Описание: Today the chasm between rich and poor is constantly widening. While the wealthy seem to acquire more and more, the impoverished struggle to survive and thrive. This problem pervades not only the secular world but also modern Christianity. The Western church continues to spend more of its resources on its own needs than on those whom God calls us to see and to serve. Perhaps worse, the wealthiest church in history has often become complicit with systemic structures that perpetuate poverty in their own cities. Author and pastor Jimmy Dorrell explains that Scripture demands a drastically different attitude and approach from the wealthy regarding the poor.In Commonwealth: Transformation through Christian Community Development, Dorrell not only explores the cultural entrapment of the modern church regarding wealth and relationships, but offers practical ways that Christians can serve and empower the poor and marginalized in their own communities. Drawing on experiences from twenty-eight years at Mission Waco | Mission World and Church Under the Bridge, and undergirded by a thorough and holistic engagement with Scripture, Christian history, and effective models, Dorrell's team has restored one of the most underserved neighborhoods in his community with programs for the unemployed, the homeless, the sick, the addicted and struggling children and teens. They even created a non-profit grocery store in the food desert, transformed a pornographic theater, and built an economic center in a former liquor store.Christian community development rooted in the Gospel of Jesus Christ is how we become neighbors in the biblical sense. Beyond handouts and increased donations, it is only when the poor and marginalized of our communities are empowered that the whole city truly prospers. There is a commonwealth of resources and gifts in all classes, and, if we choose to work together, we can change unjust structures of privilege and favoritism. Dorrell challenges us to see that it is only when we understand how financial prosperity often deepens hardheartedness toward Christ and our neighbors that the Christian church can make the good news of Jesus Christ tangible in our communities and world.
Описание: Science fiction imagines a universe teeming with life and thrilling possibility, but also hidden and hideous dangers. Christian theology, often a polemical target for science fiction, reflects on the plenitude out of which and for which the universe exists. In Science Fiction Theology , Alan Gregory investigates the troubled relationship between science fiction and Christianity and, in particular, how both have laid claim to the modern idea of sublimity. To the extent that science fiction has appropriatedaand reveledain the sublime, it has persisted in a sometimes explicit, sometimes subterranean, relationship with Christian theology. From its seventeenth-century beginnings, the sublime, with its representations of immensity, has informed the imagining of God. When science fiction critiques or reinvents religion, its writers have engaged in a literary guerrilla war with Christianity over what is truly sublime and divine. Gregory examines the sublime and its implicit theologies as they appear in early American pulp science fiction, the horror writing of H. P. Lovecraft, science fiction narratives of evolution and apocalypse, and the work of Philip K. Dick. Ironically, science fictions tussle with Christianity hides the extent to which the sublime, especially in popular culture, serves to distort the classical Christian understanding of God, secularizing that God and rendering Gods transcendence finite. But by turning from the sublime to a consideration of the beautiful, Gregory shows that both Christian and science-fictional imaginations may discover a new and surprising conversation.
Описание: A total of 57 lectures of George Whitefield, one of the most celebrated preachers of England and the American colonies in the 18th century, are presented here. Together, these lectures offer a profound insight into an innovative and often controversial preacher. A man of immense gifts for expression, George Whitefield would commonly drive an audience to tears with his sincere expressions of faith. Pushing the boundaries of his era, Whitefield rebelled against church authority and claimed that God himself permitted that he preach itinerant indoors and in the open air. Whitefield rose from humble beginnings to become one of the most pivotal Christians of his era. Too poor to afford tutelage, the young Whitefield managed to avoid tuition by acting as a servant to other students; assisting them to wash; cleaning their quarters; and carrying their books and satchels. Such menial work appeared to fire George Whitefield's spirit; he converted to Christianity and fervently attended to his studies thereafter.
Описание: God and Difference interlaces Christian theology with queer and feminist theory for both critical and constructive ends. Linn Marie Tonstad uses queer theory to show certain failures of Christian thinking about God, gender, and sexuality. She employs queer theory to dissect trinitarian discourse and the resonances found in contemporary Christian thought between sexual difference and difference within the trinity. Tonstad critiques a broad swath of prominent Christian theologians who either use queer theory in their work or affirm the validity of same-sex relationships, arguing that their work inadvertently promotes gendered hierarchy. This volume contributes to central debates in Christianity over divine and human personhood, gendered relationality, and the trinity, and provides original accounts of God, sexual difference, and Christian community that are both theologically rich and thoroughly queer.
Описание: Drawing on a rich body of multimethod field research, this book examines the ways in which Indonesian and Philippine religious actors have contributed to conflict resolution and under what conditions these efforts have been met with success or limited success.
Uncovers why Catholic organizations fail to foster civic activism
The American Catholic Church boasts a long history of teaching and activism on issues of social justice. In the face of declining religious and community involvement in the twenty-first century, many modern-day Catholic groups aspire to revive the faith as well as their connections to the larger world. Yet while thousands attend weekly meetings designed to instill religiosity and a commitment to civic engagement, these programs often fail to achieve their more large-scale goals.
In Catholic Activism Today, Maureen K. Day sheds light on the impediments to successfully enacting social change. She argues that popular organizations such as JustFaith Ministries have embraced an approach to civic engagement that focuses on mobilizing Catholics as individuals rather than as collectives. There is reason to think this approach is effective--these organizations experience robust participation in their programs and garner reports of having had a transformative effect on their participants' lives. Yet, Day shows that this approach encourages participants to make personal lifestyle changes rather than contend with structural social inequalities, thus failing to make real inroads in the pursuit of social justice. Moreover, the focus on the individual serves to undermine the institutional authority of the Catholic Church itself, shifting American Catholics' perceptions of the Church from a hierarchy that controls the laity to one that simply influences it as they pursue their individual paths.
Drawing on three years of interview, survey, and participant observation data, Catholic Activism Today offers a compelling new take on contemporary dynamics of Catholic civic engagement and its potential effect on the Church at large.
Irreconcilable differences drive the division between progressive and conservative Christians—is there a divorce coming?
Much attention has been paid to political polarization in America, but far less to the growing schism between progressive and conservative Christians. In this groundbreaking new book, George Yancey and Ashlee Quosigk offer the provocative contention that progressive and conservative Christianities have diverged so much in their core values that they ought to be thought of as two separate religions.
The authors draw on both quantitative data and interviews to uncover how progressive and conservative Christians determine with whom they align themselves religiously, and how they distinguish themselves from each other. They find that progressive Christians emphasize political agreement relating to social justice issues as they determine who is part of their in-group, and focus less on theological agreement. Among conservative Christians, on the other hand, the major concern is whether one agrees with them on core theological points. Progressive and conservative Christians thus use entirely different factors in determining their social identity and moral values.
In a time when religion and politics have never seemed so intertwined, One Faith No Longer offers a timely and compelling reframing of an age-old conflict.
Описание: For readers of Patristics, Classics, and Early Christian Studies, this book offers the fullest treatment of Clement of Alexandria`s literary form and its relationship to his theology since the 1960s, and is the only one that draws much on comparative evidence from Roman imperial authors.
Irreconcilable differences drive the division between progressive and conservative Christians—is there a divorce coming?
Much attention has been paid to political polarization in America, but far less to the growing schism between progressive and conservative Christians. In this groundbreaking new book, George Yancey and Ashlee Quosigk offer the provocative contention that progressive and conservative Christianities have diverged so much in their core values that they ought to be thought of as two separate religions.
The authors draw on both quantitative data and interviews to uncover how progressive and conservative Christians determine with whom they align themselves religiously, and how they distinguish themselves from each other. They find that progressive Christians emphasize political agreement relating to social justice issues as they determine who is part of their in-group, and focus less on theological agreement. Among conservative Christians, on the other hand, the major concern is whether one agrees with them on core theological points. Progressive and conservative Christians thus use entirely different factors in determining their social identity and moral values.
In a time when religion and politics have never seemed so intertwined, One Faith No Longer offers a timely and compelling reframing of an age-old conflict.
Описание: Today the chasm between rich and poor is constantly widening. While the wealthy seem to acquire more and more, the impoverished struggle to survive and thrive. This problem pervades not only the secular world but also modern Christianity. The Western church continues to spend more of its resources on its own needs than on those whom God calls us to see and to serve. Perhaps worse, the wealthiest church in history has often become complicit with systemic structures that perpetuate poverty in their own cities. Author and pastor Jimmy Dorrell explains that Scripture demands a drastically different attitude and approach from the wealthy regarding the poor.In Commonwealth: Transformation through Christian Community Development, Dorrell explores the cultural entrapment of the modern church regarding wealth and relationships and calls all Christians to live out genuine love for their neighbors. Drawing on experiences from his time at Mission Waco | Mission World and Church Under the Bridge, and undergirded by a thorough and holistic engagement with Scripture, Christian history, and effective models, Dorrell provides a practical and timely exploration of what it means for the church to be a place of redemption for all of God's people - the rich and the poor.Christian community development rooted in the Gospel of Jesus Christ is how we become neighbors in the biblical sense. Beyond handouts and increased donations, it is only when the poor and marginalized of our communities are empowered that the whole city truly prospers. There is a commonwealth of resources and gifts in all classes, and, if we choose to work together, we can change unjust structures of privilege and favoritism. Dorrell challenges us to see that it is only when we understand how financial prosperity often deepens hardheartedness toward Christ and our neighbors that the Christian church can make the good news of Jesus Christ tangible in our communities and world.
Описание: Just Revolution focuses on oppressed peoples as agents of social transformation in their own political contexts. Using the South African struggle against apartheid as a case study, this book posits a theory of just revolution that rests upon nonviolent just peacemaking practices and social reconciliation bolstered by restorative justice.
Описание: Mayas, and indeed all Guatemalans, are currently experiencing the collapse of their way of life. This collapse is disrupting ideologies, symbols, life practices, and social structures that have undergirded their society for almost five hundred years, and it is causing rapid and massive religious transformation among the K'iche' Maya living in highland western Guatemala. Many Maya are converting to Christian Pentecostal faiths in which adherents and leaders become bodily agitated during worship.
Drawing on over fifty years of research and data collected by field-school students, Hawkins argues that two factors-cultural collapse and systematic social and economic exclusion--explain the recent religious transformation of Maya Guatemala and the style and emotional intensity through which that transformation is expressed. Guatemala serves as a window on religious change around the world, and Hawkins examines the rapid pentecostalization of Christianity not only within Guatemala but also throughout the global South. The ""pentecostal wail,"" as he describes it, is ultimately an acknowledgment of the angst and insecurity of contemporary Maya.
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