English theologian
Charles Earle Raven (4 July 1885 – 8 July 1964) was an English theologian and Anglican priest. He was Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge University (1932–1950) and Master of Christ's College, Cambridge (1939–1950). His works have been influential in the history of science publishing on the positive effects that theology has had upon modern science.
Career.
Raven was born in Paddington, London on 4 July 1885, and was educated at Uppingham School. He obtained an open classical scholarship at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and then became lecturer in divinity, fellow and dean of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. In 1932, he was elected Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, a position he held until 1950. He was Master of Christ's College, Cambridge (1939–1950).
He was a clergyman in the Church of England, and attained the rank of canon. During the First World War he served as a chaplain to the forces and what he witnessed led him to take a pacifist position, a subject on which he wrote extensively for the rest of his life. As a pacifist, he was an active supporter of the Peace Pledge Union and the Fellowship of Reconciliation.
He first married Margaret Ermyntrude Buchanan Wollaston in 1910, with whom he had four children. Raven was the father of John Raven, the classical scholar and botanist, and grandfather of Andrew Raven and Sarah Raven.
His third marriage was to Hélène Jeanty, a Belgian widow whose husband had been killed by the occupying Germans in World War II. They met while she was working for the World Council of Churches (WCC). They worked together on reconciliation between students of different races, a continuation of her WCC work helping displaced Jews and Germans. She outlived Raven, dying on 9 October 1990 and, continuing the charitable work during her lifetime, left £150,000 to Christ's College to support medical students from overseas.
Raven was the Gifford Lecturer for 1950–1952 in Natural Religion and Christian Theology, at Edinburgh University. He was president of the Field Studies Council from 1953 to 1957 and of the Botanical Society of the British Isles from 1951 to 1955. He won the James Tait Black Award in 1947 for his book "English Naturalists from Neckam to Ray".
Some of his writings have been described as an early example of ecotheology.
Evolution.
Raven was an advocate of non-Darwinian evolutionary theories such as Lamarckism. He also supported the theistic evolution of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.
Historian Peter J. Bowler has written that Raven's book "The Creator Spirit", "outlined the case for a nonmaterialistic biology as the foundation for a renewed natural theology."
List of selected publications.
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References.
Footnotes.
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