he Faith of Friends series is part of Breakwater's religious education series for children in grades 4-6. This educational series introduces children to the underlying beliefs of the world's major religions, and it teaches young students the value of being understanding and other perspectives and showing tolerance for those who have beliefs that vary from their own. This series employs a unique approach to religious education in that it seeks to inform students about a broad range of religious faiths without using the perspective of one specific religion, and without promoting any one religion.

The Faith of Friends series is part of Breakwater's religious education series for children in grades 4-6. This educational series introduces children to the underlying beliefs of the world's major religions, and it teaches young students the value of being understanding and other perspectives and showing tolerance for those who have beliefs that vary from their own. This series employs a unique approach to religious education in that it seeks to inform students about a broad range of religious faiths without using the perspective of one specific religion, and without promoting any one religion. The texts in this series comprise a religious education experience that can provide consistent, enriching experience for children over a three-year period. One of the most notable features of the series is that it uses learning strategies that accommodate "multiple intelligences" (i.e. the learning activities and exercises used are specially designed so that the series can accommodate children with different aptitudes and learning styles). This series was created to accommodate the vision of the Newfoundland and Labrador Religious Education Curriculum: "to enable and encourage students to grow religiously, spiritually, and morally into informed, caring and contributing members of society, who appreciate their own beliefs and values of others, and who understand the contribution that Christianity and other religions make to human life." Breakwater Books is proud to have created an educational series that upholds this admirable vision.

This book is an introductory study of the Old Testament and it is based on the lesson taught for many years by the authors in two different Universities in Ghana. It is an interactive and didactic work that provides an innovative approach to the study of the Hebrew Bible. Through reading selected passages from the Bible and doing recommended exercises as a means of reinforcing what has been learnt, the reader will achieve a good knowledge of the Old Testament and will acquire the capability of reading and interpreting further texts. Each chapter begins with a presentation of a map of the journey, the objectives to be achieved, a summary and a final section that helps the student to evaluate his/her comprehension. This book is also a contextualized text. The last chapter is dedicated to the Old Testament in Africa and the relationship between the African Continent and the Bible, giving the reader the possibilities of acquiring skills to interpret the Old Testament from African perspectives.

As liberal democracies include increasingly diverse and multifaceted populations, the longstanding debate about the role of the state in religious education and the place of religion in public life seems imperative now more than ever. The maintenance of religious schools and the planning of religious education curricula raise a profound challenge. Too much state supervision can be conceived as interference in religious freedom and as a confinement of the right to cultural liberty. Too little supervision can be seen as neglecting the development of the liberal values required to live and work in a democratic society and as abandoning those who within their communities wish to attain a more rigorous education for citizenship and democracy. This book draws together leading educationalists, philosophers, theologians, and social scientists to explore issues, problems, and tensions concerning religious education in a variety of international settings. The contributors explore the possibilities and limitations of religious education in preparing citizens in multicultural and multi-religious democratic societies.

Through the last century, Catholic fraternity alumni have served as German chancellors, presidents, federal ministers, state executives, and leading voices in Germany's parliament. They have played leading roles in the Catholic press, in Catholic youth groups, in Catholic civic associations, and in the German Catholic hierarchy. After World War II, Catholic fraternity alumni played founding roles in the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Christian Social Union (CSU), the two parties that led West Germany's transition from its catastrophic defeat ("zero hour") to the economic miracle (1949-1969). This book considers the ideas that many of these Catholic leaders encountered as college students or as active alumni in their fraternities in the fifteen years before Adolf Hitler came to power.

In 1990, under the direction of Ernest Boyer, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching published a classic report on the loss of a meaningful basis for true community on college campuses-and in the nation. Now this expanded edition of Campus Life: In Search of Community reintroduces educational leaders to the Boyer report's proposals while offering up-to-date analysis and recommendations for Christian campuses today. Editors Drew Moser and Todd C. Ream have assembled pairs of academic and student-development leaders from top Christian colleges to offer a hopeful update on the practical contributions of Christian higher education to the practice of community. This volume includes new chapters, the long out-of-print Boyer report in its entirety, and a discussion guide to facilitate team conversations. Higher education now stands at a critical point, yet the contributors to this expanded edition of Campus Life see current challenges as an opportunity to revive Boyer's commitment to its formative power. Contributors include: Mark L. Sargent and Edee Schulze of Westmont College Randall Basinger and Kris Hansen-Kieffer of Messiah College Brad Lau and Linda Samek of George Fox University Stephen T. Beers and Edward Ericson III of John Brown University Paul O. Chelsen and Margaret Diddams of Wheaton College Doretha O'Quinn and Tim Young of Vanguard University Christian higher education now stands at a critical point, yet the contributors to this expanded edition of Campus Life see current challenges as an opportunity to revive Boyer's commitment to understanding the formative power of Christian higher education.

Wood, Waterfalls and Stars is a collection of essays which takes as its central focus, the challenge of Catholic education in the new millennium. The essays are rooted in the Catholic tradition and in the lived experience of Catholic students and teachers. Fred Herron builds upon the insights of authors such as Thomas Groome, William O'Malley and Andrew Greeley. Herron takes their insights and applies them to the world of Catholic education and the lives of Catholic educators, parents and students.

Lutheran colleges and universities occupy a distinctive space in American higher education. In an age where the dividing line between sacred and secular has become blurred, Brian Beckstrom argues that their "rooted and open" approach, combined with adaptive theological leadership, could be the best hope for faith based higher education. To do so, he provides an overview of Lutheran higher education, its history, and identity, and combines surveys of students, faculty, and staff at Lutheran institutions with leadership theory and theological reflection. Leaders at Lutheran colleges and universities will find it to be helpful in understanding their mission, identity, and vocation in a secular age, and navigating the changing cultural environment that challenges the church and higher education alike.

This timeless treasure from Charles Spurgeon reminds readers to place their hope in the finished work of Jesus Christ as they navigate trials on this earth. Part of the Crossway Short Classics series.

Maritain, Religion, and Education: A Theocentric Humanism Approach offers a comprehensive study of Jacques Maritain's philosophy of education as applied to the specific field of religious education. This book demonstrates that his philosophy is still relevant and that the philosophical-religious idea of the human person is an indispensable point of departure for any educational theory, particularly in the field of religious education. Maritain's theocentric humanism stresses not only the relation of God and humanity but that of humanity and the world. His thinking fosters unity - by considering the human person as unity - with religious education becoming a liberating process that conforms to the goal of religious education: to deliver persons from all obstacles to union with God by fostering the spiritual life of religious educators and society alike.

Preaching has been central to Muslim communities throughout the centuries. The liturgical Friday sermon is a prime example, although other genres that are less commonly known also serve important functions. This book addresses the ways in which Muslims relate various forms of religious oratory to authoritative tradition in 21st-century Islamic practice, while striving to adapt to local contexts and the changing circumstances of politics, media and society. This is the first book of its kind to look at homiletics beyond a specific country focus. Taking into consideration the historical developments of Muslim preaching, it offers a collection of thoroughly contextualised case studies of oratory in Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bosnia, Sweden and the USA. The analyses presented here show shared emphasis on struggles for legitimacy, efforts to speak authoritatively, as well as discursive opportunities and constraints.

Seit Grundung der Bundesrepublik ist die religiose Zusammensetzung der Gesellschaft heterogener und konfliktreicher geworden: Zugenommen hat die Gruppe der Religionslosen, von denen einige aktiv fur einen weltanschaulichen Sakularismus eintreten, und die der Muslime unterschiedlichen Bekenntnisses.
Dem Islam selbst und seiner komplexen Beziehung zum Verfassungsstaat sind zwei Beitrage gewidmet, ein weiterer sakularistischen (bzw. laizistischen) Positionen. Mehrere Kapitel gehen der Frage nach, wie das staatliche Religionsrecht auf die Herausforderungen Islam und Sakularismus reagieren sollte und ob es einer Neujustierung bedarf. Abschliessend werden zwei kontrare Urteile des Europaischen Gerichtshofs fur Menschenrechte (EGMR) zu einem italienischen Schulkreuz-Fall analysiert."

New England pastor Jonathan Edwards encourages Christians struggling through the imperfections of life here on earth to experience the perfect love of God in communion with the Holy Spirit.

Charlotte Mason was a late nineteenth-century British educator whose ideas were far ahead of her time. She believed that children are born persons worthy of respect, rather than blank slates, and that it was better to feed their growing minds with living literature and vital ideas and knowledge, rather than dry facts and knowledge filtered and pre-digested by the teacher. Her method of education, still used by some private schools and many homeschooling families, is gentle and flexible, especially with younger children, and includes first-hand exposure to great and noble ideas through books in each school subject, conveying wonder and arousing curiosity, and through reflection upon great art, music, and poetry; nature observation as the primary means of early science teaching; use of manipulatives and real-life application to understand mathematical concepts and learning to reason, rather than rote memorization and working endless sums; and an emphasis on character and on cultivating and maintaining good personal habits. Schooling is teacher-directed, not child-led, but school time should be short enough to allow students free time to play and to pursue their own worthy interests such as handicrafts. Traditional Charlotte Mason schooling is firmly based on Christianity, although the method is also used successfully by secular families and families of other religions. Here in one affordable volume is her complete Homeschooling Series: Home Education: Six lectures by Charlotte Mason about the raising and educating of young children (up to the age of nine), for parents and teachers. She details how lessons in various school subjects can be done using her approach. She concludes with remarks about the Will, the Conscience, and the Divine Life in the Child. Parents and Children: A collection of 26 articles from the original Parent's Review magazines to encourage and instruct parents. School Education: Thoughts about the teaching and curriculum of children aged 9-12, either at school or at home. Ourselves: A character curriculum book written directly to children. Book I, Self-Knowledge, is for elementary school students; Book II, Self-Direction, is for older students. Formation of Character: Includes case studies of children (and adults) who cured themselves of bad habits; reflections on subjects including both schooling and vacations (or "stay-cations" as we now call them); various aspects of home schooling, with a special section detailing the things that Charlotte Mason thought were important to teach to girls in particular; and examples of how education affected outcome of character in famous writers of her day. Towards a Philosophy of Education: Charlotte Mason's final book, written after years of seeing her approach in action. This volume gives the best overview of her philosophy, and includes the final version of her 20 Principles. This book is particularly directed to parents of older children, about ages 12 and up, but is a valuable overview for parents of younger children as well, covering both theory and practice.

There is a great deal of popular belief in the connection between religious extremism and terrorism. There are also numerous statistical analyses that reject that connection. Upon a deeper analysis, however, both of these approaches are oversimplifications. To adequately answer the question of whether there is a significant causal relationship between organizational religions and terrorism, it is necessary to take a closer and more critical look at the ideologies and practices of both religious practitioners and terrorists. It is important to focus on the causality of the relationship, because, if there is no causal relationship between religion and terrorism, then removing adherence to religion will do nothing to ameliorate the problem of terrorism. The Root of All Evil? Religious Perspectives on Terrorism conducts this kind of analysis.

The Christian Gospel and Its Jewish Roots goes against the tendency to interpret Scripture in ways that separate Christianity and Judaism. Through a redaction-critical analysis of the two sayings on the "new" and the "old" (Mark 2:21-22), the author argues that Mark does not leave his readers with a complete break between Jesus and his Jewish heritage. Rather, the Evangelist opens a ray of hope that the gospel and its Jewish soil are ultimately reconcilable, not fatally antagonistic. With thorough and incisive study, this work reaches the conclusion that standing at the literary center of the controversy series (Mark 2:1-3:6), the location of the two sayings on "new" and "old" (Mark 2:21-22) corresponds to their function of making a condensed statement for Mark, the Evangelist, of the meaning and impact of the whole conflict section.

As a teacher, you long to help others do more than understand the Bible. You want them to experience its relevance and power for their lives. Teaching like Jesus is the answer! This commonsense guide offers examples of Jesus' teaching style from the Gospels, then shows how you can make these principles work for you -- regardless of what age group or ethnic background you're dealing with. Using a proven, four-step plan, Teaching Like Jesus gives you action steps, summaries, and other practical resources that will make your classroom a lively place to learn and apply the lessons so vitally important for transforming lives and nurturing disciples. You'll learn to think in terms of "see, hear, and do" in your lesson plans. And you'll find sample plans for age groups and cultures ranging from African-American preschoolers to Chinese married couples.

Rowdy, restless, silly, out of control, moody, vulgar, disrespectful, unpredictable -- this may be the junior high stereotype, writes youth ministry expert Wayne Rice. But early adolescents' enthusiasm, loyalty, energy, candidness, and willingness to learn -- these more than compensate for the well-publicized hazards of working with middle schoolers. In this edition of Junior High Ministry -- updated and expanded to reflect the realities of middle school ministry at the turn of the century -- the cofounder of Youth Specialties takes a comprehensive look at the early adolescent experience: - A case for junior high ministry -- and what it takes to work effectively with junior highers. - New material of turn-of-the-century trends in the youth culture -- and on programming for kids living in this culture. - A chapter each on the five pivotal areas of development -- physical, social, intellectual, psycho-emotional, and faith -- among junior highers. - Altogether new chapters on parental involvement and mentoring in the context of junior high ministry . . . all topped off with 50 creative and practical ideas -- fun and games, Bible study openers, mixers, entire events -- that are tailored for junior highers in Sunday school, the youth room, or your living room. Whether you're training for youth work or a trainer of youth workers, Junior High Ministry will keep finding its dog-eared way to the top of your most used resources.

This book looks at various educational perspectives throughout history to equip educators today for the task of reclaiming Christian education.

Rape Culture on Campus explores how existing responses to sexual violence on college and university campuses fail to address religious and cultural dynamics that make rape appear normal, dynamics imbedded in social expectations around race, class, gender, sexuality, and disability. Rather than dealing with these complex dynamics, responses to sexual violence on college campuses focus on implementing changes in one-time workshops. As an alternative to quick solutions, this book argues that long-term classroom interventions are necessary in order to understand religious and cultural complexities and effectively respond to this crisis. Written for educators, administrators, activists, and students, Rape Culture on Campus provides an accessible cultural studies approach to rape culture that complements existing social science approaches, an intersectional and interdisciplinary analysis of rape culture, and offers practical, classroom-based interventions.

As recent domestic and geopolitical events have become increasingly dominated by intolerant forms of religious thought and action, the critical study of religion continues to find itself largely ignored in the public square. Caught between those who assert that its principal purpose is to reflect the perspectives of those who believe and those who assert that its only proper place is to expose these same worldviews as deceptive social and economic mechanisms of power, the discipline has generally failed to find a truly audible voice. Rejecting both of these conservative and liberal modes of knowing as insufficient to the radical subject that is religion, Jeffrey J. Kripal offers in this book another possibility, that of the serpent's gift. Such a gift hisses a form of "gnosis," that is, a deeply critical approach to religion that is at the same time profoundly engaged with the altered states of consciousness and energy that are naively literalized by the proponents of faith and too quickly dismissed by the proponents of pure reason. Kripal does not simply describe such a gnosis. He performs and transmits it through four meditations on the sexualities of Jesus, the mystical humanism of Ludwig Feuerbach, the gnostic potentials of the comparative method, and the American mythologies of the comic book. From the erotics of the gospels to the mutant powers of the superhero, "The Serpent's Gift" promises its readers both an intellectual exile from our present religious and sexual ignorance and a transfigured hope in the spiritual potentials of the human species.

Rape Culture on Campus explores how existing responses to sexual violence on college and university campuses fail to address religious and cultural dynamics that make rape appear normal, dynamics imbedded in social expectations around race, class, gender, sexuality, and disability. Rather than dealing with these complex dynamics, responses to sexual violence on college campuses focus on implementing changes in one-time workshops. As an alternative to quick solutions, this book argues that long-term classroom interventions are necessary in order to understand religious and cultural complexities and effectively respond to this crisis. Written for educators, administrators, activists, and students, Rape Culture on Campus provides an accessible cultural studies approach to rape culture that complements existing social science approaches, an intersectional and interdisciplinary analysis of rape culture, and offers practical, classroom-based interventions.