2004 Board Meeting
North American Patristics Society
Minutes of the Executive Board Meeting
Loyola University Chicago (Bremner Lounge, Mertz Building)
27 May 2004
Attending: William Tabbernee (Pres), James Goehring (VPres), Clayton Jefford (Sec/Treas), Jane Merdinger (MatL), Georgia Frank (MatL), Daniel Williams (MatL), Philip Rousseau (Ed), Patout Burns (Ed), Elizabeth Clark (Ed), Paul Schrodt (NAPS member)
Absent: Karen Jo Torjesen (MatL), Jeffrey Bingham (Nominating Committee)
William Tabbernee called the meeting to order at 9:35 am.
1. The President welcomed the new Members at Large (Frank/Williams) and the meeting’s visitor (Schrodt).
2. The Board approved the minutes from the August 2003 meeting (held at Oxford University) with minor corrections.
3. Report of Officers
a. Secretary-Treasurer (Jefford)
Membership for the Society stood at 839 total members at the end of April 2004 (654 regular members; 185 student members), based upon the number of members who have paid their annual dues to date.
Issues of the newsletter Patristics were distributed in September 2003 and March 2004.
The Society’s financial position remains strong. The profits of the Journal seem to have leveled off and are increasingly lost to the expenses that are associated with the production of each issue. During the 2003 fiscal year, general Society revenues exceeded expenses by $20,848.49. The balance of Society holdings on 27 May 2004 was $138,358.03.
The financial situation with respect to the annual meeting is difficult to evaluate now that Group Travel Plus (GTP), which collects the moneys for the event, currently handles the basic matters of registration and housing. It is clear that at least $11,000 will be spent for related fees that are not under the control of GTP.
A motion to accept the financial report of the Treasurer was offered (Merdinger), seconded (Frank) and approved.
Responsibility for the NAPS website has been passed from John O’Keefe to Carl Griffin during the course of 2003. The appreciation of the NAPS Board is extended to Prof. O’Keefe for his work in originally designing the site and maintaining it to date.
A motion that Jefford contact the JHUP with a request that the email addresses of all NAPS members be made available both on the Society’s website and on the list serv was offered (Goehring), seconded (Merdinger) and approved.
b. Vice-President (Goehring)
Both the number of paper proposals and of special sessions have increased in recent years. Goehring offered his appreciation to Williams for maintaining contacts with publishers who display books at the meeting.
Experiences with GTP in making arrangements for the annual meeting have been very positive in general. It was recommended that a survey of those who attended the meeting be undertaken to determine general satisfaction with GTP’s work in conducting the meeting. Some Board members requested that a list of conference participants (with address and email information) be collected for distribution among those who were present.
A letter of recommendations about paper submissions and the vetting process was submitted by Merdinger and will be taken under consideration by Goehring.
Williams made a recommendation that book exhibitors be charged a fee for future displays at the annual meeting.
A motion that all book exhibitors be charged a set fee of $100 per table in future meetings was offered (Williams), seconded (Jefford) and approved.
4. Report of Committees
a. Nominating Committee (Tabbernee for Jeffrey Bingham)
The Committee recommended that the following persons be offered to the Society for Board positions during the forthcoming year: Maureen Tilley of the University of Dayton as Vice-President; Richard Valantasis of Iliff School of Theology as Member at Large; and, Vasiliki Limberis of Temple University as Member at Large.
A motion to accept this recommendation was offered (Williams), seconded (Frank) and approved.
Discussion followed with respect to whether Goehring should compile a more complete handbook or Procedures Manual for the work of NAPS officers, the text of which would be kept on file by the Secretary for access by future Board members.
A motion to provide travel and incidental financial assistance for Goehring to meet with Jefford during the course of the year to compile such a manual was offered (Frank), seconded (Williams) and approved.
b. Journal of Early Christian Studies (Clark and Burns)
Three persons have been added to the Journal of Early Christian Studies (JECS) Advisory Board: David Brakke (Indiana University); Bart Ehrman (University of North Carolina); Richard Valantasis (Iliff School of Theology. Catherine Chin, the JECS editorial assistant, has resigned her position and was replaced during the summer of 2003 by Michael Rackett.
The finances of the JECS are in excellent shape. The flow of submissions varies, with more article proposals from scholars outside of the United States than in previous years. Currently there are numerous articles that have been accepted for publication pending revision that are awaiting the response of those authors. The Board recommended that contributors whose articles are in need of revision be provided with a specific due date for those changes in order to decrease the backlog of waiting manuscripts.
There has been considerable discussion between the editors of the JECS concerning the addition of a new editor to replace Burns, who will leave his position this year. It was recommended by Burns and Clark that Prof. David Brakke be installed as co-editor in place of Burns for the purpose of learning the functions of the JECS from Clark as a matter of transition before her own departure as editor. The Board expressed concern that there was not a standardized process for the transition of editors and that, unlike the process by which the editor of the PMS is selected, opportunity was not provided for the input of the Executive Board in the matter. After considerable discussion, it was agreed that the process needed specific review and significant reform.
A motion that Brakke be appointed as co-editor of the JECS to replace Burns was offered (Goehring), seconded (Jefford) and approved.
A motion that a group of NAPS members be convened (to include Williams [as chair], Clark, Burns, Brakke, Rousseau, Frank, Goehring, and Patricia Cox Miller) to decide upon a suitable process for appointing editors to the JECS and PMS that would be recommended to the Board at the annual meeting in 2005 was offered (Tabbernee), seconded (Goehring) and approved.
A motion that JECS Board members serve for three-year terms, renewable once, and to be followed by at least a one-year break was offered (Goehring), seconded (Merdinger) and approved.
A request was made by Clark to the effect that the Executive Board pay the JECS editorial assistant an additional $3000 for the 2004 fiscal year to offset research moneys that she annually provides as part of the assistant’s annual salary. Clark excused herself from the room for fair deliberation. There was a lengthy discussion on the situation.
After lengthy discussion, a motion that NAPS make a one-time payment to the JECS editorial assistant for 2004 only was offered (Williams), seconded (Frank) and approved.
The Board expressed its appreciation to Prof. Burns for his service to the JECS as Co-editor during the recent years of the journal’s publication.
c. Patristic Monograph Series (Philip Rousseau)
Three manuscripts are currently in the process of review with respect to the series: one is being revised, one is being edited; one is with the readers. Rousseau is currently in discussion with The Catholic University of America Press (CUAP) about advertising the series more widely. He intends to ask if CUAP will provide copies of each published work to the PMS Board members either gratis or at some significant discount (this practice does not appear to have been followed with past volumes). Rousseau noted that all PMS Board members would now serve for three-year periods. Williams and Tabbernee will be responsible for dividing the current members into an appropriate structure for this purpose.
The PMS publication contract excludes any copy-editing on the part of CUAP. After some discussion, the Board agreed that this element of the contract should be renegotiated with CUAP. Williams and Tabbernee were asked to discuss this situation with David J. McGonagle, the Director of the CUAP.
Rebecca Weaver has made a request that the rights to her volume in the PMS series be released for the purpose of translation into Russian. The Board approved the request.
d. Best First Article Committee (Tabbernee)
There were no submissions for the prize of ‘Best First Article’ during 2003. Therefore, no award was given.
There were four submissions for the prize of ‘Best First Article’ during 2004. No decision had been made at the time of the Board meeting, but would be decided and announced at the time of the Society business meeting on Friday 28 May 2004.
5. The next annual meeting of the Society will be held at Loyola University Chicago on 2-4 June 2005. This date is a week later than usual in order to accommodate the possible use of new campus facilities at reduced housing rates that should be available at that time.
The Board expressed its appreciation to Prof. Tabbernee for his service as President of the Society during the previous two years.
6. William Tabbernee adjourned the meeting at 1:07 pm.
(Addendum to the 2004 Minutes of the Executive Board Meeting)
2004 Business Meeting
North American Patristics Society
Actions of and Notifications to the Society
Loyola University, Chicago (Crown Center Auditorium)
28 May 2004
1. The Society will publish its Membership Directory during the Fall of 2004. All members are encouraged to have updated addresses on file with the JHUP by 01 September 2004 in order to insure the accuracy of the directory.
2. The Executive Board recommended that the following persons be offered to the Society for Board positions during the forthcoming year: Maureen Tilley of the University of Dayton as Vice-President; Richard Valantasis of Iliff School of Theology as Member at Large; and, Vasiliki Limberis of Temple University as Member at Large.
A motion to accept this recommendation was offered, seconded and approved.
3. There were four submissions for the prize of ‘Best First Article’. The Society was informed that the winner for the 2004 competition was Carole C. Burnett, Professor of Ancient and Medieval Christianity, Ecumenical Institute of Theology, at St. Mary’s Seminary and University. The title of her article is ‘Dysfunction at Diospolis: A Comparative Study of Augustine’s De gestis Pelagii and Jerome’s Dialogus adversus Pelagianos,’ Augustinian Studies 34.2 (2003): 153-173.
4. The Executive Board announced that Prof. David Brakke of Indiana University has been selected to replace Prof. Patout Burns as Co-editor of the JECS.
5. A motion that, at future annual meetings of the Executive Board, the previous year’s Society President should be expected to attend and function in an ex-officio capacity was offered (Philip Rousseau), seconded (Michael Slusser) and approved.
Respectfully submitted,
Clayton N. Jefford
16 June 2004