Awaiting the King (Cultural Liturgies Book #3)

Author: James K. A. Smith
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 1493406604
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 364

Book Description
In this culmination of his widely read and highly acclaimed Cultural Liturgies project, James K. A. Smith examines politics through the lens of liturgy. What if, he asks, citizens are not only thinkers or believers but also lovers? Smith explores how our analysis of political institutions would look different if we viewed them as incubators of love-shaping practices--not merely governing us but forming what we love. How would our political engagement change if we weren't simply looking for permission to express our "views" in the political sphere but actually hoped to shape the ethos of a nation, a state, or a municipality to foster a way of life that bends toward shalom? This book offers a well-rounded public theology as an alternative to contemporary debates about politics. Smith explores the religious nature of politics and the political nature of Christian worship, sketching how the worship of the church propels us to be invested in forging the common good. This book creatively merges theological and philosophical reflection with illustrations from film, novels, and music and includes helpful exposition and contemporary commentary on key figures in political theology.

Desiring the Kingdom (Cultural Liturgies)

Author: James K. A. Smith
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 1441211268
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 240

Book Description
Malls, stadiums, and universities are actually liturgical structures that influence and shape our thoughts and affections. Humans--as Augustine noted--are "desiring agents," full of longings and passions; in brief, we are what we love. James K. A. Smith focuses on the themes of liturgy and desire in Desiring the Kingdom, the first book in what will be a three-volume set on the theology of culture. He redirects our yearnings to focus on the greatest good: God. Ultimately, Smith seeks to re-vision education through the process and practice of worship. Students of philosophy, theology, worldview, and culture will welcome Desiring the Kingdom, as will those involved in ministry and other interested readers.

Imagining the Kingdom

Author: James K. A. Smith
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 9780801035784
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
2013 Word Guild Award (Academic) How does worship work? How exactly does liturgical formation shape us? What are the dynamics of such transformation? In the second of James K. A. Smith's three-volume theology of culture, the author expands and deepens the analysis of cultural liturgies and Christian worship he developed in his well-received Desiring the Kingdom. He helps us understand and appreciate the bodily basis of habit formation and how liturgical formation--both "secular" and Christian--affects our fundamental orientation to the world. Worship "works" by leveraging our bodies to transform our imagination, and it does this through stories we understand on a register that is closer to body than mind. This has critical implications for how we think about Christian formation. Professors and students will welcome this work as will pastors, worship leaders, and Christian educators. The book includes analyses of popular films, novels, and other cultural phenomena, such as The King's Speech, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, and Facebook.

Awaiting the King

Author: James K. A. Smith
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 9780801035791
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Hear the Ancient Wisdom

Author: Charles R. Ringma
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
ISBN: 1621895785
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 422

Book Description
There is a hunger in the modern world for spirituality. One vast resource of spiritual wisdom comes from the pre-Reformation church--from the martyrs of the first centuries of Christianity, through the long tradition of monasticism, to the medieval Christian mystics. These are the deep wells of Christian reflection from persons such as John Chrysostom, Augustine, Benedict, Francis of Assisi, Bonaventure, Bernard of Clairvaux, Meister Eckhart, Hildegard of Bingen, and Julian of Norwich, to mention just a few. The spiritual insights of over seventy men and women of pre-Reformation Christianity are found in these pages. From these figures we can learn more about the practices of prayer and contemplation, a life of following Christ, the relevance of community, the challenge of asceticism, the movement of withdrawal and engagement, the love of God for God's own sake, living the gospel, sacrificing for the kingdom of God, the longing for union with God, the practices of justice, and a life of prophetic witness. For us, so embedded and shaped by the modern world, this ancient wisdom will come as refreshing water and as a breath of fresh air, with the wings of the Spirit and whispers of angels.

Resurrection and Moral Order

Author: Oliver O'Donovan
Publisher: Inter-Varsity Press
ISBN: 1789740185
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 356

Book Description
In this truly seminal work, the Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at Oxford University illuminates the distinctive nature of Christian ethics with profound thought and massive learning. By grounding Christian ethics in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, he avoids both a revealed ethics that has no contact with the created order and one that is purely naturalistic. For this second edition Professor O'Donovan has added a prologue in which he enters into dialogue with John Finnis, Martin Honecker, Karl Barth and Stanley Hauerwas. Essential reading for advanced students of theology and ethics and their teachers.

Doctrine and Power

Author: Carlos R. Galvao-Sobrinho
Publisher: University of California Press
ISBN: 0520383168
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 322

Book Description
During the fourth century a.d., theological controversy divided Christian communities throughout the Eastern half of the Roman Empire. At stake was not only the truth about God but also the authority of church leaders, whose legitimacy depended on their claims to represent that truth. In this book, Carlos R. Galvao-Sobrinho argues that out of these disputes was born a new style of church leadership, one in which the power of the episcopal office was greatly increased. He shows how these disputes compelled church leaders repeatedly to assert their orthodoxy and legitimacy—tasks that required them to mobilize their congregations and engage in action that continuously projected their power in the public arena. These developments were largely the work of prelates of the first half of the fourth century, but the style of command they inaugurated became the basis for a dynamic model of ecclesiastical leadership found throughout late antiquity.

Migrations of the Holy

Author: William T. Cavanaugh
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 0802866093
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 207

Book Description
Whether one thinks that religion continues to fade or has made a comeback in the contemporary world, there is a common notion that religion went away somewhere, at least in the West. But William Cavanaugh argues that religious fervor never left it has only migrated toward a new object of worship. In Migrations of the Holy he examines the disconcerting modern transfer of sacred devotion from the church to the nation-state. In these chapters Cavanaugh cautions readers to be wary of a rigid separation of religion and politics that boxes in the church and sends citizens instead to the state for hope, comfort, and salvation as they navigate the risks and pains of mortal life. When nationality becomes the primary source of identity and belonging, he warns, the state becomes the god and idol of its own religion, the language of nationalism becomes a liturgy, and devotees willingly sacrifice their lives to serve and defend their country. Cavanaugh urges Christians to resist this form of idolatry, to unthink the inevitability of the nation-state and its dreary party politics, to embrace radical forms of political pluralism that privilege local communities and to cling to an incarnational theology that weaves itself seamlessly and tangibly into all aspects of daily life and culture. William Cavanaugh continues to provide leadership and vision in the field of political theology. He addresses essential questions about the religious status of the nation-state, the political character of the church, and how the tradition of Christian political thought might be brought to bear upon contemporary politics. . . . Unfolds a theological response to present political conditions and a political response to our theological condition. Luke Bretherton King s College London Another vigorous but distinct voice in the burgeoning conversation about the role of religion generally and the church specifically in political life. . . . Worth a careful read. Robert Benne

Eastern Orthodox Christianity and American Higher Education

Author: Ann Mitsakos Bezzerides
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Pess
ISBN: 0268101299
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 456

Book Description
Over the last two decades, the American academy has engaged in a wide-ranging discourse on faith and learning, religion and higher education, and Christianity and the academy. Eastern Orthodox Christians, however, have rarely participated in these conversations. The contributors to this volume aim to reverse this trend by offering original insights from Orthodox Christian perspectives that contribute to the ongoing discussion about religion, higher education, and faith and learning in the United States. The book is divided into two parts. Essays in the first part explore the historical experiences and theological traditions that inform (and sometimes explain) Orthodox approaches to the topic of religion and higher education—in ways that often set them apart from their Protestant and Roman Catholic counterparts. Those in the second part problematize and reflect on Orthodox thought and practice from diverse disciplinary contexts in contemporary higher education. The contributors to this volume offer provocative insights into philosophical questions about the relevance and application of Orthodox ideas in the religious and secular academy, as well as cross-disciplinary treatments of Orthodoxy as an identity marker, pedagogical framework, and teaching and research subject.

The Life and Afterlife of St. Elizabeth of Hungary

Author:
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199889805
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 249

Book Description
This work is a study and translation of the testimony given by witnesses at the canonization hearings of St. Elizabeth, who died at age twenty-four in 1231. The depositions offer vivid anecdotes about her life as well as the healing miracles that were associated with her shrine in Marburg.