This collection of essays and sermons challenges us to consider the Sermon on the Mount as Jesus' serious proposal for an alternative society, a speech of resistance to the forces and institutions that dominate the world. This two-part volume brings together the thoughts of biblical scholars and storytellers, theologians and historians, and evangelical and mainline scholars. Eighteen writers tackle Jesus' landmark sermon, as timely in today's discussions of empire, occupation, poverty, and wars as ever. They demonstrate that the Sermon on the Mount puts before us not an impossible ideal, but...

Description: In Christianity, Democracy, and the Radical Ordinary, theologian Stanley Hauerwas and political theorist Romand Coles reflect about possibilities and practices of radical democracy and radical ecclesia that take form in the textures of relational care for the radical ordinary. They seek to shift political and theological imaginations beyond the limits of contemporary political formations (such as global capitalism, the mega-state, and empire), which they argue are based upon both the denial and production of death. Hauerwas and Coles call us to a revolutionary politics of ""wild...

These essays reflect on possibilities and practices of radical democracy and radical ecclesia that take form in the textures of relational care for the radical ordinary. Hauerwas and Coels point out political and theological imaginations beyond the political formations, which seems to be the declination and the production of death. The authors call us to a revolutionary politics of 'wild patience' that seeks transformation through attentive practices of listening, relationship-building, and a careful tending to places, common goods, and diverse possibilities for flourishing.

Living Well and Dying Faithfully explores how Christian practices -- love, prayer, lament, compassion, and so on -- can contribute to the process of dying well. Working on the premise that one dies the way one lives, the book is unique in its constructive dialogue between theology and medicine as offering two complementary modes of care.

Description: As an explicitly christological witness, martyrdom offers a limited but vital description of the present within the various and unpredictable arenas of living, suffering, and dying. That is to say, martyrdom is not the tragic conclusion of some fatal ideological conflict but a momentary truthful glimpse of present circumstances. Martyrdom reveals, clarifies, and illumines what we take for the real. Martyrs are therefore significant for the church today because they exhibit the sort of truthful living that refuses the claims of history and power without Christ; they show the sort...

Description: This book records a set of dialogues between scientists, theologians, and philosophers on what can be done to prevent a global slide into ecological collapse. It is a uniquely multidisciplinary book that exemplifies the kinds of cultural and scholarly dialogue urgently needed to address the threat to the earth represented by our super-industrial civilization. The authors debate the conventional account of nature conservation as protection from human activity. In contrast to standard accounts, they argue what is needed is a new relationship between human beings and the earth that...

What don't Christians believe? Is Jesus really divine? Is Jesus really human? Can God suffer? Can people be saved by their own efforts?

The early church puzzled over these questions, ruling in some beliefs and ruling out others. Heresies and How to Avoid Them explains the principal ancient heresies and shows why contemporary Christians still need to know about them. These famous detours in Christian believing seemed plausible and attractive to many people in the past, and most can still be found in modern-day guises. By learning what it is that Christians don't believe--and...

In this small but powerful book, renowned theologian Stanley Hauerwas offers a moving reflection on Jesus's final words from the cross. Touching in original and surprising ways on subjects such as praying the Psalms and our need to be remembered by Jesus, Hauerwas emphasizes Christ's humanity as well as the sheer -differentness- of God. Ideal for personal devotion during Lent and throughout the church year, this book offers a transformative reading of Jesus's words that goes directly to the heart of the gospel. Now in paperback.

How are American identity and America's presence in the world shaped by war, and what does God have to do with it? Esteemed theologian Stanley Hauerwas helps readers reflect theologically on war, church, justice, and nonviolence in this compelling volume, exploring issues such as how America depends on war for its identity, how war affects the soul of a nation, the sacrifices that war entails, and why war is considered -necessary, - especially in America. He also examines the views of nonviolence held by Martin Luther King Jr. and C. S. Lewis, how Jesus constitutes the justice of God, and the...