Renewing Christian intellectual life in the world's research universities
In-depth scholarly responses exploring links between the theology and specific research areas.
University of Oxford
In ' Love and Natural Sciences ' Ian Hutchinson presents an excellent application of Oliver O'Donovans's Theology Brief ' The Sovereignty of Love ' to those working in the natural sciences. It prompted me to go beyond theoretical considerations and think how this should work out in practice within m…
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Oliver O'Donovan's theology brief "The Sovereignty of Love" [ 1 ] springs from Jesus' two great commandments (Matt 22:37-40): to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself. "On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets", says Jesus. O'Donovan's…
University of Oxford
At first sight “love” and “natural science” seem an incongruous pairing. Love is an aspect of human experience, in particular of personal relationship with another person or thing. The word love is then applied to a wide variety of entities, including inanimate things such as landscapes, sunsets, pa…
University of Queensland
I was both surprised and challenged by O’Donovan’s argument that love should be primary for a Christian scholar. My prior perspective was that universities are primarily about thinking. Integrity, both intellectual and moral, should be the main characteristic of Christian scholars. This includes int…
University of Oxford
Oliver O’Donovan offers an inspiring and illuminating account of the supremacy of love in Christian moral thinking. He clarifies how Jesus’ teaching about the greatest commandment in the law offers a principle that guides and interprets all of life. ‘To glorify God and to enjoy Him forever’ was said…
University of Oxford
An earlier version of this Brief was presented at the Global Faculty Initiative Faculty Retreat on Disciplinary Encounters with the Theology of Love at Yarnton Manor, Oxford, 8 May 2026.
University of Oxford
Love is an I know not what That comes I know not whence And slips inside, I know not how And wounds I know not where […]
University of Rosario
One of the central theses of Professor O’Donovan’s Theology Brief titled The Sovereignty of Love is that there is a strong and intimate connection between love and knowledge. This idea, which has a long history in Western thought, implies different interrelated affirmations: Firstly, there is a kind…
University of Oxford
In considering how briefly to respond to Professor O’Donovan’s Brief from the perspective of my own discipline – that of historical research and writing – a constructive point of convergence is with part of the working definition that he offers: love as ‘ directive attention to the good of persons’ …
University of Otago
The intelligibility of biblical law is derived from love, in that ‘love orients all moral direction in Scripture’, writes Professor O’Donovan . [ 1 ] The love-command directs us to love fellow-creatures as an indirect way of loving the invisible God, the neighbour presenting us with a reflection of …
University of Queensland
Oliver O’Donovan’s magisterial paper on the sovereignty of love discusses a variety of dimensions of love. A core argument is that love is more than a feeling. It requires action:
Harvard Medical School
Love is central to human flourishing, and therefore a central concern of psychiatry. Helping patients to love more effectively can become an important focus of treatment when life events challenge a patient, when the patient has lost perspective on love, when a clinician sees a need for love as a he…
Harvard University School of Public Health
As O’Donovan (2026) rightly observes in his Theology Brief on “The Sovereignty of Love,” the Christian tradition puts love at the center of its ethics, and at the heart of what it means for humans to flourish. Jesus taught that the greatest commandment was to love God and to love one’s neighbor, and…
Pontificia Universidad Católica
Oliver O'Donovan's account of the sovereignty of love offers a powerful corrective to conceptions of love as mere sentiment or benevolent motive. Love, on his account, is "an affective and directive attention to a good": it interprets moral norms, belongs within practical reason, and gives direction…
At the core of economic analysis is the idea that there are gains from trade between economic agents, such as individuals, businesses, states. The simplest formulation has two agents with different endowments of goods, who by trading with each other can attain bundles of goods that satisfy them bett…
University of Technology Sydney
An earlier version of this Brief was presented as the opening address of an Oxford Faculty Workshop on “The Sovereignty of Love” hosted by GFI in partnership with the Lanier Theological Library, Yarnton Manor, 6 June 2025.
University of Oxford
The heart of Oliver O'Donovan's paper is an Augustinian view of the “order of love”. Though he does not come to state this overtly until over half way through, its influence has been pervasive from the beginning. In his own words:
Garrett-Evangelical Seminary
Love is beleaguered in a world filled with polarization and violence. Jealousy, bigotry, hubris, and resentful revenge are traits Paul described in 1 Corinthians 13:4–5 as signs of a troubled Roman society, and they are appearing again in today’s headlines. Siloed and binary thinking divides people …
University of Oxford
At the GFI round table on the insightful theological brief The Sovereignty of Love , much of the discussion turned on O'Donovan's mobilisation of the Augustinian idea of the orders of love. The panellists were by no means sure that O'Donovan's formulation that we should love things for the sake of p…
University of Oxford
O'Donovan's Brief opens with the love-command as the summary of all moral direction and concludes with a double warning against abstract norms of knowledge and action on the one hand, and against “an impractical idea of love confined to attitude and feelings” on the other. Between these poles, the B…
University of Oxford
I thank Professor O’Donovan for such a rich and stimulating Theology Brief. I focus my remarks on one aspect that is mentioned only briefly – love for the stranger. I think it is especially important that we think more on this in an age where there is so much fear and antagonism directed towards ‘th…
As O’Donovan states, both love and justice have been deemed the supreme virtue at various points in the philosophical tradition. How can these virtues be integrated with each other when the role of governing the other virtues is attributed to both? An answer is suggested in the writings of the Churc…
No disciplinary briefs in that discipline.
