While traditional Christian thought and spirituality have always affirmed the divine presence in human life, Thatamanil argues we have much to learn from non-dualistic Hindu thought, especially that of the eighth-century thinker Sankara, and from the Christian panentheism of Paul Tillich. Thatamanil compares their diagnoses and prognoses of the human predicament in light of their doctrine of God or Ultimate Reality. What emerges is a new theology of God and human beings, with a richer and more radical conception of divine immanence, a reconceived divine transcendence, and a keener sense of how the dynamic and active Spirit at work in us anchors real hope and deep joy. Using key insights from Christian and Hindu thought Thatamanil vindicates comparative theology, expands the vocabulary about the ineffable God, and arrives at a new construal of the problems and prospects of the human condition.

This study develops a method for analyzing the semantic and narrative rhetoric of repetition and the narrative rhetoric and function of characterization and applies this method in studies of the characterization of God, Jesus, and Jesus' disciples in the Gospel of Mark.
The studies of characterization distinguish beliefs that are assumed for the audience from beliefs that the narration cultivates for the audience, identifies the rhetorical relationships and organization of cultivated beliefs, and clarifies the contribution of each character's portrayal to the overall narrative development of Mark. The study then considers the contribution of the characterization of the women at the tomb to the portrayal of Jesus' disciples and narrative developments. A concluding inquiry investigates the possible applications of the studies of characterization for determining the rhetorical exigency of the narration and for formulating statements of Mark's proposed theology.

Hauerwas explores why we so fervently seek explanations for suffering and evil, and he shows how modern medicine has become a god to which we look-in vain-for deliverance from the evils of disease and mortality.

The central thesis of The Christ-like God is that Jesus is the reflection in human life of the being of God. John Taylor begins by pointing out how few religious people-or non-religious people- ever stop and think about God, but tend to live with an unconscious stereotype. He discusses throughout the text how we acquire our idea of God, the nature of revelation experience, and the range of reflection on God both within and out-with the Christian tradition. Bishop John Taylor was one of the twentieth century's leading Anglican missionary statesmen. An ecumenist, Africanist and theologian of international repute, he served as a General Secretary of the Church Missionary Society at a crucial stage in its development and later became Bishop of Windsor.

This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishings Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the worlds literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Many believe truth is relative and there is no absolute truth. My question is "Are you absolutely sure?" Read the book. Know the truth and it will make you free.

"To think about the Spirit it will not do to think 'spiritually': to think about the Spirit you have to think materially," claims Eugene F. Rogers. The Holy Spirit, who in classical Christian discourse "pours out on all flesh," has tended in modern theology and worship to float free of bodies. The result of such disembodiment, contends Rogers, is that our talk about the Spirit has become flat and uninspiring. In "After the Spirit Rogers diagnoses a related gap in the revival of trinitarian theology, a mentality that "there's nothing the Spirit can do that the Son can't do better."

The Eastern Christian tradition, by contrast, has usually linked the Holy Spirit with holy places, holy people, and holy things. Weaving together a rich tapestry of sources from this tradition, Rogers locates the Spirit in the Gospel stories of the annunciation, Jesus' baptism, the transfiguration, and the resurrection. These stories offer illuminating glimpses into both the Spirit's connection with the tangible world and the Spirit's distinctive place in relation to the other persons of the Trinity.

Eight gorgeous color plates complement Rogers's witty and passionate prose.

Set against the tumultuous backdrop of contemporary China, Larry Lewis's autobiographical The Misfit tells a moving story of how God breaks through the aridity of human hearts, and how healing occurs in the midst of the everyday. Father Lewis, a Maryknoll missioner, was estranged from himself, his church, and his Maryknoll colleagues when he accepted an assignment to teach English to Chinese students in the interior Chinese city of Wuhan. It was a year before the now-infamous massacre in Tiananmen Square. The Misfit tells how the young Chinese Lewis taught saved him from his alienation and revealed that an important dimension in the growth of all human beings lies in accepting their "misfitness" for the unidimensional life that contemporary culture seeks to impose. With the political turmoil of 1980s China always in the background, Lewis and his Chinese students discover eternal truths through the American literature they study and the growing bonds of friendship they share. Reading John Gardner's "Redemption", Emily Dickinson's poetry, and Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find", Lewis and his students discover that they live in "a world without a roof", and the missioner finds himself rescued from estrangement by the humanity all around him.

An international journal of theology; a catholic journal in the widest sense: rooted in Roman Catholicism yet open to other Christian traditions and the worlds faiths. Promotes discussion in the spirit of Vatican II. Annual subscriptions available.

In this book, Stanley Grenz examines the long-standing trajectory of thought that has equated the concept of "being" with the God of the Bible--and thus claimed that the ontological category of being is the guiding concept by which God should be understood. Grenz extends the engagement between Christian theology and the Western philosophical tradition and focuses the discussion on the importance of naming, particularly given that the Christian God is both named and triune. In doing so, he organizes the book into three parts, forming an overarching story of the interplay between the named character of God and the question of being. First he analyzes the history of the philosophical concept of Being, then he shifts the focus to an exegesis of the "I Am" texts, and finally he moves to a renewed conversation between theology and ontological philosophy by means of the divine name.

The general goal of this book is to add one more voice to the growing chorus of opinion that the theologies of Friedrich Schleiermacher and Karl Barth may have far more in common that the many insistent assertions of the latter, or the partisans of either, would lead one to believe. While there can be no easy reconciliation of the differences which do in fact exist between these two figures, the book will argue that these differences do not always stem from irreconcilable starting points. This book will investigate one aspect of their theologies--the doctrine of Creation.
The thesis of the book asserts that both Barth and Schleiermacher take a Christological orientation to the doctrine of Creation. Approaching their theologies in this fashion allows them to solve the problem of maintaining dogmatic coherence and continuity with the Church's historic confessions while also meeting certain modern, external intellectual demands confronting those systems. To put it more sharply, this study claims that each uses Christ as the hermeneutical key for interpreting Creation, and that each does so in an effort to remain true to the faith handed down from the past while maintaining intellectual integrity in the present. This underlying connection perceptible in both Barth's and Schleiermacher's work forges one continuity between them and suggests that there may be certain fundamental similarities in their respective theologies in spite of other well-known differences.

When the Nicene Creed affirms that the eternal Son of God 'for us and for our salvation came down from heaven', it asserts that God Himself is actively present within the space and time of our world. The philosophical problems that this involves are bound up with Christian theology, and form the subject of this book. Professor Torrance begins with a critique of modern Protestant thinking, and proceeds to examine the place of spatial and temporal elements in basic theological concepts. He then offers a positive account of the relation of the incarnation to space and time. While related to the work of the great theologians of the past, this study is also supremely relevant to theological thinking in this age of science.

This scarce antiquarian book is a selection from Kessinger Publishings Legacy Reprint Series. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment to protecting, preserving, and promoting the worlds literature. Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Herbert McCabe, who died in 2001, was one of the most intelligent Roman Catholic thinkers of the twentieth century. An influence on philosophers such as Anthony Kenny and Alasdair MacIntyre he was also befriended by poets and literary critics such as Seamus Heaney and Terry Eagleton. Equally at home in philosophy and theology, he despised jargon and intellectual posturing as a substitute for reason and argument. At the time of his death, he left a wealth of unpublished material- so outstanding in its quality and originality that it is surprising that it was never published in book form. This is now put to rights. In God Still Matters we have the chance to read McCabe on the topics that interested him most - philosophy of God, Christology, Fundamental theology, Sacramental theology and ethics. No-one who reads this volume will doubt that McCabe was one of the outstanding Christian thinkers of his generation and the epitome of Dominican intellectual openness and rigour.

Find out how God protected "His Word" from private interpretation and translation errors!

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Hofmann (1810-1877) was one of the most significant theologians of the 19th century and perhaps the century's most influential Lutheran theologian. Matthew L. Becker introduces us to Hofmann's trinitarian view of God. According to Hofmann, God freely chose to give himself out of divine love. Becker's book centers on Hofmann's understanding of history. In Hofmann's trinitarian kenosis, the eternal God has become historical by self-emptying God's self into Jesus. For Hofmann, world history can only be understood within the historical self-giving of the triune God who is love. Thus, for Hofmann all of history is salvation-history, a kind of history that embraces and fulfills God's purposes in the world.
Matthew L. Becker is a Professor of Theology at Concordia University, Portland, Oregon. An ordained Lutheran minister, Dr. Becker has served congregations in Chicago and Orgegon. He is a co-editor of God Opens Doors, a history of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod in the Pacific Northwest.

"I confess that I am an unreconstructed optimist. Not a naive one; I ve lived too long for that, long enough to have experienced a resounding case for pessimism. I have vivid memories of the Great Depression, and I ve lived through several wars and those international anomalies that we call police actions. I ve watched what has seemed to me to be a rather steady decline in both public and private morals, and a growing confusion about ethics. And of course, I ve watched the increasing prevalence of both evil and inanity (sometimes they re synonymous) in television and on the Internet." from the Introduction But: There is God. And because there is God, there is goodness. I profoundly believe that God is at work in our world and that our planet has not yet been written off as a lost cause. History seems to tell me that though our human race appears so often to dedicate itself to its own destruction, God is always at work, usually, I think, behind the scenes. And because of God, faith, love, and goodness keep being reborn. So I write about Life from the Up Side.

Twelve sessions: On Being Born with a Rusty Spoon: For those who ve had a bad start When Life Is at January: Who knows what wonders lie ahead? A Woman Who Lived with Scorn: For those who suffer rejection close athand Don t Blame the Donkey Capitalize on your adversity When You ve Been Given a Bad Name: Don t let others define you Color Her Moses: Never give up. Never. Plot for a Life: More than success Party Gone Flat: What to do when life loses its flavor Suppose You re Worth More Than You Think You Are: It s time you calculated your worth How Wide Is a Boat? Gladness is nearer than you think Strange Victory: The gains in our losses The View from Mount Nebo: And then, there is heaven "

In this significant work, Professor T.F. Torrance examines the importance of the Nicene Faith for Christian Theology. By cutting across the divide between East and West and between the Catholic and Evangelical, he also offers a unique contribution to our understanding of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. The author provides an account of the principal themes of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed; the doctrine of God, as Father and Creator, the doctrine of the Holy Spirit and of the Church; and the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. He allows the patristic theologians so speak for themselves and brings to light the inner theological connections which give coherent structure to the classical theology of the ancient Catholic Church as it was formulated during the fourth century. T.F. Torrance engages with the theologians of the fourth century, illuminating and developing the one authentically ecumenical confession of faith of the churches of East and West. In the realisation of this approach, the theology of T.F. Torrance himself, one of our greatest contemporary theologians, is itself illuminated and developed, creating what is truly a remarkable 'one volume dogmatics' of today. The Very Reverend T.F. Torrance was Professor of Systematic Theology at the University of Edinburgh.

Furthering his contribution to the science and religion debate, David Ray Griffin draws upon the cosmology of Alfred North Whitehead and proposes a radical synthesis between two worldviews sometimes thought wholly incompatible. He argues that the traditions designated by the names "scientific naturalism" and "Christian faith" both embody a great truth--a truth of universal validity and importance--but that both of these truths have been distorted, fueling the conflict between the visions of the scientific and Christian communities. Griffin contends, however, that there is no inherent conflict between science, or even the kind of naturalism that it properly presupposes, and the Christian faith, understood in terms of the primary doctrines of the Christian good news.

Theologian Stanley Grenz here tells the story of trinitarian theology in the last century. He analyzes the remarkable ferment in the discipline and discusses key theologians-such as Karl Rahner, Jrgen Moltmann, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Robert Jenson, Elizabeth Johnson, Catherine Mowry LaCugna, Leonardo Boff, John Zizioulas, Hans Urs von Balthasar, and Thomas F. Torrance-on such issues as God's inner life versus God's relationship to creation (immanent and economic trinity), social versus psychological analogies for the relationships within God, the relationship between trinity and Christology, the feminist critique of classical categories, and how God's trinitarian life figures in evolution, social justice, and spirituality. Grenz's introduction places this ferment historically in the course of Christian thought from the medieval period to now, while his conclusion sets a future agenda for the doctrine and theology.

God is: unconditional love, gratefully received, safely returned. The way in to the Trinity for anyone is a way in to the mystery of love, and the story turns out to have a happy ending. The mystery of the Trinity was revealed to us, not to stop us thinking, but to start us loving. "I have never read anything on the Trinity which is as life-giving as this book. The mystery, instead of appearing unintelligible and better left alone, remains mystery, but becomes something exciting, energizing, a source of life, the source of our own lives, which can never be exhausted by any amount of exploration" Gerard W Hughes SJ GeraldO'Mahony completed this book in his 50th year as a Jesuit, his 38th as a priest, and his 20th year as a retreat director and author working in Loyola Hall Jesuit Spirituality Centre in England.

A new edition covering the latest scientific research on how the brain makes us believers or skeptics

Recent polls report that 96 percent of Americans believe in God, and 73 percent believe that angels regularly visit Earth. Why is this? Why, despite the rise of science, technology, and secular education, are people turning to religion in greater numbers than ever before? Why do people believe in God at all?

These provocative questions lie at the heart of How We Believe , an illuminating study of God, faith, and religion. Bestselling author Michael Shermer offers fresh and often startling insights into age-old questions, including how and why humans put their faith in a higher power, even in the face of scientific skepticism. Shermer has updated the book to explore the latest research and theories of psychiatrists, neuroscientists, epidemiologists, and philosophers, as well as the role of faith in our increasingly diverse modern world.

Whether believers or nonbelievers, we are all driven by the need to understand the universe and our place in it. How We Believe is a brilliant scientific tour of this ancient and mysterious desire.

If the Spirit is not equal to the Father and the Son, can the Trinity survive? Is the role of the Spirit in salvation as important as that of the Son? Why was the divinity of the Spirit problematic in the early Church? If the Son, Jesus Christ, is the way the truth and the life," what role does the Spirit have in God's reaching out to touch the Church and the world? Is there any contact with, any experience of God, apart from the Spirit? In what sense is the Spirit the goal of the Christian life? "The Other Hand of God" addresses these theological queries.

Chapters are *To Do Pneumatology is to Do Trinity, - *Struggling with Ambiguity, - *The Way of Doxology, - *To Do Pneumatology is to Do Eschatology, - *Movement Toward Fixity: Holy Spirit in Patristic Eschatology, - *To Do Pneumatology Is to Start at the Beginning, - *No Unified Vision in the New Testament, - *Losing the Battle to Stay with the Imprecision of the Scriptures, - *The Mission of the Spirit: Junior Grade? - *God Beyond the Self of God, - *The Return: The Highway Back to the Father, - *The Spirit Is the Touch of God, - *The Tradition of Subordinationism, - *Basil: Not Subordination but Communion of Life with the Father and the Son, - *Gregory Nazianzus: The Divine Pedagogy in Steps, - *The Council of Constantinople: The Triumph of Discretion, - *To Do Pneumatology is to Start with Experience, - *Experience of the Spirit in the Early Church, - *William of St. Thierry: 'so I May Know by Experience, '- *Bernard of Clairvaux: 'Today We Read in the Book of Experience, '- *The Role of Pneumatology in an Integral Theology, - *The Continuing Quest for a Theology of the Holy Spirit, - and *Toward a Theology in the Holy Spirit. -

"Kilian McDonnell, OSB, STD, a monk and priest of St. John's Abbey, Collegeville, Minnesota, is the founder and the president of the Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research in Collegeville. For years he was a consultor to the Pontifical Council for Unity in Rome. He has been involved both nationally and internationally in dialogues with the Lutherans, Presbyterians, Pentecostals, and Disciples of Christ. He has published on John Calvin, Christian initiation, and on the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, as well as collections of poetry. The Catholic Theological Society of America has honored him for his contributions to theology.""

Who has authority to speak for God? Does His message come through other people, through Scripture, or both?

According to Neil Anderson, answers to these common questions must be based on two powerful truths: We are alive in Christ, and we are God's children. He examines the danger of counterfeit messages the roles of Scripture, the Spirit, and other believers ways to guard against Satan's deceptions the freedom that can replace fear of wrong decisions true spiritual discernment

This confidence-building resource will help readers listen for God's word to their own hearts. Questions for group study or discussion are provided at the end of each chapter.

Some material previously released in "Walking in the Light."