Liberty professor earns Fulbright grant to teach, translate Romanian philosopher’s works

Dr. Michael Jones, professor of philosophy in Liberty University’s College of Arts & Sciences, has been accepted as a Fulbright Scholar to Romania, where he will spend the Spring 2026 semester at Lucian Blaga University in the city of Sibiu teaching and working alongside Romanian university students to translate the philosophical writings of Blaga into English.

The Fulbright grant is a prestigious, competitive award funded by the U.S. Department of State that provides faculty members with the opportunity to research and teach in a foreign country. This trip marks Jones’ third Fulbright grant — and second as a Liberty faculty member — and aids his decades-long endeavor to introduce Blaga’s philosophical works to America. It will be his 15th visit to Romania.

The esteemed Romanian philosopher Lucian Blaga (1895-1961), rose to prominence in the 20th century for his works in poetry, theatre, and philosophy. He was censored shortly after World War II by the Romanian People’s Republic, a communist regime influenced by the Soviet Union. Because Blaga was not a communist philosopher, he was blacklisted by the regime and prohibited from speaking, publishing, and teaching. However, Blaga continued writing philosophy manuscripts, which were later published in Romanian following his death in 1961.

Jones said the Soviet Union’s suppression prevented Blaga from potentially gaining major international notoriety.

“It’s a shame that communism took over right when it did and prevented him from getting known outside of Romania,” Jones said. “They squashed him, and he would have been a really big name otherwise. But maybe it’s not too late.”

Jones will spend the first few weeks of the semester lecturing about Blaga’s key philosophical concepts and training students how to approach translation theory. He will then work with his team, who speak both Romanian and English, to interpret Blaga’s philosophy line by line and translate his work into an accurate representation of the fluent English language. Depending on the number of students enrolled, the class may be able to translate an entire book in one semester.

“I want it to be translated into good English, not a very wooden literal translation, but fluent so it’s easy for Americans to read,” Jones said.

Jones spent his first Fulbright in 2000 researching his doctoral dissertation, which he later published as a book. He also received a Fulbright in 2014, his first as a Liberty faculty member, to teach courses in philosophy of religion and ethics at the University of Bucharest. He has organized LU Send Study Abroad trips to Romania, accepted speaking engagements at conferences, and taught at multiple universities.

These opportunities to network, teach, and research, Jones said, would not have been possible without the Fulbright grants and the support from Liberty.

“I’ve had all kinds of academic and ministry opportunities as a result of my trips to Romania, some of which were funded by Fulbright,” said Jones, noting that submitting strong applications for the program requires rigorous and time-consuming focus. “It’s had a huge and positive impact on my life, and it’s been so beneficial to me.”

While in Romania next semester, Jones plans to connect with and serve in a local church, a priority he set for each of his trips abroad.

“Most of us at Liberty who receive Fulbright grants, whether we’re students or faculty, view it as an opportunity for ministry,” said Jones, whose wife, education professor Dr. Laura Jones, also received a Fulbright grant in 2022 to research and teach in Romania. “We want to do our research, but while we’re over there, we also want to serve the Lord. We view ourselves as tentmakers. We’re going over to teach and do research, but we want to minister while we’re there. For us, that’s a really big thing.”

The university’s Fulbright committee, led by Professor of Government and Fulbright Program Advisor and Scholar Liaison Dr. Edna Udobong, has consistently helped students and faculty apply for and receive prestigious scholarship opportunities to study, teach, and research abroad.

Liberty’s applicants, who work through a laborious three-stage application process alongside the committee, are competing with students and faculty from distinguished institutions like UCLA, Harvard, Yale, MIT, and more.

“I’m thrilled that we have, almost every year now, students who are successful,” said Jones, a member of Liberty’s Fulbright committee whose key responsibilities within the committee involve mentoring students and assisting with applications.

Jones said he is looking forward to visiting Romania once again, reconnecting with friends, plugging into a church family, being the ‘hands and feet’ of Jesus, and illuminating Blaga’s philosophical work for a global audience.

“My life project is making (Blaga) no longer unknown and bringing him out into the light,” Jones said. “If we translate his work into English, he will be accessible to virtually the whole world.”

Each year, Liberty students and faculty apply for and obtain Fulbright grants. Earlier this year, two graduates, Samuel Heath and Evelyn Loftin, earned grants to research and teach in Europe; rising senior Tyler Kerr received the competitive Boren Scholarship to master Portuguese in Brazil; and Liberty hosted Dr. Hilly Moodrick-Even Khen, an expert on genocide and a senior lecturer of public international law at Ariel University in Israel, as its first Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence.

For more information on the Fulbright Program, contact Professor of Government Edna Udobong at eudobong3@liberty.edu.