Keen insight for preaching and teaching Scripture are to be found in these pages. Several respected scholars here discuss how to read and live the Bible theologically in our contemporary context. Editors Michael Root and James Buckley maintain that these essays, though varied, share at least three assumptions: (1) The word of God (not necessarily human preaching and teaching) is sharper than any two-edged sword. (2) Preaching, teaching, and living the Bible are firmly yet delicately intertwined in the communion of saints. (3) There are distinctive ministries of preaching and teaching in the...

No question is more central to Christian living, preaching, and theology than Jesus' question to his disciples: Who do you say that I am? Some would have it that pastors and theologians, biblical exegetes and historians, dogmatic and moral theologians, Catholic and Evangelical have more differences than similarities in the way Christians with such diverse vocations respond to Jesus' question. And there is little doubt that there sometimes seem to be unbridgeable gulfs between the way historians and believers, Internet gossipers and preachers, classical christological debates and present-day...

Jesus' best-known mandate--after perhaps the mandate to love God and neighbor--was given at the Last Supper just before his death: ""Do this in memory of me."" Indeed, a case can be made that to ""do this"" is the source and summit of the way Christians carry out Jesus' love-mandate. Of course, Christians have debated what it means to ""do this,"" and these debates have all too often led to divisions within and between them--debates over leavened and unleavened bread, reception of the cup, real presence and sacrifice, ""open"" or ""closed"" communion, this Supper and the hunger of the world....

What is our destiny? The final end of humanity and the universe is a subject of perennial interest, especially for Christians. What are we promised? Will anyone finally be left out of God's intentions to bless humanity? What sort of transformation will be needed to enter the presence of God? These questions have been at the heart of Christian teachings about last things. The 2013 Pro Ecclesia Conference of the Center for Catholic and Evangelical Theology focused such issues on the theme ""Heaven, Hell . . . and Purgatory?"" The six essays in this volume cover a range of topics of interest to...

About the Contributor(s): Michael Root is Professor of Systematic Theology at The Catholic University of America and Executive Director of the Center for Catholic and Evangelical Theology. He was formerly the Director of the Institute for Ecumenical Research, Strasbourg, France. James J. Buckley is Professor of Theology at Loyola University Maryland. He has recently contributed to and edited (with Frederick Bauerschmidt and Trent Pomplun) The Blackwell Companion to Catholicism (2007). He is associate director of the Center for Catholic and Evangelical Theology.

""We are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness"" (Eph 6:12). So Paul warns his Ephesian readers. And yet Paul also says that these principalities and powers were created in and for Christ (Col 1:16) and cannot separate us from the love of God (Rom 8:38). What are the principalities and powers of our time? How do we understand them as created, fallen, and disarmed? How does the Christian today engage these powers? These are the questions speakers and participants addressed at the 2014 Center...