3948 research outputs found
Sort by
TheImago Trinitatis: Towards an Analogy of Interpersonal Mind
No full textThesis advisor: Jeremy D. WilkinsThis dissertation draws upon the work of Thomas Aquinas and Bernard J. F. Lonergan in order to put forward an integrated theorem of the imago Trinitatis. The theorem of the imago Trinitatis, in Catholic theology, is a theorem about how human persons imitate and reflect the triune God. In Aquinas and Lonergan, the imago Trinitatis is identified with the intelligent emanations of word and love that occur within the human mind. But, according to Aquinas, the imago Trinitatis can be considered in two respects: first, as a likeness by analogy—that is, an analogical likeness—and, second, as a likeness by conformity between the human and the divine. The first two chapters explain each of these likenesses in Aquinas, and the next two chapters explain each of these likenesses in Lonergan. The final chapter of this dissertation proposes a complementary analogical likeness of the Trinity in humans: an analogical likeness based upon shared intentionality. It further explains how this likeness is related to the analogical likeness based upon intelligent emanation in Aquinas and Lonergan. In doing so, this dissertation defends an integrated conception of the analogical likeness of the Trinity in human beings, as it unites the analogical likeness based upon intelligible emanation occurring in the human mind and the analogical likeness based upon shared intentionality as interpersonal, coordinated activity. The imago Trinitatis, then, is at once personal and interpersonal, and the analogues for the Trinity in humans are both psychological and communal.Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Theology
Pay to Move: Two Year Analysis of the Northwest Arkansas Council's Life Works Here Program on U.S. Computer Scientist Migration
Get PDFThesis advisor: Mark KazarosianIn November of 2020, the Life Works Here Initiative was launched in Northwest Arkansas targeting the relocation of highly educated remote workers - especially in the sectors of tech and STEAM, science, technology, engineering, the arts and math - to find young talent to pipeline for the future and fill demand gaps in high-tech, high-wage industries and jobs. This paper will investigate characteristics that may have impacted an individual's descision to move into Arkansas following the implementation of the Life Works Here initiative using panel data on migration decision. I found that the characteristic of being a female on average decreases the probability of migrating to Arkansas by -.0001739 percentage points, relative to males, ceteris paribus. I also found that older aged individuals initially increase in the probability of moving into Arkansas until 41.732 years of age, where they will then decrease the probability of relocating to Arkansas.Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Departmental Honors.Discipline: Economics
The Chair, The Ambo, and the Altar: An Expression of the Tria Munera
Get PDFThesis advisor: John F. BaldovinThesis advisor: Liam BerginThis thesis is founded on the ecclesiological premise that the way in which the chair of the priest celebrant, the ambo, and the altar, are shaped and placed in a church greatly informs sacred worship and can either hinder or promote active participation or separation between ordained ministers and laity. What is the the ideal arrangement of the sacred space? This work aims to uncover the history and theology of each axis of the liturgy (chair, ambo, altar), and link them to the munera received in Baptism and Holy Orders in order to present a liturgically inspired arrangement of the sacred space. Finally, a case study of a recently built church will be presented to support the conclusion.Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry.Discipline: Sacred Theology
The Quest for Identity and Self-Understanding in Gal: 3:26-4:7
No full textThesis advisor: Pheme PerkinsThesis advisor: Matthew MonnigThesis (STL) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry.Discipline: Sacred Theology
Controlled Ring Opening Polymerization of 1,2-Anhydrosugars towards Precision Polysaccharides:
No full textThesis advisor: Jia NiuThesis advisor: Jim MorkenPolysaccharides make up one of the largest classes of nature’s macromolecules. However, they are severely understudied relative to other biomolecules such as proteins and DNA sequences. This is because discrete polysaccharides are difficult to isolate from nature or synthesize in laboratories in large enough quantities for thorough research. Polymerization is an efficient route to polysaccharides, yet has historically suffered from harsh conditions and lack of control. Herein, we investigate recent developments in the field of living polymerization as strategies towards synthesis of precision polysaccharides from 1,2- anhydrosugars. We specifically focus on cationic ring opening polymerization (ROP) and reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) ROP polymerization of 1,2-O-Bn-3,4,6-anhydromannose and 1,2-O-Bn-3,4,6-anhydroglucose. Our research screens various catalyst/initiating systems. Our findings demonstrate that cationic ROP and RAFT polymerization are unsuccessful in the living ROP of 1,2-anhydrosugars.Thesis (MS) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Chemistry
Practicing the Common Good: Catholic Tradition, Community Organizing, and the Virtues of Democratic Politics
No full textThesis advisor: M Cathleen KavenyThis dissertation examines the question of whether a politics of the common good remains possible within contemporary democratic societies, characterized by deep pluralism, division, and contention. To engage this question, it draws on the moral and theological framework of the Catholic common good tradition, and employs that framework to identify, analyze, and theorize a real, practical exemplar of common good politics: the democratic tradition of community organizing founded by Saul Alinsky. By placing these two traditions of practice and theory in sustained dialogue for the first time, this study contributes toward a new understanding of each, while developing an original constructive account of the “politics of the common good.” Chapter 1 introduces Catholic common good theory as a framework of ethical analysis and assesses its current state of development. It argues that while contemporary Catholic thinkers have articulated a rich moral vision of the common good, and reconceived it in democratic terms, they have struggled to adequately account for the role of power conflict in political life.
Chapter 2 places the Catholic common good tradition in dialogue with the Alinsky tradition. Analyzing the life, work, and methodology of its controversial founder, Saul Alinsky, it traces his deep relationship to the Catholic church and shows how he sought to embody the Catholic tradition’s vision of the common good in democratic practice, while imbuing it with a greater degree of political realism and attentiveness to power.
Chapter 3 offers a historical and ethical analysis of Alinsky-style community organizing as a practice and dynamically developing tradition of democratic politics. Drawing on Alasdair MacIntyre’s practice theory, it shows how organizing forms the moral virtues, practical skills, and political institutions needed to promote the common good in a democratic society. It also further articulates the Alinsky tradition’s historical and intellectual relationship to the Catholic tradition.
Chapter 4 examines how community organizing exemplifies a democratic form of political prudence. Reconstructing Thomas Aquinas’s theory of prudence, and employing it to analyze two real case studies of organizing campaigns, it develops a constructive account of political prudence as the virtue that enables morally principled and pragmatically effective collective action for the common good in the public realm.
Chapter 5 synthesizes the results of the preceding chapters. It argues that prudent political action, and not merely public deliberation, is the social process by which to promote the common good, social justice, and social solidarity in a democratic society. Integrating key insights from both the Catholic tradition and the Alinsky tradition, it clarifies the role of power conflict in the pursuit of the common good, and identifies further areas for theoretical development.Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Theology
Women Suck: Women as Vampires in Victorian Fiction
Get PDFThesis advisor: Alan RichardsonThis thesis examines the ways two Victorian authors employed the literary vampire to respond to contemporary anxieties regarding women and their role in society. The primary texts of interest in this thesis are Florence Marryat's 1897 novel The Blood of the Vampire and Sheridan LeFanu’s 1872 novella Carmilla. This thesis explores the way each story frames the vampire’s gender, sexuality, and racial background through the lens of her monstrosity.Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Departmental Honors.Discipline: English
Split, knead, fold: A story of Markovian dynamics in one and two dimensions
Get PDFThesis advisor: Kathryn LindseyWe use interval maps to construct pseudo-Anosovs and relate important invariants of each regime. This work builds on techniques of André de Carvalho, Toby Hall, Bill Thurston, and others. We introduce a new perspective on the pseudo-Anosovs created in this way, showing how they constitute the vertices of a tree whose edges encode relations between them. We also characterize the pseudo-Anosovs arising from interval maps, and use this result to reprove a universal lower bound on their stretch factors originally due to Boissy-Lanneau.Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.Discipline: Mathematics
Birth Center Decision-Making among Women and Birthing People in the United States:
No full textThesis advisor: Joyce K. EdmondsBackground: Midwifery-led birth centers (BC) provide positive perinatal outcomes for women and birthing people at low perinatal risk that exceed national outcomes in the United States. Yet, less than 1% of all births occur in BCs. The Coxon conceptual model of birth setting decision-making provides the most comprehensive research framework about how people decide where to give birth. Research is essential for the promotion of an informed decision-making approach regarding birth setting options and the facilitation of access to high value BC care. This dissertation aims to study birth setting decision-making, specifically decision-making about BCs, in the United States.
Methods: Three methods were used to address the overall dissertation aim. An integrative review was conducted to evaluate factors influencing birth setting decision-making in the United States, examining research studies from 2011-2022. A secondary data analysis of the population- based Listening to Mothers in California survey identified factors associated with interest in BC care in a future pregnancy among respondents who experienced hospital birth in California. Finally, a hermeneutic phenomenological study was conducted to explore the decision-making experiences of participants with Medicaid health insurance and who chose to give birth in a freestanding BC in Massachusetts.
Results: Four themes were generated from 23 research studies included in the integrative review. The themes represented factors influencing birth setting decision-making in the United States: Birth Setting Safety Versus Risk, Influence of Media, Family, and Friends on Birth Setting Awareness, Presence or Absence of Choice and Control, and Access To Options. In the Listening to Mothers in California survey, respondents (N = 1447) were more likely to express interest in future BC care if they had experienced pressure from health professionals to have an obstetric intervention, believed childbirth is a process that should not be interfered with unless medically necessary, sought information about hospital cesarean rates, had a doula in labor, and experienced mistreatment. Finally, qualitative data from participant interviews (N = 12) generated five analytic themes that described the BC decision-making process: Desire to Step Away From “the System,” Access to Birth Center Care, Influence of Partners, Family, Friends, the Media, and Birth Workers, the Built Environment of the BC, and the Temporal Dynamics of Decision- Making.
Conclusions: The findings from this dissertation extend our knowledge about BCs as a unique and necessary decision process and choice for perinatal care in the United States. Illuminating why and how people decide to seek care at BCs is vital to expanding access and supporting informed, values-based decision-making about birth settings. By making specifications and refinements to the Coxon conceptual model about birth-setting decision-making, a novel pathway is now available for further research and discovery about how people decide where to give birth in the United States and how to best support their choice.Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. Connell School of Nursing.Discipline: Nursing
Jews and Samaritans in the Gospels and Acts: The Parable of the Good Samaritan - Breaking Barriers to Love
No full textThesis advisor: Christopher R. MatthewsThesis advisor: Matthew MonnigThis study provides a historical analysis of the relations between Jews and Samaritans from the early biblical period up until the time of Jesus in the first century AD. Both Jews and Samaritans made up the ancient biblical Israel. However, rivalry and animosity affected the relationship between these two groups. In line with this development, Samaritans were hated and despised by Jews. Their hostile relations were constituted by ethnic, religious, cultural, political and social matters. Generally, Jews considered Samaritans not to be full-fledge Israelites. Therefore, for Jews, Samaritans were heretics and a schismatic group. Samaritans faced stigmatization from Jews. However, Jesus has a positive evaluation of the Samaritans as well as a friendly disposition toward them as are portrayed in the Gospels, especially in Luke and John. He demonstrates love and regard for Samaritans, and makes an inclusive approach toward them. Moreover, the inclusive and reconciliatory approach of Jesus is portrayed as continuing in the Acts of the Apostles, as the early Jewish missionaries in obedience to Jesus’ injunction (Acts 1:8) take the gospel message to Samaria, which was welcomed. Therefore, my thesis states that in relation to the Jewish-Samaritan historical conflict, the approach of Jesus as depicted in the Gospels and the attitude of the early Jewish Christians as presented in the Acts of the Apostles, were non-discriminatory, non-prejudicial, tolerant and inclusive. These texts present a vision that promotes reconciliation, fosters love and resists discrimination, which should be a paradigm for the human community. This study demonstrates that this love should go beyond the boundaries of ethnicity and past conflicts. This study provides overviews and analyses of the passages in the Gospels and Acts bearing pertinent information on the Samaritans. These scriptural texts are mainly: Matt 10:5b-6; Luke 9:51-59; 17:11–19; and 10:25-37; John 4:4-42 and 8:48; Acts 1:8; 8:1–25; 9:31; and 15:3. This study devotes particular attention to the exegesis of the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37 as the text that occupies the center of overall consideration here. This is to understand its purpose and nature in the entire narrative of Luke and as it pertains to the teachings of Christ on the call to break down barriers to love. The objective is also to draw attention to its relevance for contemporary times where discrimination, prejudices, ethnic and racial differences divide the world. Generally, my study gives significant attention to the socio- religious and narrative functions of the passages under consideration, especially that of the parable of the Good Samaritan. My research work employs the historical-critical method, together with textual, compositional, literary and narrative approaches. This study challenges a world divided by conflicts to overcome divisive structures by building bridges of true love and reconciliation which promote good human relationships and facilitate the common good. It highlights a mission of one humanity to the broken, the crushed and the oppressed of contemporary human society. The analysis of the relations between Jews and Samaritans vis-à-vis the teaching and approach of Christ indicates that people should rise beyond social boundaries, class division and a narrow understanding of “neighbor,” in the response to one love for humanity. Genuine human relationship should not be based on affiliation by blood, religion, race, ethnic group, socio-cultural ties, political group, and so forth. This contributes to paving a way to seek healthy collaboration, and lasting, peaceful co-existence. This work seeks to challenge for a reconsideration of the building of a less discriminatory society and embodying tolerance in a multi-cultural world, where cultural, social, political and religious differences are respected together with the treatment of human persons with dignity and love.Thesis (STL) — Boston College, 2023.Submitted to: Boston College. School of Theology and Ministry.Discipline: Sacred Theology