Description: This book offers a swift trek through two millennia of Christendom, with all the information provided by boring textbooks. The author presents the Christian story within the framework of a warning of Jesus in his famous Sermon on the Mount: ""You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt becomes dumb, with what shall one salt?"" (Matt 5:13). The story is told with wit, spiked by satire and a gallows humor. There are three chapters (symbolizing the Trinity), each encompassing seven centuries (symbolizing the seven days of creation), with four parts in each chapter (symbolizing the four Gospels). Chapter headings and subtitles are eye-catchers, such as ""Edifice Complex"" for the Middle Ages with its zeal for architectural and sacramental edification. Idiosyncratic features are highlighted, like the ""pillar saints,"" monks who spent their lives on pillars in the desert; ""castrated believers,"" who experienced the procedure as a refinement of penance; and competing popes, who succumbed to secular pleasures. Word plays, the wisdom of proverbs, and ""dumb"" Christian ways prevent readers from getting bored. A witty preface and a serious epilogue provide food for new insights. Endorsements: ""Just as early morning and late afternoon light provides dimensions and depth to any landscape, so Gritsch's characteristic wry humor invites the reader to an appreciation and illumination of the history of Christianity. His signature drollness, which always enhances his writings, here becomes an entree, not an appetizer. Christendumb will give greater speech and intelligence to any reader who wondered how Christianity came to its current composition."" --Reverend Lawrence R. Recla, retired ELCA clergy ""Gritsch leads us on a delightfully informative tour along the winding road Christendom has taken, from the birth of Christ to the present, including numerous off-road trips to 'Christendumb.' While providing marvelous insights into those who have tried to shape Christian thought, there are times when only a generous serving of humor can do justice to their actions, and Gritsch gleefully provides it. A must-read for historians and laymen "" --John B. Williams, The Melanchthon Institute About the Contributor(s): Eric W. Gritsch (1931-2012), a native of Austria, did his graduate work in Vienna, Zurich, Basel, and Yale (PhD), and was Emeritus Professor of Church History at Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary. He was also an ordained pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and an author of a number of books, including Martin--God's Court Jester: Luther in Retrospect (1983); Toxic Spirituality (2009); and A Handbook for Christian Life in the 21st Century (2005).

Russian political history and Russian church history are tied together very tightly. One cannot properly understand the overall history of Russia without considering the role of the Orthodox Church in Russia. Cross and Kremlin uniquely surveys both the history and the contemporary situation of the Russian Orthodox Church. The first chapter gives a concise chronology from the tenth century through the present day. The following chapters highlight several important issues and aspects of Russian Orthodoxy -- church-state relations, theology, ecclesiastical structure, monasticism, spirituality, the relation of Russian Orthodoxy to the West, dissidence as a frequent phenomenon in Russian church history, and more.

G.K. Chesterton long ago observed that real Christianity had in some ways never really been tried. Eric Gritsch, a renowned historian, a pastor, and a theologian for half a century, offers Christianity a reality check, exposing four historical movements that have weakened and abused the core of the Christian tradition. These movements represent wayward views on the relationships between Christians and Jews; between the authority of Scripture and tradition; between the church and worldy power; and between faith and morals. Readers encounter these wayward traditions in their historical trajectories, in the ways these traditions have diminished the gospel, and in the ways they have been impediments of an effective contemporary Christian witness. They represent the enduring temptation to be "like God" (Gen. 3:5), a temptation marked by a zeal for secure, unchanging, and ultimate Christian life on Earth. The author confronts these wayward traditions with the enduring challenge of faithful, cruciform, penultimate discipleship in the time between the first and second advent of Christ.

Rejected in the sixteenth century by both Protestants and Catholics, yet hailed by Marxist historians as a forerunner of the Marxist revolution, this volume tells M?ntzer's story and offers a critical assessment of him in light of his extant works, with particular attention to the religious foundations of his revolutionary program.

This reference offers a concise, well-written overview of Lutheranism's history, from The Book of Concord to the present. Grtisch explores the sect, examining the basic struggle among Lutherans who consider themselves heirs to a reform movement and Lutherans who see themselves as members of a denomination. Numerous photos and illustrations accompany the text.

In this book Eric W. Gritsch, a Lutheran and a distinguished Luther scholar, faces the glaring ugliness of Martin Luther's anti- Semitism head-on, describing Luther's journey from initial attempts to proselytize Jews to an appallingly racist position, which he apparently held until his death.
Comprehensively laying out the textual evidence for Luther's virulent anti-Semitism, Gritsch traces the development of Luther's thinking in relation to his experiences, external influences, and theological convictions. Revealing greater impending danger with each step, Martin Luther's Anti-Semitism marches steadily onward until the full extent of Luther's racism becomes apparent. Gritsch's unflinching analysis also describes the impact of Luther's egregious words on subsequent generations and places Luther within Europe's long history of anti-Semitism.
Throughout, however, Gritsch resists the temptation either to demonize or to exonerate Luther. Rather, readers will recognize Luther's mistakes as links in a chain that pulled him further and further away from an attitude of respect for Jews as the biblical people of God. Gritsch depicts Luther as a famous example of the intensive struggle with the enduring question of Christian-Jewish relations. It is a great historical tragedy that Luther, of all people, fell victim to anti-Semitism -- albeit against his better judgment.