Dr. Abraham Velez de Cea

• Professor

Bio  •  Curriculum Vitae

Contact Information

• Department: History, Philosophy & Relig Studies
• Office: Keith 331
• Mailing Address: Keith 323
• Email: Abraham.Velez@eku.edu
• Phone: 622-2939
• Web Page: http://philosophy.eku.edu/people/velez-de-cea

Bio

Born in Saragossa, Spain, Dr. J. Abraham Vélez de Cea teaches Buddhism and World Religions at Eastern Kentucky University since 2006. Before joining EKU he taught Buddhist Ethics and Buddhist-Christian Mysticism in the department of theology at Georgetown University. He is active in the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies, and the Buddhist Critical-Constructive Reflective Group of the American Academy of Religion.

He is interested in peace-building through interfaith dialogue, which he sees as a spiritual practice for everybody, not just scholars and representatives of religious communities. He believes that interreligious education, comparative theology, and interreligious studies are indispensable tools to foster mutual understanding and cooperation among people from diverse faiths.

He has published four books in Spanish and one in English, The Buddha and Religious Diversity (Routledge, 2013), which discusses the Buddha’s attitude towards religious diversity in conversation with Christian theology of religions. He has also published several articles about diverse aspects of early Buddhist thought and interreligious dialogue in peer-reviewed journals including Philosophy East &West, Sophia, Journal of Interreligious Dialogue, Buddhist Studies Review, Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Journal of Buddhist-Christian Studies.

At present he is translating Pali texts into Spanish, writing a book chapter about Pope Francis and Interreligious Dialogue, and working on a book project comparing Theresa of Avila and the Buddha, where he addresses the question of whether it is possible to practice Buddhist and Christian meditation without contradiction.

Courses