Sessional Faculty / Jacob Benjamins
Jacob Benjamins
PhD, MAS, MA, MA
- SSHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Biography
Jacob Benjamins is a SSHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Institute for Christian Studies. He completed a double doctorate with KU Leuven and Australian Catholic University, and holds a Master of Advanced Studies in Theology and Religion (KU Leuven), an MA in Philosophy of Religion (McGill University), and an MA in Theology (Regent College). At KU Leuven he coordinates the Interfaculty Centre for Catholic Thought and takes part in Atheism and Christianity: Moving Past Polemic, a research collaboration with Australian Catholic University. His recent work follows the Christian contemplative traditions — monastic and religious lives shaped by silence, solitude, asceticism and stillness.
Research Foci
- Phenomenology
- Political theology
- Metaphor in philosophy and theology
- The experience of divine absence and presence
- Christian contemplative traditions
Publications
- The Play of Goodness: Creation, Phenomenology, and Culture (New York: Fordham University Press, 2025).
- Co-editor, The Act of Contemplation: Metaphysics, Phenomenology and the Religious Life (University of Toronto Press, forthcoming).
- Co-editor, From Contemplation to Critique: Key Figures of Social Spirituality in the Twentieth Century (Studies in Spirituality, forthcoming).