In this addition to the acclaimed The Church and Postmodern Culture series, leading practical theologian Christian Scharen examines the relationship between theology and its social context. He engages with social theorist Pierre Bourdieu to offer helpful theoretical and theological grounding to those who want to reflect critically on the faith and practice of the church, particularly for those undertaking ministry internships or fieldwork assignments. As Scharen helps a wide array of readers to understand the social context of doing theology, he articulates a vision for the church's involvement with what God is doing in the world and provides concrete examples of churches living out God's mission.

Building on the success of "One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters to Those Seeking God," Christian Scharen shows how to engage faith and culture through a wide range of popular music, including the blues, hip-hop, and rock. He examines artists such as Arcade Fire, Kanye West, Leonard Cohen, and Billie Holiday, offering a fresh, compelling theology of culture in conversation with C. S. Lewis that can look suffering and brokenness in the face because it knows of a love deeper than hate, a hope stronger than despair. Written engagingly yet with theological depth, this book will resonate with readers interested in the interface between pop culture, music, and theology, as well as with pastors and youth ministers.

Description: In a time of increasing cultural pluralism and vast religious restructuring in the United States, Christian social ethics must take account of how values and commitments shape Christian communities. In Public Worship and Public Work Christian Scharen examines theological claims about the relationship of worship and ethics by means of ethnographic study of the life, worship, and work of three vibrant congregations. Public Worship and Public Work moves beyond two caricatures of the relationship between worship and social ethics. Rather than resolute portrayals of the Church as a reflection of its culture and context and causal accounts of the Church's liturgy forming a Christian witness over and against culture, this book lifts up congregational identity as an area of dynamic interaction between worship, social ethics, and culture. Chapters in Part One are "Liturgy and Social Ethics: Characterizing a Debate," and "Sociologizing the Debate: Identity, Ritual, and Public Commitment." Chapters in Part Two: Three Case Studies in Atlanta's Old Downtown are "'People Living Church': The Catholic Shrine of the Immaculate Conception," "'Jesus Saves': Big Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, '" and "'The Church at Work': Central Presbyterian Church.'" Part Three concludes with "The World in the Church in the World."

Christian ministry is deeply concerned with proclaiming the transforming power of God's gift of faith in the daily lives of disciples. How is it, then, that Christian faith so often fails to be an orienting force that impacts every aspect of our lives?

In Faith as a Way of Life Christian Scharen articulates a vision of pastoral leadership grounded in substantive faith language. He examines other powerful languages in our culture - emotion-driven therapeutic and results-driven managerial models of leadership - and shows how their domination leads to faith becoming a weak sibling. Highlighting concrete examples of excellent pastoral leadership in action, Scharen offers creative practical theological reflection on how faith can truly inform our family life, our work, our politics, our leisure - literally all of life - and how pastoral leaders of all kinds can foster faith as a way of life.

This book is a primary resource in the new and growing field of Christian Ethnography. In response to a variety of critical intellectual currents (post-colonial, post-modern, and post-liberal), scholars in Christian theology and ethics are increasingly taking up the tools of ethnography as a means to ask fundamental moral questions and to make more compelling and credible moral claims. Privileging particularity, rather than the more traditional effort to achieve universal or at least generalizable norms in making claims regarding the Christian life, echoes the most fundamental insight of the Christian tradition - that God is known most fully in Jesus of Nazareth. Echoing this 'scandal of particularity' at the heart of the Christian tradition, theologians and ethicists involved in ethnographic research draw on the particular to seek out answers to core questions of their discipline: who God is and how we become the people we are, how to conceptualize moral agency in relation to God and the world, and how to flesh out the content of conceptual categories such as justice that help direct us in our daily decisions and guiding institutions.