This volume examines the persuasive ministry of the Reverend Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick, analyzing his delivery, style, invention, and persuasion strategies. It is the first book to review Fosdick's oratory and explain his process of creating persuasive, effective sermons. It combines speech texts and an extensive bibliography with a critical interpretation of his famous homilies and addresses and it brings together in one concise text a definitive alphabetical calendar of speeches, a chronology of sermons keyed to his numerous books, and a detailed bibliography of works by and about Fosdick. This fascinating study provides a valuable new research tool in the study of rhetoric. From Puritan times to the present, religious rhetoric has played an important role in the political and social life of the United States and has occasionally revealed the highest and lowest attainments of Americans. This volume, the second in a series of book-length studies on great American orators, examines the persuasive ministry of the Reverend Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick and analyzes his delivery, style, invention, and persuasive strategies. It is the first book to review Fosdick's oratory and explain his process of creating persuasive, effective sermons. It combines speech texts and an extensive bibliography with a critical interpretation of his famous homilies and addresses and it brings together in one concise text a definitive alphabetical calendar of speeches, a chronology of sermons keyed to his numerous books, and a detailed bibliography of works by and about Fosdick. Of special note is the inclusion of the famous Shall the Fundamentalists Win? sermon, with never-before-published additions and subtractions, and the ad lib additions and deletions from speech text and recordings of the Handling Life's Second-Bests sermon. This fascinating study provides a valuable new research tool in the study of rhetoric.

Nineteenth-century American writers frequently cast the Mormon as a stock villain in various genres of popular fiction. The Mormons were depicted as a violent and perverse people. Applying the methods of literary criticism, Givens shows how the image of the Mormon as a religious and social `Other' was constructed.

How do science and religion interact? This study examines the ways in which two minorities in Britain - the Quaker and Anglo-Jewish communities - engaged with science. Drawing on a wealth of documentary material, much of which has not been analysed by previous historians, Geoffrey Cantor charts the participation of Quakers and Jews in many different aspects of science: scientific research, science education, science-related careers, and scientific institutions. The responses of both communities to the challenge of modernity posed by innovative scientific theories, such as the Newtonian worldview and Darwin's theory of evolution, are of central interest.

In Middle-Class Pentecostalism in Argentina: Inappropriate Spirits Jens Koehrsen offers an intriguing account of how the middle class relates to Latin Americas most vibrant religious movement. Based on pervasive field research, this study suggests that Pentecostalism stands in tension with the social imaginary of the middle class and is perceived as an inappropriate lower class practice. As such, middle class Pentecostals negotiate the appropriateness of their religious belonging by demonstrating distinctive tastes and styles of Pentecostalism. Abstaining from the expressiveness, emotionality, and strong spiritual practice that have marked the movement, they create a milder and socially more acceptable form of Pentecostalism. Increasingly turning into a middle class movement, this style has the potential to embody the future shape of Pentecostalism.

While there are many diatribes against the modern Word of Faith Movement and as many defenses of it, little scholarly work has investigated, analyzed, and compared and contrasted modern faith teaching with earlier evangelical writers. Only Believe is such a ground-breaking book written for non-specialists and scholars. Among its many accomplishments, Only Believe . . . * theologically engages both the teachings of the Word of Faith Movement and their critics, examining from the unique viewpoint of the elliptical nature of truth the counter-polarities of faith teaching and practice; * traces the origins of faith teachings such as revelation knowledge, logos and rhema, point of contact, seed faith, faith as a law and a force, covenant rights and inheritance, positive confession, and attitudes toward doctors and medicine through the church fathers, mystics, reformers, Pietists, Puritans, and the 19th-century Wesleyan, Keswick, and Higher Life holiness and healing movements; * draws upon the faith teachings and practices of a wide variety of theological and denominational backgrounds: Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian/Reformed, Episcopalian/Anglican, Lutheran, Congregationalist, holiness, Brethren, Catholic, Pentecostal/charismatic, and many others; * highlights positive, balanced principles and models of faith of respected evangelical leaders, guiding the reader away from questionable teaching and practice and yet encouraging a walk by faith that is both strong and sound; * contains a treasure house of preaching, teaching, Bible study, examples of faith, and research material.

This is a major study of the theological thought of John Calvin, which examines his central theological ideas through a philosophical lens, looking at issues in Metaphysics, Epistemology, and Ethics. The study, the first of its kind, is concerned with how Calvin actually uses philosophical ideas in his work as a theologian and biblical commentator. The book also includes a careful examination of those ideas of Calvin to which the Reformed Epistemologists appeal, to find grounds and precedent for their development of Reformed Epistemology', notably the sensus divinitatis and the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit.

Martin Luther was one of the most influential figures of the last millennium, with around 900 million people worldwide belonging to Protestant churches that can trace their origins back to the Reformation which he started five hundred years ago. His thinking and his writing were always original, fresh, controversial and provocative; evoking world-changing reactions in the sixteenth century that are still echoed today. This book offers an accessible path into Luther's mode of thought, by paying close attention to the way he approached a wide range of issues in his own century, and how some of that thinking might give us new ways to approach contemporary issues. Analysing his approach to topics such as sex, freedom, prayer, evil, pilgrimage and Bible translation, Tomlin's analysis vividly illustrates the mind of a man who was very much of his time, and yet whose ideas still speak creatively to the modern world and those who follow in his footsteps. Combining scholarly insight into some of the key issues surrounding the study of Luther today with a written style that renders it easily accessible to the academic and non-specialist alike, the result is an ideal guide for those wishing to get inside the mind of this most remarkable man.

"I have a passion for the gospel of Jesus Christ, a love for the people of God, and an ache for the brokenness of the world," declares Mark S. Hanson, newly elected presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Here he sets forth his vision for the church-a church faithful to the Scriptures and its tradition, yet changing to meet the new challenges of our diverse, fragmented world. Bishop Hanson issues an urgent call to mission marked by witnessing, worshiping, engaging, equipping, inviting, connecting, changing, and praying. The book invites congregations, pastors, and lay leaders into a "holy conversation" to envision the future of the church and its mission.