This four-week course examines the meaning and significance of four key virtues and their importance in cultivating a virtuous life.
In this Duke Divinity+ online course, renowned theologian Dr. Stanley Hauerwas explores virtue—the key to a life well lived. He examines the meaning and significance of four key virtues—kindness, hope, humility, and generosity—and their importance in cultivating a virtuous life.
What are the practices that shape a virtuous life? Through videos, readings, quizzes, and formation exercises, you will develop a way of thinking about ethics that is creative and relevant for cultivating virtue in your life and your community.
This course is designed so that it can be taken individually or as a small group, which could include members of your church, family, friends, colleagues, and so on. This course provides opportunities to apply your learning to your daily life. Our hope is for you to walk away with an increased capacity to practice the virtues daily.
By the end of this course, you will be able to:
- Apply the distinctiveness and narrative shape of Christian convictions and the process by which character is formed to your own life.
- Explain the role virtues play in Christian discipleship.
Meet the Instructor
Professor Hauerwas has sought to recover the significance of the virtues for understanding the nature of the Christian life. This search has led him to emphasize the importance of the church, as well as narrative for understanding Christian existence. His work cuts across disciplinary lines as he is in conversation with systematic theology, philosophical theology and ethics, political theory, as well as the philosophy of social science and medical ethics. He was named "America’s Best Theologian" by Time magazine in 2001. Dr. Hauerwas, who holds a joint appointment in Duke Law School, delivered the prestigious Gifford Lectureship at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland in 2001.
His book, A Community of Character: Toward a Constructive Christian Social Ethic, was selected as one of the 100 most important books on religion of the 20th century. Dr. Hauerwas recently authored The Work of Theology (Eerdmans, 2015), Hannah’s Child: A Theological Memoir, 2nd Ed. (Eerdmans, 2012), and War and the American Difference: Theological Reflections on Violence and National Identity ( Baker Academic Press, 2011).
If you are a Duke alum with a degree from Duke University, you can take this course for free. You will need a Duke OneLink account, and then you will need to log into the Coursera for Duke Alumni portal.
If you do not already have a OneLink account, use these instructions to register for an account. Please note that after submitting the required information on the OneLink site, you will be emailed a link to complete the process, which expires after 7 days. Please be prompt in visiting that link so you can finish creating your OneLink account within that time frame, or you will have to start over.
Once you have a OneLink account, you can visit the Coursera for Duke Alumni portal. You will log in with your OneLink credentials, and then you will be able to search at the top of the page for this course. Once you select the course, select the button that says "Enroll for Free."
If you encounter questions, please visit the Coursera for Duke website and use the instructions provided there to ask for help.
Register Today!
This is a program from Divinity+. Learn more about us, or get in touch with any questions.