Character Formation

2019 ◽  
pp. 58-83
Author(s):  
Gifford A. Grobien
Keyword(s):  
Character Formation ◽  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
The Church

This chapter engages Stanley Hauerwas’ work on the justification–sanctification distinction and character formation. Hauerwas argues that when we recognize the converting and regenerative character of justification, we may understand conversation to grant new agency or character. The life of sanctification begins with this new character, which continues to be formed through narratives and practices of virtue, especially those found in the church. Lutheran Joel Biermann builds on this argument by comparing character with the active righteousness of a Christian. Biermann’s paramount narrative for Christian character formation is the creedal narrative of the Church. Biermann’s and Hauerwas’ claims lead to further questions to be resolved: the anthropology and ontology of a Christian with new character, the operation of the specifically Christian narrative, and the distinctiveness of Christian character.

Church and Christ in the Work of Stanley Hauerwas

Ecclesiology ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 306-326
Author(s):  
Victoria Lorrimar
Keyword(s):  
Entire Life ◽  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
The Cross ◽  
The Church

Stanley Hauerwas has attracted much criticism for his ecclesiocentric approach to theology. As a result of his emphasis on the faithful practice of virtues in community for salvation, he has been accused of Pelagianism. He has also been charged with showing interest in Jesus primarily as an exemplar, rather than for himself. The adequacy of Hauerwas’ ecclesiology is tested here against its implications for Christology. Hauerwas conceives of Jesus primarily as the autobasileia, and emphasises the importance of his entire life and teachings in addition to his death and resurrection. Two questions concerning Hauerwas’ Christology are explored: (1) What did Christ achieve at the cross? (2) What constitutes salvation and how is it mediated to ensuing generations? This paper examines whether the church does indeed usurp the place of Christ in salvation in Hauerwas’ thought, as suggested by Healy.

‘Go to the ant, you lazybones’ (NRSV, Prov. 6:6): The Church and Nonhuman Animals in the World

2013 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-44
Author(s):  
Matthew Barton
Keyword(s):  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
The World ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

Abstract This article engages with the ecclesiology of Stanley Hauerwas in considering the relationship of church to world within the broader context of God’s creation, which includes nonhuman as well as human animals. In conversation with Hauerwas, an evaluation of understandings of ‘world as creation’ and ‘world as fallen’ gives rise to a new understanding of world, as a public of responsible beings. This understanding produces three questions: what does it mean for nonhuman animals to be perceived by the church as part of the world, how are we justified in advancing such a perception and what are the implications of this? In answering these questions, two distinct classes of responsibility are recognized: animal responsibility, shared by human and nonhuman animals; and responsibility to God, unique to humans. In having responsibility, animals are part of the world to which the church is called to respond; and in responding, to learn as well as to witness.

scholarly journals On be...ing political: Empat model identitas ramah-gereja di bawah bayang-bayang kanopi suci kebangsaan

Kurios ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 305
Author(s):  
Joas Adiprasetya
Keyword(s):  
Social Ethics ◽  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Four Dimensions ◽  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
Sacred Canopy ◽  
The Church

This article discusses the idea of a hospitable church that struggles under the sacred canopy of the state, especially in the Indonesian context. By using Stanley Hauerwas’ social ethics and ecclesiology that views the church as an exemplary community, this article proposes an ecclesial model that maintains the tension of being true to its nature on the one hand and being political on the other hand. Such a model is demonstrated through its four dimensions: beholding, becoming, belonging, and befriending. The paper ends with a conclusion, in which the author reflects on the four dimensions by using the perspective of the four classical marks of the church (notae ecclesiae). AbstrakArtikel ini membahas gagasan mengenai gereja dengan identitas-ramah yang berjuang di bawah kanopi suci negara, khususnya dalam konteks Indonesia. Dengan menggunakan etika sosial dan eklesiologi Stanley Hauerwas, yang memandang gereja sebagai komunitas eksemplaris, artikel ini mengusul-kan model gerejawi yang mempertahankan ketegangan antara menjadi setia pada hakikatnya di satu sisi dan menjadi politis di sisi lain. Model semacam itu ditunjukkan melalui empat dimensinya: beholding, becoming, belonging, dan befriending. Makalah diakhiri dengan kesimpulan yang di dalamnya penulis merefleksikan empat dimensi di atas dengan menggunakan perspektif empat tanda klasik gereja (notae ecclesiae).

scholarly journals The church’s witness in a secular age: A Hauerwasian response to privatized and individualized religion

2016 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 56-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Aaron Wessman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Charles Taylor ◽  
The United States ◽  
Western Society ◽  
Contemporary Society ◽  
Stanley Hauerwas ◽  
Secular Age ◽  
The Church ◽  
Contemporary Western Society

Stanley Hauerwas has been noted for his theology of missionary “witness.” However, his theology is not uncontroversial. Of late, it is argued that his theology of witness does not often, or sufficiently, attend to the nature and complexity of belief for those people who live in contemporary, Western society. Part of this complexity, as highlighted by various sociologists and theologians, is that religion has become individualized and privatized. These are serious challenges to the church’s engagement with contemporary society, which Hauerwas does not always seem to adequately address. It will be the purpose of this article, however, to attempt to overcome this lacuna in Hauerwas’s theology, and explore if, and how, his theology might serve as a response to some of the specific challenges arising out of the growing trend towards “privatized religion” in the United States. This will be accomplished by bringing into dialogue Hauerwas’s later work on witness, with some of the sociological insights provided by Charles Taylor and Robert Wuthnow. It will be argued that Hauerwas’s theology of witness, though incomplete, does provide insights that might be helpful to the church in her missionary efforts in the United States.

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