bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Re-enchanting the world: Berger's Sacramental Approach to Religion
Authors: Annette Ahern
Published: March 2013

Peter Berger's sociological enterprise constitutes a grappling with the religious, social, political, economic and cultural dimensions of modernity and, like Max Weber, he tackles the big questions concerning modern, human existence[�]A bibliography of his work from 1958 to the present demonstrates a unified sociological perspective focused upon the "central theme" of modernity in areas as diverse as political ethics, economic culture, modern consciousness and religion. Yet, while political, economic and cultural elements in social reality are important to Berger's hermeneutic, his theory of religion has grounded the central theme of his thought over the years.
Crossing the Threshold: Sojourning Together in the Wild Spaces of Love
Authors: Olthuis James
Published: March 2013

We live in a "time between times," a "place which is no place, " where, as Mark Taylor describes it, "sacred darkness lingers ... endlessly." Like it or not, the Enlightenment dream of a world increasingly controlled by the light of pure rationality is fading fast over the horizon. Control through reason and science has left wide swaths of destruction in its wake: systematic violence, marginalization, oppression, suffering, domination of the "other." It is that sorry history which both lies at the root of the postmodern attack on the totalizing power of reason, and gives shape to the postmodern ethical imperative to include the "other" and to make room for the "different." But what now, at the end of reason, after virtue, after philosophy, after God? What if there is neither a religion nor morality within the bounds of reason alone? Was Taylor right when he recently exclaimed: "[t]hough it continues, theology is as dead as the God for which theologians search,,? If the "sacred escapes the strictures of ontotheology,,,4 unattainable by either the via positive or the via negative, is the sacred beyond reach?
Feminist Consciousness and Lonergan's Intentionality Analysis
Authors: TWOHIG-MOENGANGONGO Cora
Published: March 2013

Feminist consciousness, in whichever descriptive manner it is used, denotes an emerging reality based on women's experience of oppression and women's struggle into freedom, dignity and identity. Since there is no content of experience that is universal and normative for every woman or for all women, how is it possible to speak of "women's experience" as the ground from which to begin the struggle and as a norm to guide the vision of freedom to realization? Genuine self-knowledge is one critical and comprehensive constituent of feminist consciousness that proceeds from women's experience. Intentionality analysis, as articulated in the work of Bernard Lonergan, is an invitation to self-knowledge and self-appropriation that, if it is received and if it is achieved, contributes to the integrity of women's life-project. Through explaining basic terms and relations I will differentiate feminism, consciousness and women's experience while sustaining their interrelationship. This article is an affirmation of the truth that intentional feminist consciousness, evoking our own women's experience, constitutes liberative praxis.
Christ-Devotion in the First Two Centuries: Reflections and a Proposal
Authors: Hurtado Larry
Published: March 2013

In this paper, I wish to outline a proposal for the historical investigation of devotion to Christ in early Christianity. The proposal arises in part from reflections on the present state of scholarly study of the subject, highlighting two works in particular which have shaped the modern scholarly investigation: Bousset's Kyrios Christos and Cullmann's Christology of the New Testament. I propose that, though flawed in critical assumptions and now badly outdated in data, in certain major characteristics Bousset's study offers us the model for the kind of historical analysis of early devotion to Christ we now need to attempt.
The Anglican Sprituality of Richard Hooker
Authors: Grislis Egis
Published: March 2013

Within the Anglican tradition there is no one founding patriarch who occupies an exclusively central role. The centre belongs to several and while there is no absolute agreement as to their identity, for the sixteenth century the list includes Thomas Cranmer (1489-1556), John Jewel (1511-1571), Richard Hooker (c. 1554-1600) and Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626). Among these Hooker stood out as a theologically sophisticated expositor of a via media, a judicious balance between Scripture and tradition, faith and reason, individual responsibility and ecclesial authority. His style was inimitable, his exegesis almost contemporary, and learning universal. To the modern reader Hooker's spelling may initially cause some difficulties, but soon enough is discovered to be helpful, as it assists in savouring Hooker's wisdom and wit. Many of his sentences are epigrammatically brief. Others are long; the longest sentence (in Works, 2.421.32-423.11) has five hundred and thirty words beautifully readable, but not in one breath.
From Revelation to Revolution: Some Thoughts on the Background of the Social Gospel
Authors: Grant John
Published: March 2013

In rereading Towards the Christian Revolution, published in 1936 as a manifesto of the Fellowship for a Christian Social Order, I was struck by the generally negative attitude of the contributors to the evangelical strain in the church's life. Edis Fairbairn urged that the methods of revivalism should be captured for the new message, but for the most part evangelicalism was identified with individualism and thus dismissed as an obstacle to the reconstruction of society. Yet the social gospel as generally defined made its greatest impact on denominations of evangelical background, and nowhere was this more evident than in Canada, where the United Church combined a threefold evangelical pedigree with unusual hospitality to the social gospel. How this could have come about is the question I wish to address.
Reflections on the Federal Council of Churches, the United Church of Canada and the Social Gospel in the 1930s
Authors: Handy Robert
Published: March 2013

What role did the United Church play in the 1930s as an affiliated member of the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America? This is a question which came to mind when I was asked by the editors to consider the theme of the social gospel in the United Church of Canada in comparison with developments in the United States. I chose as my basic sources two sets of printed but not readily available materials. I first read the reports of the Federal Council's meetings from 1928 to 1950, which happily include the minutes of its executive committee. They proved to be a mine of information, but made me hunger and thirst after scattered supportive archival documents of various kinds, such as correspondence, memoranda, personnel records, preliminary drafts and subcommittee reports. Then I scanned the issues of the Federal Council Bulletin from 1924 to 1944, published for most of that period ten times a year under the editorship of the Federal Council's general secretary, Samuel McCrea Cavert. The Bulletin proved helpful for sensing the changing moods of those times in Council circles, but again left me wanting to dig deeper into the archives.

In this article I am going to risk some generalizations as hypotheses, primarily on the basis of those two sets of materials, but relying for help on some of the prominent books on social Christianity in North America. Some of my interpretations may be a little (or even quite) wrong, for at times the meaning of certain passages has not been entirely clear to me, but I hope they may provide something of value for future research and writing.
Christianizing the Social Order: The Roles of Women in the Social Gospel Fiction of Nellie McClung and Ralph Connor
Authors: Profit Beth
Published: March 2013

The contribution of women to the work of the Christian church in Canada has attracted increased scholarly interest in recent years. The usual approach to the subject has been to focus on "professional" workers for the kingdom of God: nuns, missionaries and deaconesses, or to the struggle for women's ordination to ministry in the various Protestant denominations. There has even been some information available on volunteers who worked through church missionary societies. But little attention has been devoted to the informal roles of Christian women in everyday life as they work to build the kingdom of God on earth in their own families and communities. The difficulty, of course, has been the scarcity of available sources for the study of these informal roles. However, one worthwhile source for information about the day-to-day roles of late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Canadian women is the social gospel novel. Though fictional, these novels do reflect the practices, interests, ideals and values of the society for which they were written. These novels may not describe the lives of actual women, per se, but they do provide a view into the ideals of the Christian woman's role during this period.
Religious Revival and Social Transformation: George Pidgeon and the United Church of Canada in the 1930s
Authors: Manson Ian
Published: March 2013

During the 1930s many in the United Church of Canada believed that the Depression was the result of a spiritual malaise which had left the country bereft of an adequate set of religious values. Because of that, several concerted initiatives were undertaken within the church to encourage a national religious revival. Prominent United Church leaders believed that the recovery of a strong and traditional Christian spirituality would stimulate deeper levels of faith, attract newcomers to the church and help to facilitate the social and economic revival of Canada.
Moral Regulation and the Formation of Ethical Subjects
Authors: Velverde Mariana
Published: March 2013

Historians have often treated moral reform movements as diversions from the main outlines of history. Dismissing activists in such campaigns as temperance or anti-prostitution as irrational and unworthy of study, or else reducing moral concerns to the socio-economic self-interest of the reformers in question, historians have refused to grapple with moral regulation as an object of serious scholarly study. In the process, important dimensions of the social and cultural history of our society are either dismissed as comical interludes or regarded as mere ruses, covering up "the real story": the control of the working classes and the suppression of their culture (the Marxist version), or the timeless desire of men to control women's behaviour through sexual codes (the feminist version).
Christianizing the Social Order: A Three-Dimensional Task
Authors: Hutchinson Roger
Published: March 2013

It is not as common today as it was in the 1930s to talk about Christianizing the social order. In our post-Christendom, pluralistic society such language has a triumphalist, imperialistic ring to it. The World Council of Churches' quest for justice, peace and the integrity of creation is now preferred as a vision for our day-the new language analogous to Christianizing the social order. My aim in this article is to reflect upon the assumptions about church and society and about the mission of the church embedded in Christianizing the social order image, especially as that understanding of Christianity was articulated in the 1934 report of the Commission on Christianizing the• Social Order. My main point will be that for the founding generation of the United Church Christianizing the social order was a threefold task involving the transformation of persons, social structures and culture.
Advocating for the Welfare State in Canada: Institutional Responses of the United Church of Canada in the Late 1930s
Authors: Reeve Ted
Published: March 2013

The 1934 Report of the Commission on Christianizing the Social Order (CSO) articulated a number of foundational principles on social and economic policy for the church. This paper goes the next step in considering how the institutional church utilized these 'principles to consider its own socioeconomic views and to advocate policies that contributed to the development of a welfare state in Canada. An important contribution to the church's deliberations is seen in the work of the church's Standing Commission on Economic and Social Research (SCESR) and its brief to the Royal Commission on Dominion-Provincial Relations, chaired by Judge Rowell, and later by Dr. Sirois (Rowell-Sirois Commission). These deliberations seem particularly pertinent today as many social programs are being downsized or dismantled by the government. Remembering the long years of advocacy required to establish them should make us less hasty to abandon them for the laissez-faire attitude predominant in the early twentieth century. It was the failure of the free market, as so strongly recorded in the CSO report, that motivated so many to seek "managed" or "planned" alternatives.
Margaret Wrong: Christian Literacy Worker and "Africanist," 1929-19481
Authors: Brouwer Ruth
Published: March 2013

This article introduces a remarkable but largely unknown Canadian and some aspects of her work for an organization called the International Committee on Christian Literature for Africa (ICCLA). The scope and significance of the ICCLA's mandate was largely determined by Margaret Wrong from 1929, the year of its founding as a subcommittee of the International Missionary Council (IMC), to 1948, the year of her sudden death in Uganda.
Missiological Implications of Christianizing the Social Order with Special Reference to the United Church of Canada
Authors: Jay C. Douglas
Published: March 2013

The central questions addressed in this article are: (1) What are the missiological implications of the concept of Christianizing the social order, especially in the United Church of Canada and its founding churches? and (2) Has the concept any continuing validity in our increasingly pluralistic society?

My particular interest in these questions relates to my role as secretary of the Commission on World Mission, which reviewed mission policy and practice of the United Church of Canada and its founding churches up to 1966, and. which, by the adoption of its recommendations in that year by the General Council, became the official mission policy statement of the church. Reference will also be made to other official reports, especially the 1934 report on Christianizing the social order.
Theme and Variations: The Social Gospel in a New Key
Authors: Young Pamela
Published: March 2013

What are the implications for Christian theology of the questions feminists are raising? What are the implications for Christian theology of the recognition that we live in a religiously plural world? These are crucial questions to which both the United Church of Canada, in particular, and Christian theology in general must seek answers. In the United Church of Canada we have addressed some of the clusters of issues that surround both questions through special consultations and divisional committees. Both feminism and religious pluralism are familiar issues to anyone who has attended General Council or who reads United Church publications and documents. In considering these questions, another question arises: Is there a discernible legacy from the impact of the social gospel on the church in the early years of this century? I will not make any attempt to trace a direct relationship between the concerns of the social gospel and the two questions I raised. I will, however, suggest a certain commonality of commitment.
Behind the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Sons of Zadok, the Priests and Their Priestly Ideology
Authors: Hayward C.T.R.
Published: March 2013

The manuscript discoveries in the caves overlooking Qumran on the shores of the Dead Sea are of interest to all sorts and conditions of people. Those who know little about the Bible, or the writings of the rabbis and Church Fathers, are very often the keenest to know more about the Dead Sea Scrolls. Books about the manuscripts and the people who wrote them are as popular with publishers as they are with readers: the books sell. From the very outset, the Dead Sea Scrolls have offered mystery and romance in almost equal measure. The story of their discovery remains something of a puzzle; and recent suggestions that delayed publication of the documents was the result of a kind of conspiracy have contrived to perpetuate the mystique which seems destined to surround them for years to come.
Major Episodes in the Biography of Jesus: An Assessment of the Historicity of the Narrative Tradition
Authors: Arnal William
Published: March 2013

E.P. Sanders, whose impact on the contemporary study of the historical Jesus is perhaps matched only by that of John Dominic Crossan, has commented specifically on the relation of the gospels' sayings tradition to that of their narrative tradition, with a view toward establishing a secure methodological basis for drawing conclusions about the historical Jesus. Complaining that the usual focus on Jesus' sayings obviates any secure starting point from which an inquiry into Jesus might proceed, he postulates a stark contrast between the characterization thereby generated, and that suggested by the narrative tradition:
Bonhoeffer and the False Dilemma of German Atheism
Authors: Gould James
Published: March 2013

The atheist tradition, both historically and currently, has accused Christianity of being otherworldly. Atheists find in such otherworldliness a reason to repudiate religious belief. This charge was made very forcefully in the nineteenth century by, among others, Feuerbach, Marx and Nietzsche. Curiously, this same critique is made by devout Christians. Consider these words from Martin Luther King's famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail ”:
Hans Urs von Balthasar and “The Jewish Critique”: Intramural Appropriation and Response
Authors: Kieke-Sciglitano Anthony
Published: March 2013

This article argues that the twentieth-century Catholic theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar, appropriates major Jewish criticisms of Christian theology for intramural use while also providing an ample response to these criticisms within his own constructive work. More specifically, the criticisms that von Balthasar levels against various Christian theologians structurally parallel those levelled against Christianity by Jewish thinkers such as Emmanuel Levinas, Martin Buber and, most recently, Michael Wyschogrod. In part 1, I will articulate the basic lines of this Jewish critique appropriated by von Balthasar. Part 2 seeks to show that von Balthasar's diagnostic use of "drama" and "epic" structurally parallels the Jewish concern for attention to worldly affairs on the one hand and Jewish criticisms of Christian theology on the other. Part 3 is both diagnostic and prescriptive. It demonstrates von Balthasar's deployment of the "Jewish critique" against C.W.F. Hegel, Karl Barth and Karl Rahner and articulates a von Balthasarian response to Jewish criticisms on both formal and material grounds.
"Doing Conscience Over": The Reformulation of the Doctrine of Conscience in the Theological Ethics of Karl Barth and Paul Lehmann
Authors: Ziegler Philip
Published: March 2013

Thanks to the posthumous publication of the ethics lectures which Karl Barth delivered in Munster in 1928-1929 and then again in Bonn in 1930-1931, the contemporary reader is offered a glimpse both of things that were to come as well as of things which were never to come. 1 These lectures anticipate, both formally and materially, much of what would later appear in the substantive ethical sections of the four volumes of Barth's Church Dogmatics published over the subsequent decades. But of particular interest for the student of Barth's theology, these lectures in fact go farther than the ethical program of the Dogmatics would ultimately reach, offering an account of the "ethics of redemption" (i.e., ethics from the perspective of eschatology), which would have formed the final sections of the unwritten fifth volume. It is this latter material, the ethics of redemption and more specifically the account of conscience which constitutes an important element within it, which will be the particular the focus of our inquiry.
Solidarity of Others in the Body of Christ: A New Theological Paradigm
Authors: Min Anselm
Published: March 2013

For various historical reasons, recent theologies have been deliberately regional, not comprehensive. Each of them has tried to find its theological locus in the experience of a particular group, concentrating its concern on the liberation of one kind of "Others," often with indifference to other kinds of Others, sometimes at their expense and, at best, in solidarity with them, where the agenda of one's own group remains the centre and norm. The Latin American theology of liberation has been aimed at the challenge of the economic Other; feminism-Black, Hispanic and White-at the challenge of the sexual Other; ethnic theologies at the challenge of the ethnic and racial Other; and pluralist theologies at challenge of the religious Other. Although there has been a growing concern over what appears to be theological fragmentation, the prevailing emphasis has been on irreducible difference and otherness not only from the oppressors but also from fellow victims: I am a woman, not a man; a Black not a White; a Korean-American, not an Anglo-American.
The Self and Spirituality: A Variation
Authors: Dutcher-Walls Tim
Published: March 2013

Augustine has been credited with initiating, in Western thought and spirituality, the focus on the self and its experience. With pious rhetoric and intellectual rumination, his Confessions present his own personal experiences and thoughts as the precise means used by God to bring him back to God. With this status, the self is given unprecedented reality and importance. Confessions "was the first [work] in literature to be concerned entirely with an introspective analysis of the author's own spiritual and emotional experiences." We in the West are inheritors of this legacy to such a degree that exploration of the self is axiomatic in spiritual life.

The title of this article raises the natural question of what is meant by "the self." In this article a full, explicit definition is not possible. The concept of self has mutated in the Western tradition to such a degree that a separate essay would be required to describe adequately the variety of "selves." Nor is it necessary to provide here the historical range of meanings of "self." The contrasting spirituality I explore later assumes and requires only a general sense of the Western concept as it has applied since Augustine-though, as noted, there have been significant shifts in the West in the understanding of the self. What is pertinent for our purpose here is the identification of an orientation
Power, Poverty and Prayer: A Historical Perspective on the Church in the African Sate at the Edge of the Twenty-First Century
Authors: Kalu Ogbu
Published: March 2013

In the early 1990s Adrian Hastings, a consummate historian, theologian and social activist intoned that "Black Africa is today totally inconceivable apart from the presence of Christianity, a presence which a couple of generations ago could still be reasonably dismissed as fundamentally marginal and a mere subsidiary aspect of colonialism."

An African theologian Kwame Bediako cast his mind back to the Edinburgh Conference of 1910 and traced the contours of this element of surprise in the transformation of African Christianity. He declared that African Christianity has now acquired a greater consciousness of its African identity and character. The great challenge for the future is how to be of service to Africa as it voyages into the political realm of the twenty-first century. Not only have "new dimensions" emerged in African Christian spirituality as Paul Gifford said, but the roles of Christian leaders in the contemporary political crises have grown tremendously. Bediako and Gifford cite Togo, Benin, Ghana, and Liberia in West Africa, Zaire, Malawi and Zambia in Central Africa and South Africa as examples.
Book Reviews
Authors: Crook Zeba Antonin , Derrenbacker Robert , Mason Steve , Friesen Paul , Walton Brad , Coyle J. Kevin , Dekar Paul , O'Reilly Veronica , Beech Lawrence , Zynda Damian , Mercier Ronald , Schner George , Starkloff Carl , Whalen David , Wells Harold , Ajzenstat Oona , Ajzenstat Sam , Serroul Leo Vincent , Shepherd Victor
Published: March 2013

J. Dorcas Gordon, Sister or Wife? 1 Corinthians 7 and Cultural Anthropology, reviewed by Zeba Antonin Crook

K.C. Hanson and Douglas E. Oakman, Palestine in the Time of Jesus: Social Structures and Social Conflicts, reviewed by Zeba Antonin Crook

Paul Hoffman, Thomas Hieke and Ulrich Bauer, Synoptic Concordance of the First Three Gospels. A Research Project of the Department of New Testament Studies of the University of Bamberg, Germany, Vol. 1,

B. Hudson McLean, The Cursed Christ: Mediterranean Expulsion Rituals and Pauline Soteriology, reviewed by Robert A. Derrenbacker

Peter Richardson, Herod: King o/the Jews and Friend o/the Romans, reviewed by Steve Mason

Bruce Hindmarsh, John Newton and the English Evangelical Tradition: Between the Conversions of Wesley and Wilberforce, reviewed by Paul H. Friesen

Seong-Hak Kim, Michel de L'Hopital: The Vision of a Reformist Chancellor during the French Religious Wars, reviewed by Brad Walton

Eric Osborn, Tertullian, First Theologian o/the West, reviewed by 1. Kevin Coyle

David T. Priestley, ed., Memory and Hope: Strands of Canadian Baptist History, reviewed by Paul R. Dekar

Diarmuid O'Murchu, Reclaiming Spirituality, reviewed by Veronica O'Reilly

Thomas St. James O'Connor, Clinical Pastoral Supervision and the Theology of Charles Gerkin, reviewed by Lawrence A. Beech

Herbert Anderson and Edward Foley, Mighty Stories, Dangerous Rituals: Weaving Together the Human and the Divine, reviewed by Damian Zynda

Montague Brown, The Quest for Moral Foundations: An Introduction to Ethics, reviewed by Ronald Mercier

David Demson, Hans Frei and Karl Barth: Different Ways of Reading Scripture, reviewed by George P. Schner

Jacques Dupuis, SJ., Toward a Christian Theology of Religious Pluralism, reviewed by Carl F. Starkloff

Johannes H. Emminghaus, The Eucharist: Essence, Form, Celebration, reviewed by David M. Whalen

Jiirgen Moltmann, The Source of Life: The Holy Spirit and the Theology of Life, reviewed by Harold Wells

Michael Oppenheim, Speaking/Writing of God: Jewish Theological Reflections on Life with Others, reviewed by Oona Ajzenstat

Leo Strauss, Jewish Philosophy and the Crisis of Modernity: Essays and Lectures in Modem Jewish Thought, reviewed by Sam Ajzenstat

Andrew Tallon, Head and Heart: Affection, Cognition, Volition as Triune Consciousness, reviewed by Leo Vincent Serroul

Geoffrey Wainwright, For Our Salvation: Two Approaches to the Work of Christ, reviewed by Victor Shepherd
Gandhi and Lonergan: The Issue of Human Authenticity
Authors: Roy Louis
Published: March 2013

In the history of the human race, several thinkers set to themselves a twofold task: to rebut the institutions of their time and to propound an ideal of human achievement. We find instances of such endeavour in Plato's masterwork, The Republic, in Rousseau's passionate Discours sur les sciences et les arts and in Kierkegaard's famous contrast between the aesthetic and the ethical existence-spheres. These authors vividly picture the dramatic conflict that obtains, within the human soul and in society at large, between authentic and inauthentic existence.

The purpose of this article is to meditate on some aspects of Gandhi's extraordinary wisdom and to compare his thoughts with those of Lonergan on the issue of human authenticity. Although both of them — one being an Indian and the other a Canadian of Irish descent — were critical of British policies, they differ enormously in perspective. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948) was a religious ethicist and activist, whose writings, speeches and symbolic gestures aimed at addressing the masses. Bernard J. F. Lonergan (1904-1984) was a Jesuit who chose the scholarly lecture, article or book as the privileged medium to convey his views. For all their dissimilarity, these two thinkers offer a diagnosis and a prescription regarding our time which are worth pondering. Accordingly this article will compare Gandhi's and Lonergan's critiques of Western civilization and their distinctive models of human excellence.
The Dark Side of the Enlightenment
Authors: Ages Arnold
Published: March 2013

It would seem that all great languages, buildings, institutions and, by extension, ideas, have architectural faults. Physicists tell us that this is the way of nature. It is the imperfections, moreover, that produce the quirky dance of atoms and molecules that we call life itself.

The French Enlightenment, the focus of this article, was the edifice of ideas whose first intellectual foundation and footings were formed by Descartes' elevation of reason in the seventeenth century and whose superstructure was completed by Descartes' coalition of thinkers in France called philosophes. The architectural monument we know in English as the Enlightenment and in French as Les Lumieres, was a soaring, life-giving and politically liberating dialectic. It has been said that the vices of a country often come from an excess of virtues: the same can be said of institutions and manifestoes.
Karl Barth's Sixteen Answers to Adolf Harnack: God, Liberalism and the End of Theological Method
Authors: Mangina Joseph
Published: March 2013

This article deals with one of the most important skirmishes in the modern debate over authority in Christian theology: the public correspondence between Karl Barth and his great teacher, the church historian Adolf von Harnack, in the spring of 1923. In one sense, of course, this engagement was an academic enterprise of the highest order. Much of the argument between Barth and Harnack turned on such questions as the nature of revelation, the role of historical knowledge in relation to faith, and the place of theology in the research university-questions that had been the stock-in-trade of liberal Protestant theology in Germany throughout the nineteenth century. At the same time, the debate had profound practical ramifications for the life of the Church.
Wesley's Theology of Preaching and Its Implications for Worship
Authors: Whidden Woodrow
Published: March 2013

The centrality of preaching in the exercise of Wesley's evangelistic, pastoral and theological formation (that is, the way he viewed theology and preaching) is beyond question. Justifiably, much has been written about the style (the "plain" versus the "fine" or "ornate"), content, heroic circumstances (especially in the early going of the Revival), biblical texture and literary sources of his preaching.

His understanding, however, of the way in which the actual theological/ spiritual dynamics are played out in the preaching event (theology of preaching) has received surprisingly little attention. Furthermore, eyewitness testimony regarding the actual dynamics of his preaching and even Wesley's own detailed testimony about what seemed to be happening during his preaching is scant. Though he often speaks of the visible effects of his preaching on his audience (and they did record in their diaries and letters how they were attracted to or repulsed by him as a preacher), there is very little testimony that is reflective or analytical regarding what seemed to be happening from a theological perspective.
Contemporary Christologies in Response to Feminist and Ecological Challenges
Authors: Leonard Ellen
Published: March 2013

Ours is a period of upheaval in Christology, one that has been compared to the period after the death/resurrection of Jesus, when his followers were developing different ways of speaking about him. It has also been compared to the struggles in the fourth and fifth centuries to clarify what was the orthodox Christian belief in Jesus. New insights and concerns are raising new christological questions. The old answers are no longer convincing for many. It is not enough to repeat the words of the creed. We need to discover what these ancient creeds mean for us today.
Feminist Christology: Revelation in Lima
Authors: Snyder Mary Hembrow
Published: March 2013

I don't even know her name, but I will never forget her. We encountered one another the day before I left Peru in June of 1996. It was a typical day in Lima — the heavy, humid air hung like a damp blanket over this filthy, aged city. Pervasive noise and indescribable pollution added further to Lima's quotidian disgrace[�]Therefore, to be a poor, elderly, widowed and indigenous woman in this contextis to be among the most vulnerable, the most "redundant." Such a woman gracefully disrupted my life that eventful day in June.
Christology and Spirituality
Authors: Brennan Margaret
Published: March 2013

Spirituality is a widely used term today, with many different meanings and connotations. For some it means a return to the structured faith of one's childhood which gave answers and assurances to the questions of life. For others it is a search for some kind of wisdom to guide them in their life project. While the word itself has its roots in the Christian tradition it has become universalized today and refers to any inner or outward movement of the human spirit toward that which is transcendent.
Lex Orandi: The Christology of the Eucharistic Prayers of the Roman Rite
Authors: Donovan Daniel
Published: March 2013

An appeal to the axiom lex orandi, lex credenda (the law or rule of prayer and the law or rule of faith) is a common feature of much recent theological, especially liturgical, writing. Although by no means understood in the same way by all who use it, the phrase points to a significant relationship between the prayer life and the faith of the church. A classic formulation of the axiom is that of Prosper of Aquitaine in the mid-fourth century. In arguing against semi-pelagianism, he pointed to the church practice of praying for non-believers and sinners as an indication that grace is required for even the beginning of conversion. "The rites of the priestly supplications, which, transmitted by the apostles, are celebrated in the same manner in the entire world and in the catholic church, in such a way that the order of supplication determines the rule of faith" (ut legem credendi lex statuat supplicandi).
In Memoriam: George Peter Schner, S.J. 1946-2000
Authors: Loftus John Allan
Published: March 2013

The Toronto theological community has lost one of its most distinguished and delightful lights. On Sunday, November 12, 2000, word was received that George Schner had died suddenly earlier that morning in Regina, where he had been enjoying some sabbatical time away from his normal teaching responsibilities at Regis College. After a brief illness earlier in the summer, from which he was making a quick recovery, he contracted double pneumonia and never recovered. He died quietly and peacefully only ten hours after being admitted to hospital.
Forms of Service (1926): A Study in the Liturgical Ethos of The United Church of Canada
Authors: Kervin William
Published: March 2013

Worship in the United Church of Canada has received very little scholarly attention. In the past two decades a handful of contributions have taken steps toward addressing this lacuna. However. these have tended to share the assumption that the story begins with The Book of Common Order of 1932 (BCO). What is conspicuous is the absence of any serious consideration of the first service book of the United Church of Canada. 1926 Forms of Service (Forms). This paper will argue that Forms. its sources. content and context. suggests a different starting point for the study of United Church worship.
Problems of Globalization in Theological Education: An Analysis of Sources
Authors: O'Rourke Colin
Published: March 2013

Globalization is a growing concern within North American theological education. It is leading some scholars to re-examine both Christian theology and the way it is taught in the light of increasing recognition of the larger global context within which they are situated. Central to this enterprise is a discussion of how theology and theological education can or should respond to issues raised by those both within and outside the Christian tradition arising from the changing demography of Christianity. Further fuelling the discussion are non-Christian religions in North America and the new political realities of the postcolonial context of many non-Western countries.
“Speaking the Truth in Love”: Schleiermacher's Perspectives on Church Governance and Service
Authors: Tice Terrence
Published: March 2013

After providing some introductory considerations, in the main body of this essay, I shall offer a general, brief account of what "speaking the truth in love" means to Schleiermacher. In his effort to depict the focal quality of Christian ministry in any form, this phrase represents the nub of the matter. In this essay, I intend to show what Schleiermacher's practical theology consists of. I believe that to grasp what Schleiermacher actually means by church governance and service-the two main parts of his presentation of practical theology-it is necessary to have the following account in mind. Otherwise, his practical theology would be seen as just one man's view of how we should do things in the church. Successively, this account will consider the following areas: (1) Schleiermacher's use of Scripture; (2) his mode of interpretation of Ephesians 4: 15; (3) his discussion of "love" as an affective state, on the basis of (2), and thus a discussion of religion itself as grounded in what is perceived and felt. In the course of this analysis I also treat the role of faith, love and other modes of feeling that arise in our relationships with the divine and with one another, and how such experiences pass on the essence of Christianity over successive generations from Jesus to ourselves. (4) Further, this essay examines what can be said to be "the truth" in the process of communication just depicted. Finally, (5) this essay demonstrates how the process of "speaking the truth in love" determines the way Schleiermacher would view every sector of Christian ministry, whether in more broadly practised governance or in service (Dienst, ministry) as it appears in congregational life.
The Grace of Sophia and the Healing of Han
Authors: Kim Grace Ji-Sun
Published: March 2013

This article addresses the belief that Korean North American women have been silenced and subordinated for too long. They have endured hardships not only because of their Confucian heritage but also from their immigrant status. Tom between two cultures, they do not seem to fit comfortably in either one. To make matters worse, the church has rarely helped these women to become liberated. Instead, the church has reinforced their subordinate status by perpetuating notions of a masculine divinity. The imagery for God needs to expand to include more liberative metaphors from the Christian faith tradition. Female images of God are essential for maintaining the fullness of the image of God and for the promotion of equality between women and men. For a liberative understanding of God, I argue that Korean North American women need to break away from the present patriarchal framework and move to a more inclusive understanding of God and of Jesus Christ. Sophia Christology is already a major feature of white feminist theology. This paper develops the proposition that Sophia Christology may also serve as a meaningful and liberative way forward for Korean North American women's Christology, particularly because of the wisdom tradition of Korean women's own religious and cultural roots. The insights of multifaith hermeneutics encourage us to seek a genuinely inculturated and syncretic Korean North American feminist Christology. Such a hermeneutic requires us to reinterpret the Scriptures from the perspective of different religious traditions.
Moral Ontology in Kant: At What Cost Freedom and Perpetual Peace?
Authors: Schner George
Published: March 2013

Passages of transition intrigue me greatly. We read and teach the great texts which mark the mountain tops of our cultural terrain, remaining ignorant of the years of gradual change which account for the arrival at a new horizon on which a striking figure appears. The passage from the late Middle Ages to high modernity is just such an intriguing journey. I am keenly aware that my few remarks on the towering figure of Immanuel Kant deserve the nuance which only an account of four centuries of "transition" could provide. I wish neither to denigrate the voice of genius which can bring about revolutions, Copernican or otherwise, nor to ignore the prophetic voice which accuses or reassures us beyond the evident. Nonetheless, I wish to raise a cautionary question concerning the challenges of violence and healing in our culture: To what extent do both our diagnoses and proposed solutions to the problem of violence themselves still originate in the discourse of violence which, harsh as it sounds, was the result of that "passage to modernity" and which crystalized in the powerful discourse of the Enlightenment?
Confession and Confessions
Authors: Webster John
Published: March 2013

This paper addresses some fundamental theological questions about the nature and function of creeds and confessions in the life of the church. The basic positive claim here is that creeds and confessional formulae properly emerge out of one of the primary and defining activities of the church, the act of confession. In that act, which is constantly to characterize the life of the church, the church binds itself to the gospel. Confession is the act of astonished, fearful and grateful acknowledgment that the gospel is the one word by which to live and die; in making its confession, the church lifts up its voice to do what it must do—speak with amazement of the goodness and truth of the gospel and the gospel's God. Creeds and confessional formulae exist to promote that act of confession: to goad the church towards it, to shape it, to tie it to the truth, and so to perpetuate the confessional life and activity of the Christian community. In this way, creeds and confessional formulae are the servants of the gospel in the church.
Calling Disciples: Schleiermacher's Application of His Hermeneutics to John 1:35-51
Authors: Kelsey Catherine
Published: March 2013

In the mid-1980s, an informal group of scholars began to coordinate a process for translating the writings of Friedrich Schleiermacher from German into English. Recognizing that Schleiermacher as a preacher was virtually unknown to English-speaking audiences, a special effort was made to find translators for his sermons. Iain G. Nicol was one of the first to begin this work, producing a volume of sermons that set forth key Reformation themes from an 1830 celebration of the handing over of the Augsburg Confession. The translation of Schleiermacher's sermons is an essential contribution to understanding this Reformed theologian and preacher who opened the modem period of Christian theology.
The Patience of Paul
Authors: Henley John
Published: March 2013

In recent years, we have witnessed an increasing emphasis on the importance of community in certain theological circles beyond, though still including, the Roman Catholic. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that less is being heard of Bultmann-like depictions of the Christian life according to Paul. It seems to me, however—indeed, it has long seemed to me —that there are elements in the thought of the apostle which invite us to beware of those who enthuse too much about the communal dimension of Christian living. Bultmann and many others may have neglected this communal dimension but they were not wrong to draw attention to the room Paul makes for the individual. For the apostle found limits to the achievement of Christian community and so, in the rest of this salute to a friend shaped by Scottish Presbyterianism, I shall focus on three aspects of Paul's teaching about life in the body of Christ and also say something about their continuing relevance.
Logos and Sarx
Authors: Galloway Allan
Published: March 2013

"The Word became flesh" (John 1:14). This saying is as difficult to understand as it is challenging to belief. It has many layers of meaning, one of which I propose to explore.

In the past, it distressed me that our discipline, which should deal in eternal verities, is more fashion-ridden than the salon of any Paris couturier. In the course of an undeservedly long life, I have lived through many fashions, from neo-Hegelian idealism through Liberalism, Neo-orthodoxy, Existentialism, Secularism, Death-of-God, and so on. I estimate that the half-life of the average theological fashion is about ten years. The ephemeral character of our theological adventures distresses me no longer. This is the sarx—-the fleshly, temporal character of all our being and doing. We do indeed attempt to express and interpret the eternal truth of God but we can do so with relevance only within the context of our own living and ever-changing situation.

Certainly we need the relative permanence of the creeds as the body needs a skeleton. But skeletons without flesh belong either in the grave or in a museum. Without the flesh of contextual relevance, the ancient creeds read like strange and largely meaningless metaphysical recipes. They even give instructions on how to combine the ingredients without dividing the substance or confounding the natures, and so on.
The Theology of Relevance: Nowhere to Lay Its Head
Authors: McIntyre John
Published: March 2013

This paper takes this concept of relevance and marries it to christological themes and thereby explores a theology of relevance through which questions of meaning and truth might be addressed. An initial distinction has to be made between primary and secondary relevance. Primary relevance refers to the "given" of the Christian faith and the events from which it sprang. Secondary relevance refers to the application of this givenness to the generations of Christians who followed. In this discussion "relevance" is understood christologically as "intrinsic relatedness."
“Church Practices”: Sacraments or Invocations? H¨tter's Proposal in Light of Barth's
Authors: Demson David
Published: March 2013

The concept of "church practices" has entered in a prominent way into current theological discussion. While the lineage of this concept includes Alasdair MacIntyre and Stanley Hauerwas, the concept most recently has been taken up as a special point of concentration by a group of Lutheran, Roman Catholic and Anglican theologians, which this year has brought out a book entitled, Knowing the Triune God: The Work of the Spirit in the Practices of the Church. Among its accomplished contributors is Reinhard Hütter who, as is indicated by the title of his recent book, has been a principal advocate in the development of the concept. Hütter's work is especially instructive for the following reasons: (a) his account of what is meant by the concept of church practices; (b) his account of the comprehensive role church practices (together with church doctrine) play in determining what theology is and does, and; (c) his criticism of Barth's account of church practices and, consequently, of the way in which Barth does theology.

Since Hütter's account of church practices gains some of its descriptive force from its polemical relation to Barth's theology of the Christian community, it is useful to compare Hütter's proposal (first section) with Barth's (second section). Further, it may be noted, Barth provides something that Hutter does not-the exegetical support for his proposed understanding of one church practice-water baptism. (The implication of his exegesis for the understanding of the other church practices is, I believe, evident.) The question posed, then, is: are Barth's exegetical grounds (recounted in the third section) for his description of church practices clear enough and convincing enough to withstand Hutter's criticism and alternate proposal? Contrariwise, Hutter is challenged to provide more convincing exegetical grounds for his proposal than has Barth.