Disciples Of Christ Research Articles

Thomas Aquinas: Faith, Reason, and Following Christ. By FREDERICK CHRISTIAN BAUERSCHMIDT.

Many introductions to St Thomas Aquinas now exist, but I would enthusiastically recommend this work by Professor Frederick Bauerschmidt to anyone starting to study Aquinas. There was a time when introductions often focused on Aquinas's philosophy; this one locates Aquinas's philosophical ideas within his theological (or, better, evangelistic) project. It used to be easier to suppose that, throughout his working life, Aquinas maintained a single position on any matter, and even that this was the position of ‘the Middle Ages’. Drawing on a great range of Aquinas's writings, Bauerschmidt makes us aware that his ideas developed, and locates him in a complex, varied history of thought. What is most fresh and valuable in this work is that it shows us Aquinas, not just Aquinas's thought: it brings alive his determination to be a preaching friar, his concern to be veritatis Catholicae doctor. This concern, with his obedience to his Dominican mission, fired Aquinas's projects, designed to equip others in turn to ‘take every thought captive for Christ’ and to form people as Christ's disciples by preaching and personal counsel.

Paul the Social Worker — Yet Another Self Portrait of Paul Displayed in the Pauline Epistle

It is not that Korean Protestants do not practice community service; they practice it more than the followers of any other religion. However, the Korean society points its finger at Korean Protestantism, calling it “Gaedokgyo” (a denigrating term for Protestantism). The Korean church is eager about evangelizing and community service, but it is being reproached by the society because of that eagerness. Is there a way out? This brief study attempts to find the solution regarding the Korean church’s community service by looking at the social welfare aspect of Paul’s ministry. Paul never talked about a communist society in which all those who belong to the church have to share everything. What the Pauline epistles emphasize in regard to possessions and sharing is not that Christians should give up all their possessions, but that those who have plenty should share with those who are needy (1 Corinthians 16:20; 2 Corinthians 8:14). He said that through this, those who have gathered more should have nothing remaining and those who have gathered less should not be lacking. To Paul, community service was something that one practiced in Jesus’ steps. Jesus’ life and teaching were the signposts and the standard for decisions in the service and work of His disciples. To respond to His call was to love Him and love one’s neighbors at the same time. To Paul, community service means using the spiritual gift that the Holy Spirit poured out individually onto each Christian. Above all else, Paul understands proclaiming the Gospel as his most fundamental duty (Romans 11:13, 4:1, 5:18, 6:3, 11:8). However, he expresses the duty of proclaiming the Gospel and the duty of serving one’s neighbors with one word, “service.” Paul did not refrain from expressing the ministry of Christ and the Holy Spirit as “diakonia” (Romans 15:8, 2 Corinthians 3:8). How we assemble at churches and what we do inside the church does not necessarily lead to the Korean church becoming a practicing community known as the disciples of Christ. The title of Christian is something that the neighbors around us give us after observing our actions. Christians should not argue for themselves that the service of the Korean church in the 21st century is indeed the service of Christ. It would be more accurate to ask this to the objects of our service and their surrounding neighbors.

Can the Market Save? An Intersection of Economy, Mimesis, and the Atonement

Can the Market Save?: An Intersection of Economy, Mimesis, and the Atonement Gawain F. de Leeuw This project arises from some dissatisfaction. I found many public commentators unconvincing in their description of market activity, and churches and individuals lacked a roadmap for negotiating commerce as disciples of Christ. Although sympathetic to the desires for a world where wealth is more equitable, I found many standard analyses of commercial economies by theologians to be insufficient. Certainly, along with Barack Obama, Alan Greenspan, and Pope Francis, there is some problem in our system of arrangements; however, my intuition is that the brokenness in our current state of affairs is not a found in advocating for either a commercial or a planned economy. In this paper, I seek to show how mimetic theory can illuminate markets and our role in the institutions that participate in them; and how it links with one theory of the atonement. Mimetic theory sheds light on how a diminishment of government will result also in a diminishment in the virtues within commerce. As institutions, both corporations and governments make plans and share information within their organizations; both consume; and both produce. The venn diagram between the different institutional sectors and their actions, overlap greatly. Many theologians are familiar with Adam Smith, Hayek, Marx and Keynes. Some theologians, like Michael Novak, Max Stackhouse, and James McCann emphasize the creative, wealth producing aspects of capitalism; other theologians, such as Daniel Bell, D. Stephen Long, and Timothy Gorringe challenge the market. In one of the more illuminating dialogues between the economists Rebecca Blank and William McGurn, we see a general acceptance of the market, but a disagreement about the role of government intervention. It is my view that the stalemate can be broken with a deeper reflection about the dynamics of the market, desire, and freedom, from an alternate view of the individual and the institutional forces that shape individual behavior. To undertake this task, I will first seek an accurate understanding of what markets are. This will require an assessment of the neo‐classical economic self, the acquisitive self, which I will argue conceals, rather than describes, how people actually behave. I will then illustrate how our institutions, whether operating primarily in the market or as representative of the public will, mutually reinforce each other because the networks cannot be kept separate. Although I believe the scriptures indicate a preferential option for the poor, require hospitality toward the stranger, and an understanding of our economic life as dependent upon God, the case for a specific economic system remains elusive. We don't need to have a particular faith to defend a system, and we need not assume that our religious codes of conduct require adherence to an economic philosophy. Neither socialism nor capitalism needs Christianity to make their case. But if we do assume Jesus saves, we can assume that some transformation requires understanding our relationship to the market differently. What I will do is offer, by the end of the paper, some possibilities and challenges for Christian communities. They will not be exhaustive. One primary challenge arises from a seemingly simple category confusion: the distinction between the descriptive and the normative. Economists can study how markets actually work. They look at data, distinguish between correlation and causation, and look for mathematical ways to explain the flow of money. This may be different than a theory deduced from a model that assumes we are rational, self‐interested actors who think like economist. Empirically defined research can reveal the different ways incentives work, but an economist may begin by elevating the calculating, acquisitive, self‐interested person, implying that a kingdom of industrious private shopkeepers is our free‐market utopia. Fortunately, some economists have sought to quantify and challenge a narrow version of “economic man” through the study of behavior. I will discuss a realist position of who the economic person is, using a few examples from behavioral and institutional economics. The descriptive problem in economics led me to ask two intersecting sets of questions. The first concerns the market: what is it? What does the market show about human psychology? Can I describe a familiar, non‐mathematical model that interests religious...

Rethinking the Creation of Cultural Hierarchy in America

vol. 6, 2014 Copyright © 2014 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA The year 2013 marked the twenty-fifth anniversary of the publication of Lawrence Levine’s Highbrow/ Lowbrow: The Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America. The book was immediately, and wildly, influential among American cultural historians and students of American literature. I remember attending a national meeting shortly after it came out where participants reverentially invoked Levine’s key terms and assumptions, as if they had discovered in the book’s pages an explanation, deeply satisfying both ideologically and emotionally, for a phenomenon that had long been troubling them. In the years since 1988, Highbrow/Lowbrow has exhibited the staying power of a classic, a status certified by the book’s appearance on countless syllabi and oral exam lists. Today it remains available in paperback and in a Kindle version, and I am told that a French edition was just recently published. Many of us have profited a great deal from Levine’s study, and we lament his untimely death in 2006. Yet those of us who have been working in the history of the book and related areas have arrived at a point where we might profitably reassess the arguments of Highbrow/Lowbrow, instead of merely appropriating its framework. What have we learned over the last twentyfive years about cultural hierarchy in America? What Rethinking the Creation of Cultural Hierarchy in America

Christological Foundations for an Ecological Ethic: Learning from Bonhoeffer

AbstractIn an age where the church needs to foster moral concern for the environment, some are suggesting that Christian theology itself must be changed to produce this result. This article argues that such emendations are unnecessary because Dietrich Bonhoeffer, working a couple of decades before ecological concern was even seen as necessary, manages to craft a theological and ethical approach which is sensitive to ecological concern while retaining large portions of the Christian tradition. Bonhoeffer's anthropology robustly affirms humanity's connection with the natural environment and does not separate humans from the natural order. In fact, his novel approach to the image of God emphasises the necessity of human physicality and the ethical responsibility for the other, which seems to be extendable to the natural order as well. In addition, Bonhoeffer's interpretation of the command to have dominion sees the injunction as a call to be ‘bound’ to nature as a servant, not as a lord free to exploit the earth for wanton pleasure. Consequently, Bonhoeffer interprets the industrial revolution as the failure of humans to rule and serve creation well. Finally, his anthropology, unlike many in the tradition, does not extradite humans from the world, but rather situates them entirely within the matrix of interlocking relationships in the natural world. While Christian soteriology has been criticised for shifting Christian concern away from the environment and life in this world, Bonhoeffer's soteriology overcomes this criticism. Bonhoeffer vociferously repudiates two kingdoms theology in favour of a single unified reality of Christ, which unites God's work of creation and redemption into a unified whole. Furthermore, he interprets the incarnation as a robust affirmation of God's creation and thereby life in this present world. Finally, Bonhoeffer posits redemption encompassing the entire world order, rather than seeing humans as its unique constituents. Bonhoeffer's ethics of responsible action shows that humans need to evaluate not just their immediate actions, but also the long-term consequences of their actions, especially when it comes to use of the environment, both for the sake of other humans and for the sake of following Christ. Since disciples of Christ are supposed to be working towards the reality of Christ, one can conclude that Bonhoeffer's thought encourages humans to work towards the harmony that is to typify creation in the eschaton. Thus, Bonhoeffer's ethics encourages a moral concern for the environment both as a means of neighbourly love and as a means of following Christ.

“Christianity and Mountainanity”: The Restoration Movement’s Influence on John Muir

Abstract The theological underpinnings of John Muir’s work and thought have, justifiably, received a fair amount of scholarly attention. Most of the early scholarship, however, focused on correlations between Muir’s beliefs and pantheism, and ignored the more immediate influence exerted on Muir by his upbringing in the Disciples of Christ. More recent scholars, such as Donald Worster, Dennis Williams, and Stephen Holmes, have attested to the significance of Muir’s Disciples of Christ background but have so far failed to explicate its influence. Yet we know from Muir’s letters that he remained engaged with Disciples’ people and issues throughout his life. Despite occasional dissatisfaction expressed toward his childhood faith, he could never entirely escape it, and a consideration of Muir’s thought in relation to the dominant themes of Disciples theology reveals a close relationship between the two. In numerous ways, the tenets of the Disciples of Christ belief system guide Muir’s thought and mission: his anthropological views, his beliefs on sin and salvation, his approach to politics, and his eschatological mission to encourage harmony among all created beings, are shaped by Disciples of Christ theology.

Virtutes apostolorum:Origin, Aim, and Use

The history of Christianity shows roughly two ways of remembering the apostles: as acollegiumof twelve and as individual authorities or saints. In the earliest centuries, the reference to Christ's disciples as a group predominates. Both in the visual arts and in writing, “the twelve” are undiscriminated, forming a collective representation of testimony to Christian teaching. Prescriptive writings from the first four centuries dealing with matters of ecclesiastical organization, doctrine, and worship may serve as an example, such as the first-century document entitled “Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles,” better known asDidache, and the second- to fourth-century related sourcesDoctrina apostolorum, Didascalia apostolorum, andConstitutiones apostolicae.

Decomposing but to Recompose: Browning, Biblical Hermeneutics, and the Dramatic Monologue

Decomposing but to Recompose: Browning, Biblical Hermeneutics, and the Dramatic Monologue Erin Nerstad (bio) Benjamin Jowett wrote in his contribution to Essays and Reviews (1860) about the proper way to interpret the Scriptures. The reader of Scripture, he said, must overcome difficulties posed by temporal distance and linguistic and cultural difference: He [the interpreter] has to transfer himself to another age; to imagine that he is a disciple of Christ or Paul; to disengage himself from all that follows.…[I]t is an inner not an outer world that he is striving to restore. . . . [His] business is to place himself as nearly as possible in the position of the sacred writer. . . . To get inside that world is an effort of thought and imagination, requiring the sense of a poet as well as a critic,—demanding, much more than learning[,] a degree of original power, and intensity of mind.1 Though Jowett is outlining principles for scriptural hermeneutics, his technique calls for a “poetic” imaginative power in order to perform the interpretive feat. While one may simply read this as a rhetorical flourish, it is striking how similar Jowett’s hermeneutics are to the methodology of a particular contemporary poetic form. For dramatic monologues, especially those by the form’s preeminent practitioner Robert Browning, are indeed “effort[s] of thought and imagination” to create or “restore” the “inner” world of another person who is often a figure from the past, with whose “position” or point of view the reader is compelled to identify. Why do we find such similarities between Browning’s poetic form and the hermeneutics of the Broad Churchman and Greek scholar Benjamin Jowett (1817–1893)? Browning and Jowett knew of each other’s work and became very close friends, but their friendship did not begin until 1865, when Jowett had already published his essay and twenty-nine years after Browning had published his first dramatic monologues.2 I will argue that both men are drawing on a common source, and Jowett’s essay On the Interpretation of Scripture points us to the contemporary religious, interpretive, and epistemological techniques that also shaped the dramatic monologue.3 I argue that the roots [End Page 543] of Browning’s poetics will be found in an ultimately religious hermeneutics, which came to Browning, as to Jowett, from German and English religious and literary paradigms of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Though a few scholars have noted a similarity between the work of Browning and the Christian hermeneuticists Friedrich Schleiermacher and Jowett,4 I am going to argue for a much more pervasive link between Browning, the dramatic monologue, and contemporary Christian hermeneutics. Out of a nexus of aesthetics and Christian interpretive practices emerged a type of sympathetic seeing that both poets and Christian hermeneuticists developed as an essential supplement to the new historical criticism of the Bible. My approach departs from that of scholars who have acknowledged Browning’s indebtedness to higher critical thought but view him as inhabiting the skeptical stance of critics like Ernest Renan.5 Rather, Browning, like Jowett and Schleiermacher, acknowledges the difficulties and limitations inherent within the attempt to recover past truth properly while viewing a certain “effort of thought and imagination” as a necessary complement to textual and historical reconstruction. To place Jowett’s hermeneutics in dialogue with the dramatic monologue, one can begin with Browning’s Essay on Shelley, written in late 1851.6 In the essay Browning gives an account of two opposed types of poet, the “subjective” and the “objective.” The “objective poet, as the phrase now goes,” is concerned “to reproduce things external (whether the phenomena of the scenic universe, or the manifested action of the human heart and brain).” We learn from this poet about “the fact itself” (p. 137). Conversely, the “subjective” poet is “a seer” (p. 139) who “is impelled to embody the thing he perceives, not so much with reference to the many below as to the one above him, the supreme Intelligence which apprehends all things in their absolute truth” (p. 138). While readers generally identify Browning as a hybrid of these two types of “dramatic” and “lyric” poets,7 I want to emphasize an...

Preserving “God's Wildness” for Redemptive Baptism

The distinctive theology of the Disciples of Christ prepared John Muir to understand nature as an agent of egalitarian, unifying, and primitive redemption. Because of God's immanent presence in the Yosemite, Muir believed that by immersing himself in the Sierra he could partake in its divinely natural redemption. This wild baptism imparted a more effective redemption than even the baptism offered by the Disciples, so Muir preached “the gospel of glaciers,” seeking to bring as many people as possible to the wilds where they would be cleansed by divine love. Because Muir feared some people were too encrusted by civilization to participate in wild religion, he developed a unique, second-person rhetoric to directly immerse his readers in “Godful beauty.”

Theology After Obama—What Does Race Have to Do With It?: A Racial Prolegomenon to American Theological Production in the Twenty‐first Century

Theology After Obama—What Does Race Have to Do With It?: A Racial Prolegomenon to American Theological Production in the Twenty‐first Century James W. Perkinson My concern in this essay is one of challenging North American Chris tianity concerning the ways our racialized history continues to influence and impede our national aspirations toward democracy and justice. In lifting up this concern, my focus is not primarily one of identifying strictly theological issues for strictly theological purposes, but one of making clear the degree to which race continues to dominate perception and broker behavior both inside and outside the church, even in supposedly “post‐racial” America. In my short 60 years on the planet—moving broadly through church circles of all kinds—growing up Presbyterian, born‐again evangelical at age 19, charismatic renewal “disciple” for decades, 15‐year member of Episcopal Church of the Messiah on Detroit’s near east side, Roman Catholic seminary trained, University of Chicago schooled, (not ordained) Disciples of Christ pastor/preacher for a year, poet‐performer for 3 years for the downtown United Methodist Church in Motown—and simultaneously spending 9 years in the business world and another 15 years teaching for six different universities/colleges—I have yet to notice any generalized difference between Christian whites and secular whites in handling race. My concern then is not so much to tease out relevant theological themes as to outline racial meanings for theological consideration. In such a project, “God‐talk” is secondary and after the fact. What first must be grasped is an underground tsunami of our time, only one of whose tributaries is conscious articulation. How the Spirit is moving inside of such remains a task of discernment possible only on the other side of plunging into the waters. Framing the situation In his recent book entitled The Backlash,Philadelphia News writer Will Bunch elaborates a tripartite rationale for the recent emergence of the Tea Party into the role of public adjudicator of political speech. Whatever actual electoral successes might ensue in coming elections, Bunch argues, Tea Party‐ers have already proven potent in shifting public debate onto the terrain of right‐wing concerns for “things American” by amalgamating rank‐and‐file conservative anger and panic with talk radio and social networking jingoism under the rule of vulture capitalism, “ever‐circling” in search of popular means to further a big‐business agenda (Bunch 2010). While reason three (big‐capitalist “prescience” in funding rabid hucksterism and supporting Tea Party rancor) occupies much of Bunch’s attention, the undercurrent of anger and fear that anchors the amalgam will command consideration here. Anti‐racist activist Tim Wise has written extensively on the way the continuing subtext of race, in the United States, serves as an ever‐looming portent useful for segmenting shared interests and organizing popular resentment into political sentiments and behavior actually at odds with popular interest (Wise 2010). The interest in this essay is precisely at the point where anxiety meets elocution. It is no mystery that Obama’s own party heads into a new election season laboring under an enthusiasm‐deficit. Its own tacit covenant with corporate interest and mainstream mentality in securing electability required foreswearing strong shows of oppositional emotion. Obama as “icon of the new” could never step free from the deep shadow of our continuing struggle with race in this country. He remained intimately tethered to the great shibboleth of popular terror in the political imaginary: a public black man armed with both political power and historical anger. Gaining access to the top office of power required a clear and public repudiation of black indignation. As Wise has argued, Obama had to package himself as post‐racially “pale” to have any chance of securing the mainstream support necessary to ascend the steps of the accurately named “White” House (Wise 2009). That pallor is the subject of this writing. But as already indicated, the theological interest animating the text is one that works the intersection between word and energy, the place where palaver and passion intertwine to determine political destiny. In teasing out the argument that in many ways race today remains the most potent political fulcrum to manage “democracy” in service...

Seeking the good (peace) of the republic: The violence against and of difference in defining the public space

This article will reflect on the role of legitimate and authorised violence in state-making. This violence in the name of the good defines the state (Benjamin�s law-making violence) by the exclusion of others (Benjamin 1996). Law-making violence together with the violence that coerces or binds [religare] the public into a common understanding of the good (Benjamin�s law-maintaining violence) is at the exclusion of other interpretations of the good (Benjamin 1996). As the law-making and law-maintaining violence of the state is always at the expense of the excluded other, the excluded other will produce a counter violence of difference seeking a legitimate place within the common space of the republic (Benjamin�s divine violence). What is the church�s role in such a context of violence? Is the church�s role to help clarify and clearly define the good that will bind [religare] the citizens into a stronger and more prosperous and peaceful state � onward Christian soldiers marching as to war? Or is there another calling, to be disciples of Christ � with the Cross of Jesus going on before � and enter the space of violence beyond the knowledge of good and evil as peacemakers? These questions will be examined by bringing into dialogue �i�ek�s (1997) interpretation of Christianity with Derrida�s (2002) interpretation of hospitality, specifically in the violent South African context.

Religion and modernity in a secular city: A public theology of <i>différance</i>

Seeking the good often authorises and legitimises certain forms of violence: violence that defines the state (Benjamin’s law-founding violence) by the exclusion of others and the violence that coerces or binds (religare) the public into a common understanding of the good at the exclusion of other interpretations of that good (Benjamin’s law-maintaining violence). The secular modern state has never been without religion functioning as religare. The modern state, often seen as a peacemaker, is founded on these two forms of ‘legitimate’ violence against what is other or different, just as the peace, prosperity and good of the state is sought through the elimination of the different and a unification of the state under the banner of a ‘common’ good. This ‘legitimate’ violence will always produce the counter-violence of difference (i.e. excluded others) seeking a legitimate place within the common space of the republic (Benjamin’s divine violence). With the rise of religious fundamentalism, institutionalised religion has been allowed to return to the public debate. Is the call for this return one that further sanctions legitimate violence by eating and sharing the fruit of knowledge of good and evil? Is the call the church is hearing one that seeks to clarify and clearly define the good that will bind us (religare) into a stronger and more prosperous and peaceful city – onward Christian soldiers marching as to war? Or is there another calling, one that requires us to be Disciples of Christ – with the Cross of Jesus going on before – entering the space of violence beyond the knowledge of good and evil as peacemakers? In this article, I sought to understand this ‘peacemaking’ space by bringing into dialogue Žižek’s interpretation of Christianity with Derrida’s interpretation of hospitality.

Virtue, Grace and the Early Revisionists of the Twentieth Century

Roman Catholic theological ethics went through a period of enormous transition in the twentieth century, abandoning its classic textbooks, the so-called ‘moral manuals’, which were centered on sins derived from the Decalogue and developing a more integrated ‘revisionist’ moral theology that depended on both systematic and ascetical theology. In terms of grace and virtue, the former moved from its peripheral connection to the sacraments to becoming the very foundation of the moral life, while the latter went from being the subject matter for yet another list of sins to the personal, embodied way of becoming a true disciple of Christ.

Studying Apostolic Hagiography: The Case of Fronto of Périgueux, Disciple of Christ

Studying Apostolic Hagiography: The Case of Fronto of Périgueux, Disciple of Christ

The Ecumenical Christian Dialogues and the Catechism of the Catholic Church ed. by Jeffrey Gros, F.S.C. and Daniel S. Mulhall

about religion and law, religion and the Constitution—a need recognized by McConnell, Garvey and Berg. McConnell is U.S. Circuit Judge for the Tenth Circuit and Professor at the S.J. Quinney College of Law, Utah; Harvey, Dean and Professor of Law at Boston College; and Berg, Professor at the University of St. Thomas School of Law, Minnesota. There is no question about their credentials. The text is comprehensive, replete with valuable excerpts from judicial decisions, historical documents, and endless questions in casebook style. It covers the history of religion under the Constitution, religion in the regulatory state, the power of the purse (over religion), the influence of government and religion on culture, and the burning question, “What is religion anyway?”. It follows a classic methodology of looking at secular legal doctrine from two perspectives: Establishment Clause/Free Exercise Clause (necessary, given the constitutional text). The authors find the Supreme Court’s resolution of questions concerning religion no more satisfactory than anyone else writing on the subject; however, they offer a rich and valuable resource for asking the right questions, probing the right issues, and critiquing inanities in the jurisprudence. While Religion and the Constitution is costly, it can well serve one teaching a course on religion and the law at the university level. Phillip J. Brown, S.S. The Catholic University of America School of Canon Law Washington, D.C. THE ECUMENICAL CHRISTIAN DIALOGUES AND THE CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH edited by Jeffrey Gros, F.S.C. and Daniel S. Mulhall. NewYork and Mahwah: Paulist Press, 2006. The editors (Gros, an ecumenist for thirty years and Mulhall, a catechist for twenty-five years) recognize that the Catechism of the Catholic Church forms one essential resource for Catholic educators and catechists as well as for those engaged in “the effort to bring about visible unity within the church” [1]. Thus, the Catechism assists in fulfilling the purpose of this book as summarized succinctly by the editors: “This book was written to help you understand key aspects from the [ecumenibook reviews 245 246 the jurist cal] dialogues organized around the articles of faith as expressed in the catechism. . . . What the Catholic Church believes and what other Christian churches believe on the same topic are gathered together for the reader’s consideration.” [3] In Chapter 2 “Church Unity and Catholic Education,” the editors establish the Catholic context through which the ecumenical dialogues can be both encouraged and understood, most particularly through prayer, collaborative efforts, internal renewal and common theological dialogue as well as involvement in the ecumenical movement.Among the insights derived fromVatican II, the editors signal out the real but imperfect communion among the churches and ecclesial communities; a shift in terminology from “separated brethren” to “fellow Christians”; recognition of common baptism; transition from an ecumenism of return to one of mutual respect; and a realization that elements of the true Church are present outside the Catholic Church. The chapter concludes with a section concerning the dialogues with other churches and ecclesial communities. Chapter 3 answers the title question, “Who Are our Partners?” i.e., those with whom the Catholic Church has entered into dialogue. These partners include the Orthodox, Polish National Catholics, Anglicans; Lutherans; Methodists; Reformed; Presbyterian, members of the United Church of Christ, Disciples of Christ; Mennonites; Baptists; Evangelicals ; and Pentecostals. The Catholic Church enters into dialogue with other churches and communities through the Faith and Order Commission of the World and the National Council of Churches. [22] The following seven chapters, aligned with both the Catechism and the results of various dialogues and agreements, concern the profession of faith, specifically, transmission of divine revelation (Chapter 4); the profession of faith, specifically, the Creed (Chapter 5); celebrating the Mysteries: the sacraments of initiation (Chapter 6); the sacraments at the service of communion (Chapter 7); life in Christ, the dignity of the human person (Chapter 8); salvation and the Church (Chapter 9); and Christian prayer and spirituality (Chapter 10). These seven chapters follow the same basic outline. After giving citations to the Catechism, ‘reflection questions’ are posed, followed by selections of pertinent texts from various dialogues with ‘Editors notes’. The editors have an important mission in mind: to...

A Biblical Basis for a Critical Christian Theology

Yesterday afternoon, this year's gold medallist in the Emmanuel M. Div. program was ordained in Hillcrest Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). When it came time for the act of ordination, various elders and ministers were invited to join in laying on hands with prayer for our sister Jennifer. But so were all members of the congregation who cared to. So imagine about a dozen of us robed, with hands on Jennifer's head or shoulders and others with their hands on our shoulders, and still others with hands touching their shoulders. Then came the prayer to the Holy Spirit that Jen would be filled with gifts and graces to minister faithfully in Christ's name. .

Wind and Anchor, Roots and Wings

Yesterday afternoon, this year's gold medallist in the Emmanuel M. Div. program was ordained in Hillcrest Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). When it came time for the act of ordination, various elders and ministers were invited to join in laying on hands with prayer for our sister Jennifer. But so were all members of the congregation who cared to. So imagine about a dozen of us robed, with hands on Jennifer's head or shoulders and others with their hands on our shoulders, and still others with hands touching their shoulders. Then came the prayer to the Holy Spirit that Jen would be filled with gifts and graces to minister faithfully in Christ's name. .

Practicing the Religious Self: Buddhist-Christian Identity as Social Artifact

Practicing the Religious Self: Buddhist-Christian Identity as Social Artifact Duane R. Bidwell It is somewhat paradoxical to write or speak about identity formation in two religious traditions that ultimately deny the reality of any identity that we might claim or fashion for ourselves. In the Christian traditions, a person’s true (or ultimate) identity is received through God’s action and grace in baptism; to foreground any other facet of the self, or to anchor identity in anything but baptism, could be considered a form of idolatry. In the Buddhist traditions human identity is empty, woven not from an inherent or externally granted essence but through the interdependent arising of all things; 1 to cling to self and to identity as independent, enduring, immutable, or autonomous signals a mistaken understanding of reality.2 Indeed, as religious scholar Alice Keefe has written, “belief in the self as independent and self-existent is our fundamental delusion and root poison.” 3 Yet day by day most of us experience our identities, including our religious, cultural, and social identities, as neither empty nor erased. On the contrary: they seem to be inscribed with enduring meaning. Knowledge has been chiseled into them through our participation in the rituals and relationships of the world. At times the very fullness of our identities can feel on the verge of overflowing. This sense of dynamic presence and fullness causes our identities to serve as important (and perhaps essential) tools for negotiating the hurly-burly of experience and relationship in the mundane, finite, material world.4 From this perspective, our religious identities are social artifacts, entities and meanings formed in between, or on the margins of, biological selves that are related to one another through communities of practice.5 These communal artifacts may then be interiorized by individuals as resources that can be employed in or offered back to the world—performed, if you will—through particular (and sometimes disciplined) practices.6 The primacy of social process in creating and maintaining religious identity implies that community remains central to the process of fashioning the religious self in contemporary Buddhist and Christian practice. If this is true, it raises, of course, important questions about our understandings of ecclesiology and the nature of the sangha, theological anthropology and Buddhist understandings of the person. These questions [End Page 3] deserve to be answered, but they are too broad to be addressed here. My more modest intention is to contribute to generative conversation about religious identity formation by illustrating how my own religious identities as Buddhist and Christian have been practiced and performed as social artifacts in two particular instances. In a secondary sense, this essay serves as a reflection on pastoral work in a multifaith context, something “much needed in the Buddhist-Christian studies milieu.” 7 Given the diverse academic approaches to Buddhist-Christian studies, it seems wise to begin by describing my own background and approach. By training I am a pastoral theologian, someone who seeks to understand critically the richness and complexity of human experiences and then to respond with appropriate, faithful, and effective acts of care. The psychological meta-theory of social constructionism serves as a primary conversation partner for my work; it invites me to ask “not what goes on ‘inside’ people, but what people go on inside of.” 8 For pragmatic reasons I tend to utilize David Tracy’s mutual critical (or revised) correlational method,9 and in the dialectic between understanding human experience and responding to it, I privilege liberationist theologies and religio-ethical norms of justice, love, and wisdom. My practice as a spiritual director and pastoral counselor seeks to promote practices of freedom for all people.10 As a minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA) I am accountable to the Reformed tradition of Christian theology. My formal theological education occurred in the ecumenical context of a divinity school affiliated with the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and at a diocesan seminary affiliated with the contemplative Anglican tradition. My informal training in Buddhist philosophy and practice occurred in the Theravada traditions of Southeast Asia, primarily through five years of participation in an immigrant congregation and weekly study with Thich Phap Nhan, a Vietnamese monk...

Prophet, Pastor, and Patriarch: The Rhetorical Leadership of Alexander Campbell (review)

Reviewed by: Prophet, Pastor, and Patriarch: The Rhetorical Leadership of Alexander Campbell Brian Jackson Prophet, Pastor, and Patriarch: The Rhetorical Leadership of Alexander Campbell. By Peter A. Verkruyse . Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press, 2005; pp. ix + 225. $39.75. Alexander Campbell, father of nineteenth-century America's Restorationist Movement, was a man of profound rhetorical contradictions. He preached for unity within the Christian faith, yet his movement broke from the Baptists and eventually splintered into at least three distinct denominations. He was [End Page 551] university trained and immersed in both classical and Enlightenment rhetoric, and yet he eschewed the trappings of classical eloquence in favor of a more natural, conversational style. He sought to restore the ancient church, but used the persuasive principles of modern science, such as Lockean empiricism. He was an outsider without ecclesiastical rank, and yet his rhetorical leadership, according to Peter Verkruyse, hinged on the claim that his restoration theology could not be more authoritative, or more central, to Christianity. In Prophet, Pastor, and Patriarch, Verkruyse gives us a thorough and attentive reading of Alexander Campbell's rhetoric as he worked within these contradictions in publications and speeches, forging "an evolving leadership ethos" that was "progressively adapted to the shifting needs of the movement" (50). Near the end of the Revolutionary War, American religion began to transform itself through the impassioned work of largely uncredentialed populists whose charisma and rhetorical acumen did much to democratize the church. Methodists, Baptists, Mormons, itinerant preachers, African Americans, and women exhorters all contributed to a new atmosphere of anticlericalism, millennial expectation, innovative communication, and a new zeal for restoring the principles of the primitive church, long since lost. Under the leadership of Barton W. Stone, a Presbyterian minister in Kentucky, and Alexander Campbell, a handful of independent churches broke from other denominations to become the Stone-Campbell Movement, which would later fracture into the Christian Church, the Disciples of Christ, and the Churches of Christ. Through "discursive activities" alone rather than any "external authority" or "official position," Campbell became the leader of this popular religious movement (153). "The Ancient Gospel," he argued in 1830, "will alone be the instrument of converting the whole human race, and of uniting all Christians upon one and the same foundation," a foundation built on a literal interpretation of the Bible (24). Verkruyse describes how, as a young student at the University of Glasgow, Campbell was immersed in the rhetoric of the new science including Baconian induction, faculty psychology, Scottish commonsense realism, and George Campbell's "affective" rhetorical tradition (30). In all his rhetorical practices in America, Campbell used "historical and inductive proofs" to demonstrate the ways in which faith in the ancient gospel followed a clear understanding of the "facts" of the scriptures, if expounded naturally and with "perspicuity" by the preacher (38, 45). In his own writing and speaking, Campbell sought to convey these truths in "pure speech" that emphasized the "natural relationship between words, ideas, and human understanding" (44). This quest for certainty through evidentiary rhetoric was the hallmark of American theology until after the Civil War. To lay bare Campbell's rhetorical leadership, Verkruyse relies on a handful of the most popular theories in the discipline drawn from Aristotle, George [End Page 552] Campbell, Maurice Charland, Richard Lanham, Chaim Perelman, Kenneth Burke, and Ernest Bormann. He uses these theorists not so much to add anything new to the conversation on rhetorical theory as to read Alexander Campbell rhetorically to account for the way that his leadership of the movement evolved through his discourse. The product of this inquiry is a monograph in which each chapter introduces a different rhetorical theory and applies it through close reading to a selection from Campbell's sermons or articles. His goal, as he tells us in the beginning of the work, is to read Campbell's rhetorical leadership "diachronically" as it evolved from an uncompromising prophetic ethos of ridiculing theological enemies, to a more reasonable and tolerant pastoral ethos, and finally, in Campbell's old age, to a patriarchal ethos through which he cast himself as the father and "chief executive visionary" of the movement (146). Verkruyse's careful and close readings of...

Evangelism and Church Growth: Research on Non‐Believers for Developing an Evangelizing Strategy in the Korean Context and the Diamond Evangelistic System*

Introduction No matter how often evangelism is emphasized in growth, it is never too much. Donald McGavran originally used the term church as a synonym for evangelism and mission. He said that mission is proclaiming Christ and making people Christ's disciples and members of the that Christ had established. McGavran also emphasizes that evangelism and growth have an inseparable relationship: Evangelization intends the redemption of individuals and the multiplication of Christ's churches. Concern for evangelism and growth is an essential part of the Christian faith and an irreplaceable part of the work of the church. The is the Body of Christ and brings persons and nations to faith and obedience as it proclaims the gospel effectively in every people and incorporates believers from every people into ongoing churches (1) In order to evangelize effectively, what strategies are needed? Vaguely applying the same strategy to every walk of life does not bring about big results. Just as Paul became a Jew to a Jew, and a Greek to a Greek (1 Cor. 9:20), using different methods in approaching each individual is an important strategy. In other words, with a thorough research of non-believers as the basis for it, a customized approach is necessary. McGavran emphasizes it in this way: It is essential, therefore, not only in the United States but around the world to realize that carrying out eternal God's command can be done only by exact knowledge as to these different segments, their responsiveness or resistance to gospel, and other factors related to their discipling. Exact knowledge is essential (2) When dealing with evangelism, having such research as a foundation is necessary for effectiveness. Without accurate facts and information, it is hard to give an exact diagnosis. Without an exact diagnosis, any effort made in growth will be unproductive. Scholars of growth have already used social scientific methods to research the differences between growing churches and non-growing churches. In order to determine the laws of growth, scholars not only get help from theology but also from sociology, anthropology, psychology and statistics. Scientific method is also a God-given gift. As president of the Institute for Church Growth in Korea, I want to present the results of the experiential research that has been carried out on the non-believers of Korea. I was able to learn new insights through the thinking and values of non-believers, and with that as a source, a new evangelizing method could be established. I call this method the Evangelistic I will present in order the results of the research on non-believers in the Korean context, and the Diamond Evangelistic System. Research on non-believers for an evangelizing strategy in the Korean This research concerned 1,500 non-believers from a total of nine different provinces throughout Korea, and was carried out from March 2004 to May 2004. From those researched, an effective sample of 1,059 people were chosen for the analysis. This research dealt with demographic and sociological features such as gender, age, scholarly attainments, etc., and the main research contents concerned the lifestyle of the non-believers, plus their past life, experience of being evangelized, perspectives on churches, and religious tendencies. In this research, after examining the basic statistical data, an in-depth analysis was done by putting the demographic and sociological features of the population, the religious preference of the non-believers and the life styles of the non-believers as the independent variable. The confidence interval of this research is 95%, and the significance level was [+ or -] 3.1%. Here, I would like to present some important points. Basic statistical analysis 1. …