Christian Story Research Articles

Stay (review)

Reviewed by: Stay Deborah Stevenson, Editor Caletti, Deb. Stay. Simon Pulse, 2011. [352p]. Trade ed. ISBN 978-1-4424-0373-4 $16.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-1-4424-0375-8 $9.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 8–12. It may look like a casual family vacation, but Clara and her father have traveled to a small coastal town for a non-casual reason: to hide Clara from her ex-boyfriend, Christian. The story of Clara and Christian’s romance unfolds in interspersed flashbacks, following the trajectory of their relationship from passionate startup to [End Page 365] his development of disturbingly overcontrolling tendencies and then his stalkery refusal to let go when Clara finally heartbrokenly cuts things off. Now Clara’s settling in to her new home, even finding a possible new romance with a sweet local guy, but she’s disturbed that Christian keeps getting hold of her updated cell-phone numbers—and eventually discovers where she is. While there are some atmospheric, even gothic touches to the story (Clara works in an old lighthouse at the edge of the pounding surf, and she discovers a terrible family secret her father has hidden from her since childhood), they blend effectively, not cheaply, with a psychologically valid chronicle of a relationship that’s crazy hot in the bad way and the terrific struggle it can be to move on from it. Caletti is, as always, a smart, classy stylist who manages to richly color secondary characters and relationships as well as the star turns, and the pace rolls along briskly as the tension ramps up. Girls who’ll never read de Becker’s landmark The Gift of Fear will absorb many of that title’s key important points about controlling partners here, and readers in general will find this a gripping exploration of multiple kinds of relationships. Copyright © 2011 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Stories We Tell Our Clients: Alleviating Suffering and Understanding Classic and Innovative Therapeutic Approaches

VERED SLONIM-NEVO, ITZHAK LANDER: Stories We Tell Our Clients: Alleviating Suffering and Understanding Classic and Innovative Therapeutic Approaches. Russell House Publishing, Dorset, UK, 2008, 175 pp, $37.95, ISBN 978-1-905541-19-5. Vered SIonim-Nevo, who specializes in family therapy and is a peace activist, is an associate professor of social work at Ben Gurion University in Israel. Itzhak Lander is a lecturer in social work at Sapir Academic College, also in Israel. He specializes in child therapy and is a long distance runner. Together, they present here a book intended for social workers, psychologists, family therapists and counselors. There are ten chapters in the book and each story deals with a different problematic theme we may encounter in the quest of helping our clients. Crisis, trauma, traumatic bereavement, intergenerational transmission of conflict, loss, death, social rejection, self destructive sexual behavior, eating disorders, loneliness, isolation and suicidality, amongst others, are presented and the dynamics that lead to pathology are researched meticulously and explained extensively by Slomin-Nevo and Lander. Each chapter of the book is divided into three parts: a unique story of a clinical interaction, followed by an analysis of the client's situation using theory and research, and finally an explanation of the specific intervention used in each case with a focus on rationale, theory and empirical basis for the intervention chosen. The highlights of this short book are the stories of the patients themselves. These stories are unique to the clients and to the land of Israel, but the themes are universal for those who work in the mental health field. Each chapter has an intriguing name such as "The Young Man in a Room," which is about a 24-year-old man who, prior to his compulsory army service in the Israeli army, has barricaded himself in his room for two years. The therapist decides to reframe his situation by admiring the young man's integrity and his change strategy is to lecture the patient on psychological development, almost like taking an introductory course at the university. The stories presented here are certainly evocative and the interventions nonconventional. "The Man Who Went Bankrupt" tells the story of a formerly successful businessman who went bankrupt, was divorced by his wife, and is now seriously depressed and considering suicide. The intervention is to bring him to a hospital to hear the stories of patients in a cancer ward to demonstrate that his situation, in contrast to a person with cancer, is not that bad. "I Forfit My Life for Mommy" tells the story of a thirteen year old who refuses to go to school. She lives "in an ok house with ok furniture and ok food and a seemingly ok mother but . . . nothing at all was ok." Her father and mother are divorced and she lives in an unhealthy dyadic relationship. The therapist responds to this patient by telling a story about himself and his difficult family situation. When he finds out that the patient's father was a tennis champion, he embarks on years of "tennis therapy" and eventually pays for the patient's father to travel over and play tennis with the patient. "Heavenly Father I am Sinking" tells the story of a devout Christian "girlish woman, naive and pure . . . tall and skinny, blonde wispy hair in pigtails" who, as a child, discovered her depressed mother hanging from a beam in her bedroom a suicide. Her father, while superficially caring about the family, becomes more distant and remarries, only to have his second wife die in a car accident. The patient decompensates after revealing this to the therapist "she was transformed almost overnight from nice little daddy's girl to a vixen, getting deep into alcohol and sex," plagued by depression and suicidality. …

<i>Bibo Ergo Sum</i>: Theo-Social Reflections of the Taguibo Watershed Advocacy

The article deals with a local ecological issue, the mining activities that threaten to destroy the Taguibo Watershed in Butuan, southern Philippines. Conversing with social theories, philosophical systems, and theological knowledge, the author examines the involvement of the “narrators of the Christian story”. The investigation reveals that the prevailing stance of the Church can be described as “disengaged pacifism” and “hegemonic engagement,” both tend to project a “triumphalist and self-exalting stance.” The essay argues for an active engagement of “dissenting particularity,” which the radical person of Jesus Christ exemplified for the sake of God’s Kingdom values and on behalf of the poor and marginalized. In the Butuan struggle to save the Taguibo watershed, the dissenting particularity of the Christian narrative calls for critical, creative and productive dialogue processes with the various and conflicting stakeholders, as the narrators also go through a conversion process that can make them truer to their vocation of opting for the poor. DOI: 10.3860/hapag.v7i1.1924 Hapag 7, No. 1 (2010) 79-91

Cultural and Religious Reversals in Clint Eastwood’s Gran Torino

Abstract Clint Eastwood’s Gran Torino is one of the most fascinating religious films of recent decades. Its portrayal of confession is highly ambiguous and multi-layered, as it both mocks confession and recognizes the enduring importance of its moral core. Equally complex is the film’s imitation and reversal of the Christ story. The religious dimension is interwoven with a complex portrayal and evaluation of multicultural America that does not shy away from unveiling elements of moral ugliness in American history and the American spirit, even as it provides a redemptive image of American potential. The film reflects on the shallowness of a modern culture devoid of tradition and higher meaning without succumbing to an idealization of pre-modern culture. The film is also Eastwood’s deepest and most effective criticism of the relentless logic of violence and so reverses a common conception of Eastwood’s world-view.

Woman of Many Names: Mary in Orthodox and Catholic Theology

Catholic emphasis on Mary's role in the Christian story of salvation and on the unique privileges given her by God to accomplish that salvation for humanity continues to trouble some Protestants and seems to distract from the Church's central preaching. This article attempts to show the continuity between Catholic and Orthodox liturgical and theological traditions on Mary, despite apparent differences in terminology and image, and draws on the works of Sergei Bulgakov and Karl Rahner to reflect on the fundamental meaning of Mary for both Eastern and Western forms of Christian faith.

Truly Divine and Truly Human: The Story of Christ and the Seven Ecumenical Councils – By Stephen W. Need

Truly Divine and Truly Human: The Story of Christ and the Seven Ecumenical Councils – By Stephen W. Need

Book Review: Kingdom without Borders: The Untold Story of Global Christianity

Book Review: Kingdom without Borders: The Untold Story of Global Christianity

Christianity in Korea (review)

Reviewed by: Christianity in Korea Kirsteen Kim Christianity in Korea, edited by Robert E. Buswell, Jr. and Timothy S. Lee, Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2006, viii + 408p. The growth of Korean Christianity from mere thousands in 1905 to approaching one third of the population of South Korea in 2005 is the great success story of twentieth-century Christianity and is an inspiration to other evangelists and missionaries around the world. This edited volume gives something of an inside story of the Korean Christian movement, emphasizing the complex nature of Korean reception of the faith, showing the inter-relationship of Christianity and politics, analyzing statistics to reveal the rise and fall of different forms of Christian belief and practice, and revealing a darker side to the story. In so doing, it adds depth and nuance to it and brings it up to the end of the twentieth century, from which vantage point contributors are able to assess the contribution of Christianity to Korean life and make suggestions for the future. This fascinating book is the most comprehensive text for students of Christianity in Korea that has been produced to date. The editors are well qualified for their role: Robert E. Buswell, Jr. is founder of the Center for Korean Studies at UCLA and Timothy S. Lee is a leading scholar of Korean Christianity based at Brite Divinity School, at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth. The work they have commissioned is mainly historical, political and socio-cultural, with some theological and inter-religious interest. Christianity in Korea contains seventeen chapters contributed by established experts—including James Huntley Grayson, Gari Ledyard, Wi Jo Kang, Donald N. Clark, Yi Man-Yol, Anselm Kyongsuk Min, and Donald Baker—as well as promising doctoral and post-doctoral researchers. The chapters are neatly divided into five parts in rough historical order: overview, beginnings, nationalism and colonialism, struggles for democracy and reunification, growth and challenges. Inevitably the book suffers from the disadvantages of such a compilation, including uneven styles, repetition of background material (especially Korean Christian history), and significant gaps in coverage of the subject. However, the editors have done well to ensure that writing is generally of high standard, and there are some cross-references between chapters. [End Page 217] Christianity in Korea adds significantly to the literature in its attention to Catholicism, to Christian women, and to Korean and other East Asian players in Korea’s evangelization. Although Catholicism has a much longer history than Protestantism in Korea, Protestants have dominated the twentieth century and have tended to monopolize the literature in English on Korean Christianity. This book offers a more balanced approach: two chapters address Catholic origins (Cho and Ledyard) and many of the others include the Catholic case, offering a much needed correction. There is apparently also an intentional effort to address women’s faith and concerns, with three chapters focusing on women (Ledyard, Clark and Chong), but the emphasis on the public dimensions of religion and the paucity of relevant literature means that women are invisible in most other chapters. Although emanating from the USA, this book also moves discussion of Korean Christianity further away from being seen as a North American mission initiative toward greater appreciation of its global setting in East Asia, and its nature as a Korean enterprise. Some significant omissions include separate consideration of Korean Pentecostalism, reference to Orthodox Christianity in Korea, and information about Christianity in North Korea. The title Christianity in Korea leads to the omission of another important topic: the diaspora and missionary Korean Christian movements and the worldwide impact of Korean church growth. Chapters which stood out for this reviewer include the excellent yet succinct historical overview by Grayson at the beginning, which rightly emphasizes Korean initiative in the importation, appropriation and dissemination of Christianity in Korea. Cho Kwang’s short contribution highlights effectively the clash between Confucian and Catholic thought and ethics in the early period. Ledyard’s study of Kollumba Kang Wansuk gives fascinating insight into the life of a woman Catholic leader against a detailed background of late eighteenth-century Korean society. This chapter is one which brings new material, drawn from primary sources in Korean and French, to...

Christianity: the first three thousand years

The National Book Critics Circle Award-winning author of The Reformation returns with the definitive history of Christianity for our time Once in a generation a historian will redefine his field, producing a book that demands to be read-a product of electrifying scholarship conveyed with commanding skill. Diarmaid MacCulloch's Christianity is such a book. Breathtaking in ambition, it ranges back to the origins of the Hebrew Bible and covers the world, following the three main strands of the Christian faith. Christianity will teach modern readers things that have been lost in time about how Jesus' message spread and how the New Testament was formed. We follow the Christian story to all corners of the globe, filling in often neglected accounts of conversions and confrontations in Africa and Asia. And we discover the roots of the faith that galvanized America, charting the rise of the evangelical movement from its origins in Germany and England. This book encompasses all of intellectual history-we meet monks and crusaders, heretics and saints, slave traders and abolitionists, and discover Christianity's essential role in driving the enlightenment and the age of exploration, and shaping the course of World War I and World War II. We are living in a time of tremendous religious awareness, when both believers and non-believers are deeply engaged by questions of religion and tradition, seeking to understand the violence sometimes perpetrated in the name of God. The son of an Anglican clergyman, MacCulloch writes with deep feeling about faith. His last book, The Reformation, was chosen by dozens of publications as Best Book of the Year and won the National Book Critics Circle Award. This awe-inspiring follow-up is a landmark new history of the faith that continues to shape the world.

What Makes Care Pastoral?

This essay argues for including two principal foci in both research and practice within pastoral theology. These foci include the care of souls (soul care) and care offered against the backdrop of “the Christian story.” The distinctiveness of pastoral care, as compared with other types of care, is also discussed.

The Patronage of Rembrandt's Passion Series: Art, Politics, and Princely Display at the Court of Orange in the Seventeenth Century

IntroductionBetween 1633 and 1646, Prince Frederik Hendrik of Orange (1584-1647) commissioned and purchased seven paintings by Rembrandt. Commonly known as the Passion Series, the paintings remain an intriguing puzzle in the world of Rembrandt studies. The Passion paintings do not, in fact, narrate the story of Christ's Passion. Two scenes from the childhood of Christ (the Adoration of the Shepherds and Circumcision) are included, while major events of the Passion (such as the Crucifixion) are omitted. Furthermore, the paintings are on different supports, in different styles, and were assembled in a piecemeal fashion at irregular intervals over more than 15 years. Yet the series remains the most prestigious commission in Rembrandt's career. Made for the premier patron of art in the Northern Netherlands, it was by any standards among the artist's most valuable (as well as lucrative) projects.Seven paintings made up the Passion group in 1646; today, six survive, in the Alte Pinakothek in Munich. In chronological order of production, they are: the Descent from the Cross (1633); the Raising of the Cross (1633); the Ascension (1636); the Entombment (by 1639) and Resurrection (by 1639); and the Adoration of the Shepherds (1646). A Circumcision (1646) has been lost, though a copy of the composition may exist in the Herzog Anton Ulrich Museum, Braunschweig.1 There are two main reasons to think about these paintings as a group: the first is their common size and format (about 90 x 70 cm, with slight variations, all with semicircular arched tops and ebony frames). The second is the fact that they were all owned by Frederik Hendrik, stadhouder in the Northern Netherlands and Prince of Orange-Nassau.The paintings have garnered relatively little sustained attention in Rembrandt scholarship, perhaps due to their visual oddity (a perception exacerbated by the sadly worn condition of the six remaining paintings). The scholarly focus has been on the artist, and on the seven letters in Rembrandt's own hand that survive regarding this commission. By contrast, the role of the patron has been minimized. Most scholarship on the paintings simply states the fact that they were made for the Prince while discussing separate issues such as Rembrandt's stylistic development or biography.2 In this article, I will focus on the patronage of these works, their location within a larger system of court display, and their reception and interpretation. As writers on patronage have pointed out, court art and architecture in the early modern period was invested with important functions and carried significant weight in a ruler's quest to define and solidify power.3 Since the Passion series was a court commission, re-establishing its courtly context (both in its physical setting and audience) provides a new understanding of the frame of reference within which the series operated.Enter the PatronFrederik Hendrik was the third son of the famous champion of Dutch independence, Willem van Orange-Nassau (also known as Willem de Zwijger, or 'the Taciturn'), and one of several military heroes and stadhouders from that aristocratic family. From youth he was groomed to serve the United Provinces and further the family interests. Frederik Hendrik learned military skills at the elbow of his elder half-brother Maurits van Orange, the renowned general and military strategist. Frederik Hendrik acquired diplomatic and social skills during service to his godfather King Henri IV of France, and from his well-connected French Hugenot mother, Louise de Coligny.Like his father and brother, Frederik Hendrik served as stadhouder in the Northern Netherlands. The stadhouder (literally, 'city-holder,' or governor in today's terms) post derived from the nation's earlier history as a part of the Burgundian and Hapsburg empires. In those days, trusted local aristocrats were appointed by absent rulers to govern on their behalf. During the Republic, the stadhouder instead served the States-General, the sovereign governmental body made up of representatives from the regent class across the Netherlands. …

Allegorical Interpretation of Geography in Origen’s Homilies on the Book of Joshua

Abstract In his sermons on the Book of Joshua Origen argues that whereas the book refers to historical facts, the book should to also be seen as a story of Christ’s salvation of man. More specifically the Israelites entering of the Holy Land is a prefiguring of the newly baptised Christian’s journey toward Christ. This should furthermore be seen in connection with the fact that the primary audience for these sermons where the catechumens and the newly baptised.

The Old Saxon Heliand: Memoria as Cultural Transfer

In the Old Saxon Heliand , one of the great poetic Bible adaptations of the ninth century, the unknown author tells the story of Christ's life for a monastic audience, availing himself of three aspects of memoria , the ancient art of memory. On the rhetorical level, the text is arranged in speeches and dialogues and uses stylistic elements like alliteration and variation, which aid individual memory. On the historical level of memoria , this early vernacular work ties in with the Carolingian renovatio , as part of an effort to overcome the past traumas of Saxon history through communal prayer in the Old Saxon language. This is achieved on the metaphysical level of memoria , which unites the memory of the past and Christian remembrance that establishes community.

Our Lady of Guanganmen

The early decades of the twentieth century in China saw the rise of many movements calling for both reform and revolution. These movements touched all facets of society, from military training colleges to private art schools. The field of art was one domain where the role of China’s great cultural tradition clashed with the reformers’ desire for modernization in all things. The Catholic Church in China was also undergoing much change as it strove to be more representative of the millions of Chinese in its midst, even as this brought the church communities into conflict with the wishes of the foreign missionaries leading them. Higher education was one area in which this reform of the church took place, with the art department of the Catholic University of Peking, Furen University, being influential in the expression of such reform. Graduates and teachers of this art department active at a workshop in the Beijing district of Guanganmen sought to develop Chinese Catholic visual imagery, picturing such age-old Christian stories of the visit of the magi and the annunciation of the angel Gabriel in new and beautiful ways.

The invention of history in the later Roman world. The conversion of Isauria inThe Life of Conon

AbstractThe historiography of the later Roman Empire has emphasised the centripetal results of Christianisation, in which the new religion completed the earlier Hellenisation and destroyed independent languages, histories and notions of identity in Anatolia and much of Syria. However, the discourse of ethnic origins, drawn from Christian stories as well as the Classical past, allowed different kinds of cultural independence to survive this process on the edges of the Empire. While more famous cases are provided by the Armenians, Suryoye and Goths, here I examine an ultimately unsuccessful attempt at historical invention and cultural independence, that of the Isaurians from the end of the fifth century. I begin by discussing the stereotypes employed by a Roman élite to distinguish themselves from ‘barbarians’, both within and outside the empire, before examining the attempts of Isaurians to contest this in history and hagiography.

At forlade sekten

Tetz Rooke: “Leaving the Sect”In the prize-winning novel Azazil (2008) by Yusuf Zaydan, a Christian monk tells the dramatic story of his life, which is also the dramatic story of early Christianity in the Middle East. The novel problematizes the role of religion in politics and the individual’s responsibility for violence directed against “non-believers”. The same issues are also addressed in the true life story of the former Egyptian, Islamist activist Khaled al-Berry, Life is More Beautiful than Paradise (2001). Both books show defection as a proper solution when religious movements turn authoritarian and sully both individual freedom and moral principles.

The Church: Signs of the Spirit and Signs of the Times. The Christian Story—A Pastoral Systematics 5 by Gabriel Fackre

<i>The Church: Signs of the Spirit and Signs of the Times</i>. The Christian Story—A Pastoral Systematics 5 by Gabriel Fackre

The Idol Body: Stars, Statuary and the Classical Epic

The Idol Body:Stars, Statuary and the Classical Epic Michael Williams This article explores the relationship between the male star body and the ancient world constructed through production design and star iconography. My primary case study is provided by M-G-M's 1925 production Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (Fred Niblo; henceforth Ben-Hur). The film influentially exploited the slippage between the star, Ramon Novarro, as a contemporary idol, and the diegetic hero he plays, who rises to become "the Idol of Rome." This historical interplay was achieved through extra-textual publicity that constructed Novarro as a rising "Apollo," and his on-screen performance of a contrapposto pose that referenced canonical sculptures of Hellenistic art. Equally important was Cedric Gibbons' production design (in particular his Circus Maximus set), replete with monumental sculptures that frame the action of the chariot race. Zack Snyder's 300 (2007) is the second film discussed in this essay, which I examine to interrogate the themes of the star body, 'frieze-framing' and monumentality in a contemporary context. In both cases I will draw upon archival research undertaken in both the United States and the United Kingdom, including studio production files, promotion and reception materials, and textual analyses of the films themselves. Contrapposto and the Historical Style Ben-Hur tells the story of the eponymous Jewish prince who is wrongly accused of attempting to assassinate a Roman Prefect by his old childhood friend, Messala, who has turned against him and his religion. After escaping life as a galley slave Ben-Hur reclaims his position and defeats Messala in a chariot race, his restoration with his family told in parallel to the story of Christ's crucifixion. The 1925 Ben-Hur production is infamous for its troubled production history, with most of the cast replaced (including George Walsh, who was exchanged for Novarro) after an already expensive shoot in Italy. Original scenario writer June Mathis and director Charles Brabin were also dismissed from the project.2 What an examination of some of the ensuing script and design changes reveals is a careful iconographic balancing act between M-G-M's upcoming star Novarro and the themes of sexuality and "pagan" / Christian idolatry and religion. One pivotal scene carefully constructs Ben-Hur's transformation from galley-slave to contrapposto "idol of Rome." Essential to this iconography, is the use of a contrapposto pose that consolidates many of the mythic and iconographic tensions within the film's narrative. Contrapposto is the technique developed in Hellenistic sculpture, in the Belvedere Apollo, for example, and rediscovered in the Renaissance, where the arms and shoulders of the body are turned out of direct alignment with the hips, usually with one leg slightly before the other; an implied movement of the body that dramatizes psychological aspects of the subject as well as the tension between animation and stasis. Such poses differentiate the individual from the crowd as Garry Wills discussion of the contrapposto pose of John Wayne indicates. Wills suggests that Wayne referenced the pose of both Michelangelo and Donatello's Davids in his films, adding an unusual [End Page 39] grace to his imposing figure, making: "each motion a statement of individualism, a balletic Declaration of Independence." Wills links Wayne's persona to his post-WWII and Cold War context, and "the sense of imperial burden" that came to America during this period, posing his counterpoised stance with and against the prevailing political mores of this period.3 To strike such poses is to stand at once in the past and present, as I hope to demonstrate below. In the scene in question, after rowing in the galley for two years, Ben-Hur is spotted by the Roman Quintus Arrius, who appears fascinated with him. After the ship is attacked and sunk by pirates, Ben-Hur saves Arrius from the water, finding himself officially adopted as his son when the men are rescued by a passing Roman ship. At the start of the sequence, in an addition to the original scenario by June Mathis, a nude male slave is prominent to the right of the frame, bound in the fashion of the crucifixion, as the camera takes in the...

Visions of Christ in the Amazon

In the Amazon, under the influence of ayahuasca, eco revolutionary Christian visions describe how Christ’s power takes root in the Amazonian ground. The article explores the “Gospel”—the story of Christ’s life and teachings—according to ayahuasca as told by the Quichua Aguarico Runa, a native people of the Ecuadorian upper Amazon and then traces local phrasings of the Gospel according to Santo Daime, a Christian sect indigenous to Brazil. As the Christian myth transforms, these radical botanical visions reinterpret South American history, bringing healing to continental and communal memory, and to the decimated and threatened land.

The Resurrection Effect: Transforming Christian Life and Thought. By Anthony J. Kelly

Pp. xv, 205 , Maryknoll, NY , Orbis Books , 2008 , $30.00 . Kelly is a Redemptorist priest who teaches theology at the Australian Catholic University, and is a member of the Catholic Church's International Theological Commission. His book tackles an important question for specialist and non-specialist alike: how can we ensure that the resurrection of Christ is not merely read as an epilogue to the Gospel, or some sort of add-on, but rather is seen as central to our understanding to the whole story of Christ? In other words, to use the phrasing of his subtitle, how do we understand the way the resurrection transforms Christian life and thought? Could, for example, the resurrection have a decisive effect, among other things, on the way we do moral theology (pp 159–168)? How these questions will be answered will depend on the way we view the resurrection in the first place. And here we encounter the central challenge. No one witnessed the event itself; and the appearances of the risen Christ after the resurrection are mysterious to say the least. The resurrection event is qualitatively different to the other events in the life of Jesus, as Kelly makes clear in his first chapter (pp. 1–23). This is the only course to take, for to try and place the Resurrection with other events would be to reduce it to another miracle like the others, which it most clearly is not. In his first chapter Kelly admits that he is stating the obvious, but the obvious, in this case, needs to be stated. Faced with this problem, or challenge, of understanding just how the resurrection stands out as a unique event, Kelly turns to phenomenology as the method that will best articulate the answer. The resurrection, we discover, is a ‘saturated phenomenon’ (p. 27), from which starting point we begin a fully phenomenological investigation. As for the results of such an investigation, we encounter conclusions such as the following: ‘Through [Jesus'] resurrection, the divine persons are disclosed to the world of violence as being from and for each other in a dynamic of mutual love. Such a divine unity, eternally differentiated and eternally achieved in self-giving love, is the all-encompassing and final truth. Outside and apart from this source and exemplar, any hope of reconciliation or peace-making activity is deprived of its ultimate support. The theological horizon must unfold, therefore, in an open-ness to the phenomenon of the resurrection. The resurrection of the Crucified saturates all moral existence.’ (p. 165). Naturally enough, one agrees with these sentiments, but that may be because they tell us what we already knew; and that these thoughts are in fact contained in embryo in the original idea of the resurrection as saturated phenomenon. Again, we may agree, but want to put it another way, if we are not phenomenologically inclined. But at the same time an unbeliever could simply decline to enter the phenomenological discourse, though acknowledging its internal coherence: that might be a pity, but could one blame her? What is needed is a theology of the resurrection that cannot be ignored but which must command attention. Fr Kelly's book, an eloquent exposition of the phenomenological approach, illustrates the heights to which such a language can reach, and its limitations as well.