"I do not think there are any issues on the theological and human scene more important than the ones liberation theologians are raising," says Robert McAfee Brown. In this book Brown explores how we can respond to liberation theology without condescension, arrogance, or co-optation. He surveys in detail the kind of challenges to North American Christians issued by South American theologians. He then calls upon the church to work to make itself what it ought to be and to take sides politically in support of human rights.
In 1945, Dietrich Bonhoeffer—a theologian and pastor—was executed by the Nazis for his resistance to their unspeakable crimes against humanity. He was only 39 years old when he died, but Bonhoeffer left behind volumes of work exploring theological and ethical themes that have now inspired multiple generations of scholars, students, pastors, and activists. This book highlights the ways Dietrich Bonhoeffer's work informs political theology and examines Bonhoeffer's contributions in three ways: historical-critical interpretation, critical-constructive engagement, and constructive-practical application. With contributions from a broad array of scholars from around the world, chapters range from historical analysis of Bonhoeffer’s early political resistance language to accounts of Bonhoeffer-inspired, front-line resistance to white supremacists in Charlottesville, VA. This volume speaks to the ongoing relevance of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s work and life in and out of the academy.
Organized as a companion volume to Karl Rahner's master work, Foundations of Christian Faith, this book, now again available, also provides the most useful introduction to his theology as a whole. Each chapter presents a broad commentary on the corresponding chapter of Foundations, beginning with Rahner's method and anthropology and concluding with his theology of the church and eschatology. It includes a separate chapter on Rahner's moral thought. Valuable for classroom or individual use, this volume provides questions for discussion, suggestions for further reading, and an extensive glossary of specialized terminology.
The 20th and 21st Centuries have been characterized by theologians and philosophers rethinking theology and revitalizing the tradition. This unique anthology presents contributions from leading contemporary theologians - including Rowan Williams, Fergus Kerr, Aidan Nichols, G.R. Evans and Tracey Rowland - who offer portraits of over fifty key theological thinkers in the modern and postmodern era. Distinguished by its broad ecumenical perspective, this anthology spans arguably one of the most creative periods in the history of Christian theology and includes thinkers from all three Christian traditions: Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox. Each individual portrait in this anthology includes a biographical introduction, an overview of theological or philosophical writing, presentation of key thoughts, and contextual placing of the thinker within 20th Century religious discourse. Overview articles explore postmodern theology, radical orthodoxy, ecumenical theology, feminist theology, and liberation theology. A final section includes portraits of important thinkers who have influenced Christian thought from other fields, not least from Continental philosophy and literature.
This book sets out to interpret Henri de Lubac's theology of creation from a christological perspective. The challenge of this research has been the absence of a systematic christology in the writings of de Lubac. Yet it is possible to posit a Lubacian christology by sifting through the author's work on a myriad of subjects. The point of entry is the patristic distinction between 'image' and 'likeness', whereby 'image' is understood as an inamissible seal which bestows the divine prerogatives of reason, freedom, immortality and dominion over nature. 'Likeness' is a potential given at creation and realised in the course of the economy of salvation. De Lubac describes it variously as divinisation, divine union, the supernatural dignity of the human being, and participation in the internal movement of the Trinity. The originality of this book consists in the gradual emergence of the role of Christ in the process whereby image becomes likeness. De Lubac records his intention to publish a book on Jesus Christ, an ambition he never realised. The present book does not just illustrate the omnipresence of Christ in the writings of de Lubac but dares to delineate what a Lubacian christology would look like.
The growing shift in Catholic moral theology from reflecting on rules alone to focusing on the identity and formation of persons as moral agents prompts a further question: What impact do recent changes in the identity and formation of Catholic moral theologians themselves have on how that discipline is practiced? Young Catholic moral theologians experience a sharply different professional formation and a changed location of ongoing professional life than prior generations of moral theologians. How do these differences influence the field of moral theology as a whole? New Wine, New Wineskins: A Next Generation Reflects on Key Issues in Catholic Moral Theology addresses these questions and more by offering a snapshot of how a new generation of Catholic moral theologians understands not only topics in the field, but the effects of their own identity and formation on their treatment of those topics. The distinctive contribution of this volume is the interweaving of three key concerns, all of which arise out of a critical self-reflection on the task of moral theology today: the character and adequacy of training and ongoing formation in the field of Catholic moral theology, the purpose and nature of teaching Catholic moral theology, and the fittingness of methodological debates with regard to the needs of the Christian life. Each essay makes a contribution to its specific area of interest-ranging from economic ethics, to Patristic rhetoric, to the nature and development of practical reasoning-while probing what exactly young Catholic moral theologians are doing, and how they can do what they do better.
Can we affirm that a political theology exists in Islam? This apparently simple question is the core of Massimo Capanini and Marco Di Donato's edited collection of essays. Considering the wide range of meanings of political theology this book contains essays written by different authors having their own, specific, and specialized, point of view on the topics, from Shia and Sunni political thought, to Islamic classic philosophy, and philosophers until arriving at contemporary Muslim thinkers.
THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER As seen on The Joe Rogan Experience! A groundbreaking dive into the role psychedelics have played in the origins of Western civilization, and the real-life quest for the Holy Grail that could shake the Church to its foundations. The most influential religious historian of the 20th century, Huston Smith, once referred to it as the "best-kept secret" in history. Did the Ancient Greeks use drugs to find God? And did the earliest Christians inherit the same, secret tradition? A profound knowledge of visionary plants, herbs and fungi passed from one generation to the next, ever since the Stone Age? There is zero archaeological evidence for the original Eucharist – the sacred wine said to guarantee life after death for those who drink the blood of Jesus. The Holy Grail and its miraculous contents have never been found. In the absence of any hard data, whatever happened at the Last Supper remains an article of faith for today’s 2.5 billion Christians. In an unprecedented search for answers, The Immortality Key examines the archaic roots of the ritual that is performed every Sunday for nearly one third of the planet. Religion and science converge to paint a radical picture of Christianity’s founding event. And after centuries of debate, to solve history’s greatest puzzle. Before the birth of Jesus, the Ancient Greeks found salvation in their own sacraments. Sacred beverages were routinely consumed as part of the so-called Ancient Mysteries – elaborate rites that led initiates to the brink of death. The best and brightest from Athens and Rome flocked to the spiritual capital of Eleusis, where a holy beer unleashed heavenly visions for two thousand years. Others drank the holy wine of Dionysus to become one with the god. In the 1970s, renegade scholars claimed this beer and wine – the original sacraments of Western civilization – were spiked with mind-altering drugs. In recent years, vindication for the disgraced theory has been quietly mounting in the laboratory. The constantly advancing fields of archaeobotany and archaeochemistry have hinted at the enduring use of hallucinogenic drinks in antiquity. And with a single dose of psilocybin, the psychopharmacologists at Johns Hopkins and NYU are now turning self-proclaimed atheists into instant believers. But the smoking gun remains elusive. If these sacraments survived for thousands of years in our remote prehistory, from the Stone Age to the Ancient Greeks, did they also survive into the age of Jesus? Was the Eucharist of the earliest Christians, in fact, a psychedelic Eucharist? With an unquenchable thirst for evidence, Muraresku takes the reader on his twelve-year global hunt for proof. He tours the ruins of Greece with its government archaeologists. He gains access to the hidden collections of the Louvre to show the continuity from pagan to Christian wine. He unravels the Ancient Greek of the New Testament with the world’s most controversial priest. He spelunks into the catacombs under the streets of Rome to decipher the lost symbols of Christianity’s oldest monuments. He breaches the secret archives of the Vatican to unearth manuscripts never before translated into English. And with leads from the archaeological chemists at UPenn and MIT, he unveils the first scientific data for the ritual use of psychedelic drugs in classical antiquity. The Immortality Key reconstructs the suppressed history of women consecrating a forbidden, drugged Eucharist that was later banned by the Church Fathers. Women who were then targeted as witches during the Inquisition, when Europe’s sacred pharmacology largely disappeared. If the scientists of today have resurrected this technology, then Christianity is in crisis. Unless it returns to its roots. Featuring a Foreword by Graham Hancock, the NYT bestselling author of America Before.
