaries, university theology departments and, most important, in the secular market. In 2008 we published 22 volumes including:

Ø An Introduction to the New Testament by Raymond Brown

Ø An Introduction to the Old Testament ed. by Erich Zenger

Ø That They May All Be One. The Call to Unity by Walter Kasper

Ø Spirituality: Forms, Foundations, Methods by Kees Waaijman

Ø For Our Salvation. Two Approaches to the Work of Christ by Geoffrey Wainwright

Ø First five volumes of the commentary New Testament for Everyone by Tom Wright

Our participation in international book exhibitions in Frankfurt, Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kiev helps us to develop our cooperation with leading publishers and book distributors worldwide. And we maintain our special book distribution projects to theological, university and regional libraries and to theological graduates.

Support Foundation in Europe

Support Foundation for St. Andrew’s Biblical Theological Institute has been launched on 8 November at its first Board meeting in Wageningen, the Netherlands. The details can be found at http://supportstandrews.blogspot.com We are very grateful to our friends in Europe who made it possible and for their support!

Our Gratitude

We are extremely grateful to all organizations and people from different countries and church traditions who provided their spiritual and material support and for their prayers. Our special gratitude is extended to The John Templeton Foundation (USA), The Catholic Committee for Cultural Collaboration (Italy), EMWKerk in Actie (the Netherlands) and The Friends of St. Andrew’s (USA). Without everyone’s support we could not develop our mission and the very existence of St. Andrew’s would be impossible.