About the author
Thomas O’Loughlin is Professor of Historical Theology in the University of Nottingham. His research explores how our understanding of Christian belief can be enriched by seeing how individual expressions of that faith, such as the Didache, can be located within the dynamic life of the communities that produced them. ‘Tradition’ is not, therefore, a weight from the past that pulls a community backwards, but rather is the life of that community, constantly seeking to reinterpret its inheritance in the light of its current experience and hopes. The historical theologian’s task is, consequently, that of uncovering how a community inherited, lived, shaped and handed on its vision. O’Loughlin has pursued this study in numerous books and articles over the past 20 years, covering topics relating to the early Church and the early Middle Ages; his passion is training graduate students in this often neglected field of research. He is the editor of the series Studia Traditionis Theologiae (Brepols), which is dedicated to the study of theology through the lens of tradition.