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John D. Barbour

John D. Barbour

Professor of Religion and Boldt Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Humanities

St. Olaf College

John D. Barbour is Professor of Religion and Boldt Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Humanities at St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota. A version of his essay “Professing Religion” will appear in Claiming Our Callings: Toward a New Understanding of Vocation in the Liberal Arts, ed. James Farrell, DeAne Lagerquist, and Kaethe Schwehn (Oxford University Press, forthcoming).

Published Articles

Article

Professing Religion

John D. Barbour

No. 37 · Spring 2013

Barbour reflects on the vocation of a Professor of Religion at St. Olaf College, asking when and how a teacher should disclose personal faith in the classroom. Drawing on his graduate teachers Anthony C. Yu and Langdon Gilkey, and on Augustine’s Confessions, Dorothy Day, Malcolm X, C. S. Lewis, and Kathleen Norris, he argues that teaching autobiography invites teaching autobiographically—and that professing religion is finally a matter of how one believes, not just what.