Biography

Schroeder has been committed to research, teaching, writing, mentoring, and practice in the area of mission and intercultural ministry from the perspectives of post-Vatican II developments, most recently under the inspiration of Pope Francis. He published a revised and expanded edition of his book What is the Mission of the Church? A Guide for Catholics in 2018. Secondly, since 2012 he has been collaborating with others in developing resources and long-term programs to foster true intercultural relationships, which are mutually enriching and challenging, primarily for women’s and men’s religious congregations for both the international and North American contexts. In 2020, he co-edited (with CTU colleague Maria Cimperman) Engaging Our Diversity: Interculturality and Consecrated Life Today, and it was published in Spanish in 2022 (Comprometernos con la Diversidad). Thirdly, coming out of his years of research and teaching in the field of the polycentric History of the World Christian Movement, Schroeder’s ten-year work of Christian Tradition from a Global Perspective was published in the Fall of 2021. This book received Third Place for Excellence in Publishing Award in Theology by the Association of Catholic Publishers, and it was selected as one of the “Ten Outstanding Books in Mission Studies, Intercultural Theology, and World Christianity for 2021” by the ecumenical Overseas Ministry Study Center of Princeton Theological Seminary. Finally, his experience with and learning from indigenous peoples includes six years of life and work in remote village areas of Papua New Guinea in the 70s and 80s as a missionary and practical anthropologist, and annual visits to the Lakota reservations in southwest South Dakota since 1991.

Roger is an Associate Editor of the International Bulletin of Mission Research and on the editorial committee for the Scholarly Monograph Series of the American Society of Missiology. He has served as president of the American Society of Missiology, the Association of Professors of Mission, and the Midwest Fellowship of Professors of Mission (twice). He is currently serving his sixth three-year term as the Coordinator of Anthropos Institute (international network of about forty SVD/SSpS specialists in the social and religious sciences) for his religious congregation of the Society of the Divine Word (SVD). In relation to the latter, he co-edited (with SVDs Stanisław Grodź and Sebastian Michael) in late 2021 Giants’ Footprints: 90th Anniversary of Anthropos Institute (1931-2021).

Roger Schroeder, SVD

Achievements

Publications
  • Initiation and Religion: A Case Study from the Wosera of Papua New Guinea. Studia Instituti Anthropos 46 (University Press, Fribourg Switzerland, 1992).
  • Constants in Context: A Theology of Mission for Today (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2004). With Stephen Bevans. [Also published as an Asian edition, and translated into Indonesian, Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese]
  • Prophetic Dialogue: Reflections on Christian Mission Today (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2011). With Stephen Bevans. [Translated into Italian and Portuguese]
  • What is the Mission of the Church? A Guide for Catholics: Revised and Expanded Edition (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018).
  • Engaging Our Diversity: Interculturality and Consecrated Life Today (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2020). Co-edited with Maria Cimperman. [Translated into Spanish, 2022]
  • Christian Tradition in Global Perspective (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2021).
  • Giants’ Footprints: 90th Anniversary of Anthropos Institute (1931-2021). Collectanea Instituti Anthropos No. 53 (Baden-Baden, Germany: Academia Verlag, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 2021). Co-edited with Stanisław Grodź and S.M. Michael.
  • “Prophetic Dialogue and Interculturality.” In Mission on the Road to Emmaus: Constants, Context and
    Prophetic Dialogue, edited by Cathy Ross and Stephen Bevans, 215-226 (London: SCM Press, 2015).
  • “Defining New Prospects: Mission Inter-Gentes, Prophetic Dialogue, and Evangelization Today.” In Evangelizing in Time: New Models of Mission in the Ethiopian Context. Proceedings of the Conference, 17-19 December 2015, 10-21. (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: Comboni Missionaries, 2016).
  • “La interculturalidad como paradigm de mission.” In Interculturalidad: en la vida y la mission, edited by
    Lazar T. Stanislaus and Martin Ueffing, 417-438 (Estella, Spain: Editorial Verbo Divino, 2017).
  • “Interculturality as a Paradigm for Mission.” In Intercultural Living: Explorations in Missiology, edited by
    Lazar Stanislaus and Martin Ueffing, 172-185. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018.
  • “Mission in Roman Catholic Theology.” In Christian Mission, Contextual Theology, Prophetic Dialogue: Essays in Honor of Stephen B. Bevans, SVD, edited by Dale T. Irvin and Peter C. Phan, 17-36. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2018.
  • “Indigenous Theologies in the Americas.” Australian Journal of Mission Studies 12, no. 2 (2018): 35-46.
  • “Steps Toward Reconciliation: The CTU-Lakota Relationship.” In The Church and Indigenous Peoples in the Americas, edited by Michel Andraos, 160-173. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2019.