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The Christians of Europe are still gathering in their big old
churches. But the communities are getting smaller, and many things
that used to be natural are falling apart. Christianity is no
longer a form of life for many baptized persons. And for many
others, the question of God or of the Church has become
insignificant. However, it is noteworthy that the number of those
who are newly asking about the Christian faith is growing. You want
to get to know him better. They want to know what Christianity
really is. Of course, much more would be true about the Christian
faith. But in these fifty letters, the most important things are
said. â€
2020 Catholic Press Association second place award for English
translation edition Is the Christian hope for resurrection still
alive or has it become tired? How can we talk about the
Resurrection today? Gerhard Lohfink takes up the question of death
and resurrection in this new book. He argues against the dazzling
array of today's ideas and expectations and seeks his answers in
Scripture, the Christian tradition, and human reason. With his
characteristically gentle but clear language, he reveals the power
of Christian resurrection, showing it is not about events that lie
in the distant future but rather occurrences incomprehensively
close to us. They were long since begun and they will embrace us
fully in our own death..
Is Jesus relevant for today? If you think not, don't bother with
this book. But if you think that Jesus might have something to say
to today's world, which Jesus comes to mind? Is he "gentle Jesus,
meek and mild," offering individual salvation but with no message
for a suffering world? Is he to be remembered as a Zealot fighting
for a hopeless cause or as an outstanding rabbi? Was he a prophet
in the long series of Israel's prophets or a religious founder like
Muhammad or Gautama? Or was Jesus unique, a man utterly consumed by
zeal for the reign of God, by the "fierce urgency of now," the
leader of a movement dedicated to God's cause but committed to
nonviolence and living for others? If we seek him, can we find him
in the churches? In No Irrelevant Jesus, Gerhard Lohfink, author of
the acclaimed Jesus of Nazareth, explores these questions and
offers a resounding yes to the relevance of Jesus today.
Who was Jesus? A prophet? There have been many of those. A
miracle-worker? A radical revolutionary? A wise teacher? There have
been many of these, too. In his latest book, renowned Scripture
scholar Gerhard Lohfink asks, What is unique about Jesus of
Nazareth, and what did he really want? Lohfink engages the
perceptions of the first witnesses of his life and ministry and
those who handed on their testimony. His approach is altogether
historical and critical, but he agrees with Karl Barth's statement
that "historical criticism has to be more critical." Lohfink takes
seriously the fact that Jesus was a Jew and lived entirely in and
out of Israel's faith experiences but at the same time brought
those experiences to their goal and fulfilment. The result is a
convincing and profound picture of Jesus.
Are not al religions equally close to and equally far from God?
Why, then, the Church? Gerhard Lohfink poses these questions with
scholarly reliability and on the basis of his own experience of
community in "Does God Need the Church?"
In 1982 Father Lohfink wrote "Wie hat Jesus Gemeinde gewollt?"
(translated into English as"Jesus and Community") to show, on the
basis of the New Testament, that faith is founded in a community
that distinguishes itself in clear contours from the rest of
society. In that book he also described a sequence of events that
moved directly from commonality to a community that was readily
accessible to every group of people and was made legitimate by
Jesus himself. Only later did Father Lohfink learn, within a new
horizon of experience, that such a description is not the way to
community. The story of the gathering of the people of God, from
Abraham until today, never took place according to such a
model.
Today Father Lohfink states that he would not write "Wie hat
Jesus Gemeinde gewollt?" the same way. The situation of belief and
believers has undergone a shift: the question of the Church has
become much more urgent. Church life is declining and the religions
are returning, often in new guises.
In light of these shifts and the change in his own view of
community, Father Lohfink inquires in "Does God Need the Church?"
of Israel's theology, Jesus' praxis, the experiences of the early
Christian communities, and of what is appearing in the Church
today. These inquiries lead to an amazing history involving God and
the world - a history that God presses forward with the aid of a
single people and that always turns out differently from what they
think and plan.
"Gerhard Lohfink, ThD, was professor of New Testament exegesis
at the University of Tubingen until 1986 when he resigned from his
professorship in order to live and work as a theologian in the
Catholic Integrierte Gemeinde and its community of priests."
The author calls the present-day church to once again be the
"contrast society," which attracts non-believers by living what it
preaches and by being different without being narrowly sectarian.
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