Battle for the heart

Battle for the heart PDF Author: Jan Albert van den Berg
Publisher: LIT Verlag Münster
ISBN: 3643913060
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 204

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Book Description
The battle of the heart can be seen as the core problem of the Christian religion in modern culture. According to Augustine, the complex mixture of longings are the driving forces of human lives. These longing are not an intellectual puzzle, but rather a craving for sustenance. The contributions locate the battle for the heart and transformation of society and church in the context of an ethnic, multi-religious, socio-economical divided Africa. Where are the authentic voices of leaders who can change the heart? How to mend a 'broken' heart? How to transform congregations towards inclusion of difference? Can we embrace the dignity of difference as attitudes that enable transformation of church and society?

Battle for the heart

Battle for the heart PDF Author: Jan Albert van den Berg
Publisher: LIT Verlag Münster
ISBN: 3643913060
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 204

Get Book Here

Book Description
The battle of the heart can be seen as the core problem of the Christian religion in modern culture. According to Augustine, the complex mixture of longings are the driving forces of human lives. These longing are not an intellectual puzzle, but rather a craving for sustenance. The contributions locate the battle for the heart and transformation of society and church in the context of an ethnic, multi-religious, socio-economical divided Africa. Where are the authentic voices of leaders who can change the heart? How to mend a 'broken' heart? How to transform congregations towards inclusion of difference? Can we embrace the dignity of difference as attitudes that enable transformation of church and society?

Do We Need Religion?

Do We Need Religion? PDF Author: Hans Joas
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317260996
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 144

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Book Description
The old assumption that modernization leads to secularization is outdated. Yet the certainty that religion is an anthropological universal that can only be suppressed by governments is also dead. Thus it is now a favorable moment for a new perspective on religion. This book takes human experiences of self-transcendence as its point of departure. Religious faith is seen as an attempt to articulate and interpret such experiences. Faith then is neither useful nor a symptom of weakness or misery, but an opening up of ways of experience. This book develops this basic idea, contrasts it with the thinking of some leading religious thinkers of our time, and relates it to the current debates about human rights and universal human dignity.

The Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies

The Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies PDF Author: Kirsteen Kim
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192567586
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 769

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Book Description
The Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies represents more than a century of scholarship related to the theology, history, and methodology of the propagation of Christian faith and the engagement of Christians with cultures, religions, and societies worldwide. It contains more than 40 articles by experts from different disciplinary and ecclesial perspectives, who are from all continents. It not only offers a broad overview of key approaches and issues in mission studies but it also highlights current trends and suggests future developments. The Handbook builds on renewed interest in mission studies this century generated by recent key statements on mission from ecumenical, evangelical, Catholic, and Orthodox sources, and by a spate of academic works on the topic. Western church leaders now apply insights from foreign missions (such as, inculturation, liberation, interfaith work, and power encounter) to today's multicultural societies. Meanwhile, there are new initiatives in mission from the Majority World, where most Christians live, so that sending is not only 'from the west to the rest' but 'from everywhere to everywhere'. Therefore, this volume aims to reflect the voices of the receivers of mission as well as its protagonists and to raise awareness of new movements. In a time of growing recognition of 'religions' more generally, this work examines and theorizes the missional dimensions of the world's largest religion: its agendas, growth, outreach, role in public life, effect on cultures, relevance for development, and its approaches to other communities.

The Preacher as 'First Listener'

The Preacher as 'First Listener' PDF Author: Filip De Cavel
Publisher: LIT Verlag Münster
ISBN: 3643912838
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
The preacher's weekly assignment is brutally repetitive: Fill the blank page by Sunday, at least twice a month, if not, even more. This book offers a biblical, theological and empirical grounding to support the preacher's self-reflective, listening, and sermonizing practices in order for the preacher to be aware of his/her spirituality of listening and discernment.

The Invisible Wounded Warriors in a Nation at Peace

The Invisible Wounded Warriors in a Nation at Peace PDF Author: Jan Grimell
Publisher: LIT Verlag Münster
ISBN: 364391489X
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 218

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Book Description
Although there has not been war in Swedish territory for many years, this does not mean that the country has no veterans who have experienced the challenges of war zone deployments or suffer from combat trauma. The Invisible Wounded Warriors in a Nation at Peace gives a rare look at the international operations of the Swedish military, while offering the reader a unique and deeper understanding of life with PTSD. The book uses terms such as moral injury to further describe the complexity. Complex PTSD after deployment in a conflict zone is a uniquely complicated web of problems that can have medical, psychological, moral, existential and spiritual dimensions. The book discusses what this might mean from an identity and pastoral care perspective.

Resilient Religion, Resilience and Heartbreaking Adversity

Resilient Religion, Resilience and Heartbreaking Adversity PDF Author: LIT Verlag
Publisher: LIT Verlag
ISBN: 3643965001
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
A resilience theory on religion needs to answer four questions. What defines the kind of adversity which is addressed in religion? What is characteristic for processes of resilience in religion? What defines resilient religion as outcome? Which logic of inference (epistemology) based on our beliefs and experiences about reality binds these three elements together? The book starts with mapping the field of resilience theory on religion by addressing all four questions. The need for thinking about Christian resilience and the God symbol is addressed, and the need to be "explicitly contextual" with regard to resilience in South Africa. Next three types practices of religious acting are related to experiences of resilience, namely preaching, narrating and discerning. In the last chapters the focus is on the way stories help to express feelings of experiences of crises, tragedy, and trauma. But also how stories can help heal the broken heart. Prof Chris A.M. Hermans is extraordinary professor in practical theology and missiology at the University of the Free State (South Africa). He is emeritus professor in pastoral theology at Radboud University (the Netherlands).and emeritus professor in empirical study of religion as Radboud University (the Netherlands). Prof. Kobus (W.J.) Schoeman is professor of practical theology at the University of the Free State (South Africa).

Ethics of Resilience

Ethics of Resilience PDF Author: Robert Petkovsek
Publisher: LIT Verlag Münster
ISBN: 3643912110
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 262

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Book Description
Resilience is one of the hottest terms in the modern humanities, social sciences and beyond. The reason for this is the current situation at various levels, from ecological, health, economical to political, which requires the formation of resilience from individuals, communities, countries, institutions and humanity as a whole. The term resilience refers to a new realistic paradigm in tackling the challenges required by the modern world, in which changes are happening faster and faster and are becoming less transparent and predictable. Therefore, the paradigm of stability and protection against disturbances is no longer realistic and has been replaced by the paradigm of resilience. People, natural and social systems can no longer be protected from ruptures, but must become as resilient as possible. This, in turn, raises a number of issues involving ethical questions and challenges for religions. This book addresses these issues in a holistic and interdisciplinary way that fits the multifaceted nature of resilience.

Divine Will and Human Choice

Divine Will and Human Choice PDF Author: Richard A. Muller
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 1493406701
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 524

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Book Description
This fresh study from an internationally respected scholar of the Reformation and post-Reformation eras shows how the Reformers and their successors analyzed and reconciled the concepts of divine sovereignty and human freedom. Richard Muller argues that traditional Reformed theology supported a robust theory of an omnipotent divine will and human free choice and drew on a tradition of Western theological and philosophical discussion. The book provides historical perspective on a topic of current interest and debate and offers a corrective to recent discussions.

Collectivistic Religions

Collectivistic Religions PDF Author: Slavica Jakelic
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317164199
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
Collectivistic Religions draws upon empirical studies of Christianity in Europe to address questions of religion and collective identity, religion and nationalism, religion and public life, and religion and conflict. It moves beyond the attempts to tackle such questions in terms of 'choice' and 'religious nationalism' by introducing the notion of 'collectivistic religions' to contemporary debates surrounding public religions. Using a comparison of several case studies, this book challenges the modernist bias in understanding of collectivistic religions as reducible to national identities. A significant contribution to both the study of religious change in contemporary Europe and the theoretical debates that surround religion and secularization, it will be of key interest to scholars across a range of disciplines, including sociology, political science, religious studies, and geography.

Churches in the mirror

Churches in the mirror PDF Author: Kobus Schoeman
Publisher: UJ Press
ISBN: 1928424716
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
Ecclesiology is the study of the church and has two focal points; the one is the historical and doctrinal perspective on the church, and the other is the church as situated in a local context in the sense of the local practices of actual congregations. The ecclesiology or, more correctly, the ecclesiologies of this volume mainly focuses on the second aspect, i.e., understanding the local congregation or parish as a community of believers. A congregation may firstly be described by posing a theological question: What is the local missional church or congregation all about? This question may be answered from different perspectives, but it remains essential to answer it from a theological perspective. The first five chapters in this book focus mainly on a theological understanding of the congregation. This is done from different disciplines within the study field of theology. Congregations are, secondly, social realities and should be described and analysed through an analytical or empirical lens, or, to answer the question attached to the first empirical-descriptive task of practical theology, “What is going on?”. The remaining chapters use a quantitative and qualitative lens and give an empirical analysis of the congregation. The intention is to critically reflect on the church and congregations’ ecclesiology from a theological and analytical perspective with an emphasis on the South African context. It wants to map markers for the development of contemporary ecclesiologies, and the different chapters are meant as mirrors to look in and reflect on the theological and contextual relevance of denominations and congregations in South Africa.