Navigation

Tag Archives | Book

Matthew Hill

By on February 24, 2016 in Faculty Publications

Hill, Matthew. Evolution and Holiness: Sociobiology, Altruism and the Quest for Wesleyan Perfection. Westmont, IL: IVP Academic, 2016.

Evolution & HolinessTheology needs to engage what recent developments in the study of evolution mean for how we understand moral behavior. How does the theological concept of holiness connect to contemporary understandings of evolution? If genetic explanations of altruism fall short, what role should we give to environmental explanations and free will? Likewise, how do genetic explanations relate to theological accounts of human goodness and holiness? In this groundbreaking work, Matthew Hill uses the lens of Wesleyan ethics to offer a fresh assessment of the intersection of evolution and theology. He shows that what is at stake in this conversation is not only the future of the church but also the fine-tuning of human evolution.

Jen Letherer

By on October 31, 2015 in Faculty Publications

Letherer, Jen. Remote Virtue: A Christian Guide to Intentional Media Viewing. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2015.

Remote VirtueTelevision and movies shape popular culture, with audiences often unaware of how media messages influence the way they think, act, and view the world. In this enlightening guide, author Jen Letherer interprets film and television shows from a Christian standpoint, revealing how beliefs and values portrayed on the big and small screens often impact the moral conduct of daily viewers. This book provides the tools for Christians to discern the implicit and explicit messages found within this medium, and shows how motion pictures can improve or erode religious principles and a spiritual way of life.

In a conversational tone, the work combines classic film theory, an assessment of story structure, and faith-based film criticism to delve into meaning and interpretations of popular movies and shows. Highlighted television programs include Top Chef, Modern Family, Downton Abbey, and The Walking Dead. The book also features films like Citizen Kane, Thelma and Louise, Star Wars, Inception, and The Hunger Games. This fascinating critique prompts media consumers to analyze the messages that their favorite broadcast programs send, consider if those messages are in line with their own values, and align their viewing choices with their personal beliefs.

Jeffrey Bilbro

By on April 30, 2015 in Faculty Publications

Bilbro, Jeffrey. Loving God’s Wildness: The Christian Roots of Ecological Ethics in American Literature. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2015.

Jogging with ChestertonWhen the Puritans arrived in the New World to carry out the colonization they saw as divinely mandated, they were confronted by the American wilderness. Part of their theology led them to view the natural environment as “a temple of God” in which they should glorify and serve its creator. The larger prevailing theological view, however, saw this vast continent as “the Devil’s Territories” needing to be conquered and cultivated for God’s Kingdom. These contradictory designations gave rise to an ambivalence regarding the character of this land and humanity’s proper relation to it.

Loving God’s Wildness rediscovers the environmental roots of America’s Puritan heritage. In tracing this history, Jeffrey Bilbro demonstrates how the dualistic Christianity that the Puritans brought to America led them to see the land as an empty wilderness that God would turn into a productive source of marketable commodities. Bilbro carefully explores the effect of this dichotomy in the nature writings of Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, Willa Cather, and Wendell Berry.

Thoreau, Muir, Cather, and Berry imaginatively developed the Puritan theological tradition to propose practical, physical means by which humans should live and worship within the natural temple of God’s creation. They reshaped Puritan dualism, each according to the particular needs of his or her own ecological and cultural contexts, into a theology that demands care for the entire created community. While differing in their approaches and respective ecological ethics, the four authors Bilbro examines all share the conviction that God remains active in creation and that humans ought to relinquish their selfish ends to participate in his wild ecology.

Loving God’s Wildness fills a critical gap in literary criticism and environmental studies by offering a sustained, detailed argument regarding how Christian theology has had a profound and enduring legacy in shaping the contours of the American ecological imagination. Literary critics, scholars of religion and environmental studies, and thoughtful Christians who are concerned about environmental issues will profit from this engaging new book.

Nathan Foster

By on October 7, 2014 in Faculty Publications, General

Foster, Nathan. The Making of an Ordinary Saint: My Journey from Frustration to Joy with the Spiritual Disciplines. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2014.

The Making of an Ordinary Saint More than thirty years after his father’s classic book brought them to the masses, Nathan Foster took his own unique path into the spiritual disciplines. As he sought day by day to develop habits that would enable him to live more like Jesus, he encountered problems both universal and personal. Along the way, he found creative new ways to practice the disciplines and discovered that a vital, conversational relationship with God was truly within his grasp.

Now he invites you to join him on the journey. You may just find that holy habits are truly possible for all.

Robert Moore-Jumonville & Brian Shaw

By on May 7, 2014 in Faculty Publications

Moore-Jumonville, Robert, Dale Ahlquist, & Brian Shaw (Illustrator). Jogging with G.K. Chesterton: 65 Earthshaking Expeditions. Cheshire, CT: Winged Lion Press, 2014.

Jogging with ChestertonImagine having the brilliant journalist and prolific Christian author G.K. Chesterton as your daily jogging partner. This is precisely what Robert Moore-Jumonville did for over twelve years – he read LOTS of Chesterton’s books and, during his daily jogging routine, reflected on them. The resulting essays appeared in Gilbert magazine, the monthly publication of the American G.K. Chesterton Society. JOGGING WITH G.K. CHESTERTON is a showcase for the merry mind of Chesterton. But Chesterton’s lighthearted wit always runs side-by-side with his weighty wisdom. These 65 “earthshaking expeditions” will keep you smiling and thinking from start to finish. You’ll be entertained, challenged, and spiritually uplifted as you take time to breathe the crisp morning air and contemplate the wonders of the world. “This is a delightfully improbable book in which Chesterton puts us through our spiritual and intellectual exercises with mind-jogging and body-jiggling brilliance. It will leave you breathless with the exhilaration and exhaustion of the Chestertonian chase.” Joseph Pearce Author of Wisdom and Innocence: A Life of G.K. Chesterton “G.K. Chesterton is one of the giants of the Christian intellectual tradition. If you want to learn about him, or learn more than you now know, I heartily recommend JOGGING WITH G.K. CHESTERTON. It will delight, entertain, instruct and challenge you.” Richard J. Foster Author Celebration of Discipline and Sanctuary of the Soul Robert Moore-Jumonville is Professor of Christian Spirituality at Spring Arbor University in Michigan and the pastor of Pope United Methodist Church. He is the author of Hermeneutics of Historical Distance and co-authored (with Thom Slatterlee) two books of selected readings from G.K. Chesterton.

Mark Correll

By on March 17, 2014 in Faculty Publications

Correll, Mark R. Shepherds of the Empire: Germany’s Conservative Protestant Leadership–1888-1919. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2014.

Shepherds of the EmpireThe late nineteenth century was a time of rapid industrialization, mass politicization, and modern philosophy. The resulting political and cultural upheaval confronted the German protestant church with deep questions of identity. On the one side sat an educated academic guild whose explorations of history, philology, and emerging social scientific disciplines gave rise to serious questions about the Christian faith and its meaning for today. On the other sat parish clergy faced with the complexities of daily life and leadership in common communities. For these parish clergy the pressure was great to support and bolster people not only in their life as Christians, but in their life as Germans.

Shepherds of the Empire engages timeless questions of identity and faith through the time-bound work of four key thinkers who attempted, and ultimately failed, to carve a middle way for the German parish clergy in that environment.

John Hawthorne

By on February 18, 2014 in Faculty Publications

Hawthorne, John W. A First Step into a Much Larger World: The Christian University and Beyond. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock Publishers, 2014.

A First StepHow do Christian students approach their years at a Christian college or university? What are the connections between all those hours of study and the Christian life? A FIRST STEP INTO A MUCH LARGER WORLD invites students, parents, and educators into a broad conversation about faith and learning in a postmodern age. Students will explore how to respond to diversity while maintaining community, how to make learning sensible as an expression of faith, and how to move from passive recipients of education to active and engaged co-learners with others. In so doing, they can transform their undergraduate years into a springboard for engaging the culture beyond the university.

Robert Woods

By on December 3, 2013 in Faculty Publications

Woods, Robert  and Kevin Healy, eds. Prophetic Critique and Popular Media: Theoretical Foundations and Practical Applications, New York: Peter Lang , 2013.

Prophetic CritiqueThis book positions the «prophetic» as an organizing concept that can bridge religious and secular criticism of popular media. Drawing from philosophical ethics and moral psychology, the book argues that prophetic critique engages a complex set of universal human capabilities. Whether religious or secular in origin, prophetic critique requires developmentally complex modes of critical reflection, imagination, empathy, and communication. Although this book is diverse in perspective, each author seeks to expose how the content, institutions, and technologies of popular media alternately support – or undermine – the basic values of equality, human dignity, and social justice. By foregrounding such universal principles, the authors distinguish their arguments from critical/cultural scholarship that fails to acknowledge its own normative foundations and implicit theology of culture. The authors demonstrate the efficacy of this framework by applying it to specific case studies in popular media including theater, film, music, journalism, and digital culture. The book argues that the prophetic critique of mass media is essential to maintaining a productive tension between religious communities and the institutions of secular democracy. More broadly, in outlining an inclusive understanding of prophetic critique, this book builds bridges between religious and secular scholarship and generates a unique vision for a revitalized, mass-mediated public sphere.

Michael Buratovich

By on December 1, 2013 in Faculty Publications

Auday, Bryan C., Michael A., Buratovich, Geraldine F. Marrocco, and Paul Moglia. Magill’s Medical Guide 7th edition. Ipswich, Massachusetts : Amenia, NY: Salem Press, 2013.

Magill's Medical Guide 7th editionNow in its seventh edition, Magill’s Medical Guide contains 1,200 entries in five volumes. Many essay topics are completely new to this edition, and all entries from the previous edition have been evaluated and updated by a panel of Medical Editors to ensure their currency and accuracy, as needed. All cross-references to other relevant entries in Magill’s Medical Guide have been revised. Every bibliography has been updated with the latest editions and sources, including Web sites for relevant organizations. All appendixes from the previous edition have been updated and checked for accuracy, and the “Medical Journals” list has been expanded to include standard title abbreviations, now serving as a key for users.

Michael Buratovich

By on October 9, 2013 in Faculty Publications

Buratovich, Michael A. The Stem Cell Epistles: Letters to My Students about Bioethics, Embryos, Stem Cells, and Fertility Treatments. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2013.

The Stem Cell EpistlesHuman embryos, it has been said, “have no muscles, nerves, digestive system, feet, hands, face, or brain; they have nothing to distinguish them as a human being, and if one of them died, no one would mourn as they would for one of us.” Consequently, early human embryos are being dismembered in laboratories around the world to produce embryonic stem cells, which, we are told, are the tools that will lead to the next quantum leap in medicine. Should Christians support such small sacrifices for something that might potentially relieve the suffering of millions, or should we vigorously oppose it?

Developmental biologist and professor of biochemistry Michael Buratovich was asked such a question (among others) by his students. This book contains his measured answers and provides support from the scientific literature to substantiate his claims. He shows that embryonic stem cells are unnecessary, since the renaissance in regenerative medicine is occurring largely without them. Furthermore, he sets forth the scientific and historic case that the embryo is the youngest and most vulnerable member of humanity, and that ones such as these are precisely those whom the Christian church worked to protect in the past—and should champion in the present.