The Church’s Journey through Time

Pneuma ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 421-438
Author(s):  
Gregory John Liston
Keyword(s):  
Working Through ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
Spirit Christology ◽  
The Church

Abstract Applying the methodology of Third Article Theology to the doctrine of eschatology enables the development of a nuanced understanding of the church’s journey through time. Just as Spirit Christology has revealed insights into Christ’s humanity and growth, similarly a Spirit eschatology informs an understanding of the church’s transformation and development. Such a Spirit eschatology complements rather than replaces the more common christologically focused eschatologies, painting a picture of the Spirit working through but not being beholden to the church, leading us in cruciform lives that echo Christ’s overarching metanarrative.

Church as Charismatic Fellowship: Ecclesiological Reflections from The pentecostal-Roman Catholic Dialogue

2001 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 100-121 ◽  
Author(s):  
Veli-Matti Karkkainen
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Free Flow ◽  
Roman Catholic Church ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

Pentecostal ecclesiology, a lived charismatic experience rather than discursive theology, naturally leans toward the charismatic structure of the church and free flow of the Spirit. In dialogue with the Roman Catholic church, Pentecostal ecclesiologv has been challenged to develop a more nuanced understanding of the relationship between the Spirit, institution, and Koinonia. As charismatic fellowship, the church is a communion of participating, empowered believers.

scholarly journals “Guds Israel” i Gal 6,16 og “hele Israel” i Rom 11,26

2015 ◽  
Vol 78 (3) ◽  
pp. 282-298
Author(s):  
Mogens Müller
Keyword(s):  
The Real ◽  
Working Through ◽  
In Christ ◽  
Jewish Christians ◽  
The Church

Earlier interpreters claimed two possibilities with respect to the expression “God’s Israel” in Galatians 6,16: Either it was the Christians irrespective of their ethnical descendence, or it was the Jewish Christians. In the later years a third possibility has made its appearance, namely that it is the real Israel which Paul then has not forgotten and the destiny of which he returns to in Romans 9-11. This article argues that only the first solution corresponds to Paul’s thinking where nobody reach salvation without a faith in Christ working through love. Thus there is only one candidate to the title “God’s Israel” and that is the church.

Conclusions

2020 ◽  
pp. 183-196
Author(s):  
Richard A. Muller
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Free Choice ◽  
Church Of England ◽  
Human Freedom ◽  
Reformed Theology ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Divine Grace ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
The Church

Perkins’s work has been shown to stand at the intersection of the strongly traditionary and catholic defense of the Church of England against Roman polemics with the early Reformed orthodox appropriations of scholastic argumentation. Early orthodox Reformed theology, in the works of William Perkins and his contemporaries, developed a highly nuanced understanding of human free choice and divine grace, distinguished according to the four states of human nature. His resolution of the issue of divine grace and human freedom drew eclectically on arguments from the Thomist tradition and from patterns in late medieval voluntarism. At the same time, it reinforced and refined the heritage of the Reformation on the doctrine of salvation by grace alone. The Reformed orthodoxy represented by Perkins and his contemporaries insists that God guarantees the free choice of free creatures, who always must act according to their natures.

scholarly journals What hope is there for South Africa? A public theological reflection on the role of the church as a bearer of hope for the future

2015 ◽  
Vol 71 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dion A. Forster
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
Theological Reflection ◽  
Dynamic Tension ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
Theological Methodology ◽  
The Church

What hope is there for South Africa? What role can the church play as a bearer of hope in South Africa? This article seeks to address these important questions. Firstly, it problematises the contemporary notion of hope in South Africa by showing that it is a complex theological and social concept. Next, a nuanced understanding of hope is presented by adopting a public theological methodology that brings dominant theological perspectives on eschatological hope into dialogue with the most recent statistics about the quality of life in South Africa from 1994, 2004 and 2014. The article proposes that the complexity of Christian hope necessitates an understanding of the present reality that is held in dynamic tension with the desired future – namely a present-futurist eschatology. Finally the article shows that from this vantage point the church, in its various forms and understandings, is able to be a bearer of Christian hope that can contribute towards shaping a better future for South Africa.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark S. Massa
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Scientific Progress ◽  
Moral Theology ◽  
Detailed Examination ◽  
Christian Ethics ◽  
Scientific Revolutions ◽  
Structure Of Scientific Revolutions ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
Theological Argument ◽  
The Church

This chapter presents a more detailed examination of Thomas Kuhn’s structure than that provided in the Introduction. The chapter explains how and why Kuhn’s book permanently rejected the idea of scientific “progress.” The author notes that although most Catholics experienced the widespread critique of Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical as a sudden (if welcome) rejection of the kind of theological argument that the Church had utilized in its moral teaching for several centuries, the cracks in the foundations of that older approach to natural law had appeared considerably before 1968. The emergence of a historicist approach to moral theology in the decades before the promulgation of the encyclical contextualized the rocky reception accorded it within a much larger historical framework. Further, even the guild of moral theologians had come to a much more nuanced understanding of what could be (and what could not be) “unchangeable” in Christian ethics.

Temporality and the Text of Scripture in Thomas More’s Religious Polemics

Moreana ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 43 & 44 (Number (4 & 1-2) ◽  
pp. 226-248
Author(s):  
Travis DeCook
Keyword(s):  
Textual Criticism ◽  
Divine Revelation ◽  
Historical Approach ◽  
Working Through ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Written Word ◽  
Holy Writ ◽  
Religious Polemics ◽  
The Church

This paper considers how More’s attacks on the *sola scriptura* doctrine depend on his conviction that the composition, collection, and reception of the biblical books are eminently time-bound processes. In order to foreground basic problems with the reformers’ claims about the nature of Scripture, More exploits the historical approach to texts characteristic of humanist philology and textual criticism. He also draws on an awareness of the varying manifestations of the Bible in history and the vulnerability of the written word to corruption. These insights dovetail with More’s understanding of divine revelation: rather than being fully contained in Holy Writ, revelation is an unfolding within history, working through the mediation of the Church.

Diakonie ist Kirche

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthias Fichtmüller
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Church Membership ◽  
Eastern Germany ◽  
Protestant Churches ◽  
The Future ◽  
Institutional Church ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
The Church

In the Protestant understanding, a church has to renew itself continuously. In the 21st century, Protestant churches have a high reputation but few bonding forces. The results of surveys among churchmen are obvious: The perception of the church in society derives from welfare and social work (diaconia). In times of a post-traditional people’s church, the question arises of whether the church will be a church of welfare and social work (diaconia) in the future. Reflecting on the countrywide disappearance of churches in Eastern Germany, Matthias Fichtmüller formulates the thesis that in future entrepreneurial welfare and social work will take over the tasks of churches. He outlines the conflicts between the institutional church and welfare and social work, and develops a nuanced understanding of church membership. Welfare and social work are not replacing the institutional church but are an enriching addition to it. They are a place for people who cannot find a home in the national churches any more.

David Coffey: Reshaping Traditional Theology

2018 ◽  
Vol 83 (4) ◽  
pp. 310-328
Author(s):  
Paul Crittenden
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Systematic Theology ◽  
Synoptic Gospels ◽  
Christian Anthropology ◽  
Australian Context ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Spirit Christology ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity

The article seeks to locate the genealogy of David Coffey’s systematic theology in his original search for a unified account of grace. This led to the recovery of early but forgotten ways of thinking about the central doctrines of the Trinity and Christology related especially to the role of the Holy Spirit in the Incarnation. Coffey’s Spirit Christology, based on the Synoptic Gospels and patristic reflection, complements the traditional Christology of Chalcedon in ways that throw light on Christ’s humanity and the redemptive character of his death and resurrection. It also grounds a theology of grace, Christian anthropology, death and resurrection, the Church, and the salvation of unbelievers. Coffey is a prominent Australian theologian and the discussion of his thought is set within a brief account of the development of theological studies in the Australian context.

Codependent Christians: Some Issues for Church-Based Recovery Groups

1993 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 158-164 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard J. Riordan ◽  
Diane Simone
Keyword(s):  
Belief Systems ◽  
Group Setting ◽  
Psychological Issues ◽  
Safe Place ◽  
Working Through ◽  
Personal Needs ◽  
Core Issues ◽  
The Church ◽  
Recovery Groups

Codependents who are Christians often wrestle with theological as well as psychological issues in working through codependent behavior. In such cases, the church-based group can provide a unique setting for restructuring belief systems that may incorporate Scripture. This environment can also provide a safe place for self-revelation among Christians who share a community and a common faith. This article outlines an approach to the integration of scriptural and psychological principles in addressing codependence. Based on suggested biblical passages and Cermak & Brown's (1982) five core issues of codependence–-control, trust, personal needs, responsibility, and feeling–-a framework is provided for discussion and intervention in the group setting. The authors note the advantages of using this approach for both the group and the church in which it is based.

Dangerous Dreaming: The Christian Transformation of Dream Incubation

2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 117-142
Author(s):  
Fritz Graf
Keyword(s):  
Christian Theology ◽  
Christian Churches ◽  
Nuanced Understanding ◽  
The Church

Abstract Deubner’s thesis of an easy transformation of pagan into Christian incubation has been revived recently. In my paper, I argue against such an easy reception, both for general and for specific reasons. Christian theology was much more suspicious of dreams than the pagan world and would argue against an easy adoption of dream incubation; this is confirmed by the fact that the ritual forms of dream healing in Christian churches looked very different from the rituals in pagan incubation shrines and never attained the uniformity of the pagan rites. None of the few cases where continuity has been argued for on archaeological grounds stands up to closer scrutiny, and the analysis of dream healing in the church of the Twelve Apostles in Menouthis near Alexandria and of other early literary records leads to a very nuanced understanding of how Christian dream healing succeeded pagan incubation.

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