Hope for the Earth

Hope for the Earth

Author: Ernst M. Conradie

Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers

Published: 2005-05-18

Total Pages: 369

ISBN-13: 1597522090

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'Hope for the Earth' explores the viability of an eschatological approach to an ecological theology, spirituality, and praxis in the South African context. The basic intuition of such an eschatological approach is that an environmental praxis can only be empowered on the basis of an adequate understanding of Christian hope. Despair in the face of environmental destruction will inevitably lead to a spirit of resignation. Where, then, can a vision of hope that includes hope for the earth be found? The author proposes a Òroad mapÓ for eschatology based on the observation that eschatology has traditionally responded to three aspects of the human predicament, namely 1) the evil effects of sin; 2) the problem of finitude and transience; and 3) the limitations of human power and knowledge in space (Part A). This analysis is used to fathom the depths of despair as a result of environmental destruction (Part B). The Biblical roots and subsequent history of Christian eschatology are discussed briefly (Part C). Recent contributions in Christian eschatology, ecological theology, cosmology, and South African expressions of hope are explored in depth in search of a vision of hope that includes hope for the earth itself (Part D). The eschatological road map is used to develop a vision of hope for the earth on the basis of a theology of life: life amidst death and destruction, life beyond death and eternal life in the presence of God (Part E). Finally the implications of this vision for an ecological ethos, spirituality, and praxis in the South African context are indicated (Part F).


Encyclopedia of New Religious Movements

Encyclopedia of New Religious Movements

Author: Peter Clarke

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2004-03

Total Pages: 839

ISBN-13: 1134499701

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An essential companion to both research and scholarship upon which undergraduates, postgraduates, lecturers and researchers can all be expected to draw.


Bourdieu in Africa

Bourdieu in Africa

Author:

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2015-11-02

Total Pages: 286

ISBN-13: 9004307567

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Bourdieu in Africa: Exploring the Dynamics of Religious Fields offers a view of religions as social games played by interested actors. Analyzing practices as strategic moves, this critical approach conceptualizes the religious field as relations of exchange and competition between experts and laity, and explores how the actors’ habitus, including religious beliefs, serve to misrecognize and thus legitimize relations of power within the religious sphere and beyond. The authors discuss the volatile religious fields of Nigeria, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya and South Africa, with their variably configured tensions between African traditions, Christianity and Islam, but also consider the interrelations of religion with other social fields, with politics, economy, education and law. Contributors are: Ulrich Berner, Chikas Danfulani, Jonathan Draper, Magnus Echtler, Gemechu Jemal Geda, Magnus Treiber, Asonzeh Ukah, Dale Wallace, Halkano Abdi Wario.


Kimbanguism

Kimbanguism

Author: Aurélien Mokoko Gampiot

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2017-03-20

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 0271079703

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In this volume, Aurélien Mokoko Gampiot, a sociologist and son of a Kimbanguist pastor, provides a fresh and insightful perspective on African Kimbanguism and its traditions. The largest of the African-initiated churches, Kimbanguism claims seventeen million followers worldwide. Like other such churches, it originated out of black African resistance to colonization in the early twentieth century and advocates reconstructing blackness by appropriating the parameters of Christian identity. Mokoko Gampiot provides a contextual history of the religion’s origins and development, compares Kimbanguism with other African-initiated churches and with earlier movements of political and spiritual liberation, and explores the implicit and explicit racial dynamics of Christian identity that inform church leaders and lay practitioners. He explains how Kimbanguists understand their own blackness as both a curse and a mission and how that underlying belief continuously spurs them to reinterpret the Bible through their own prisms. Drawing from an unprecedented investigation into Kimbanguism’s massive body of oral traditions—recorded sermons, participant observations of church services and healing sessions, and translations of hymns—and informed throughout by Mokoko Gampiot’s intimate knowledge of the customs and language of Kimbanguism, this is an unparalleled theological and sociological analysis of a unique African Christian movement.