Italo Calvino on re-reading

For a variety of reasons, I’ve been doing quite a bit of re-reading lately. And then, with great delight and while engaging in some non-re-reading, I came across this wonderful little opening to Italo Calvino’s essay Why Read the Classics? (a book which I will probably re-read at some stage):

1. The classics are those books about which you usually hear people saying: ‘I’m rereading…’, never ‘I’m reading…’

At least this is the case with those people whom one presumes are ‘well read‘; it does not apply to the young, since they are at an age when their contact with the world, and with the classics which are part of that world, is important precisely because it is their first such contact.

The iterative prefix ‘re-’ in front of the verb ‘read’ can represent a small act of hypocrisy on the part of people ashamed to admit they have not read a famous book. To reassure them, all one need do is to point out that however wide-ranging any person’s formative reading may be, there will always be an enormous number of fundamental works that one has not read.

Put up your hand anyone who has read the whole of Herodotus and Thucydides. And what about Saint-Simon? and Cardinal Retz? Even the great cycles of nineteenth-century novels are more often mentioned than read. In France they start to read Balzac at school, and judging by the number of editions in circulation people apparently continue to read him long after the end of their schooldays. But if there were an official survey on Balzac’s popularity in Italy, I am afraid he would figure very low down the list. Fans of Dickens in Italy are a small elite who whenever they meet start to reminisce about characters and episodes as though talking of people they actually knew. When Michel Butor was teaching in the United States a number of yean ago, he became so tired of people asking him about Émile Zola, whom he had never read, that he made up his mind to read the whole cycle of Rougon-Macquart novels. He discovered that it was entirely different from how he had imagined it: it turned out to be a fabulous, mythological genealogy and cosmogony, which he then described in a brilliant article.

What this shows is that reading a great work for the first time when one is fully adult is an extraordinary pleasure, one which is very different (though it is impossible to say whether more or less pleasurable) from reading it in one’s youth. Youth endows every reading, as it does every experience, with a unique flavour and significance, whereas at a mature age one appreciates (or should appreciate) many more details, levels and meanings.

The Novel-Reading Disease

Every historian can testify that one of the real stimulants in their field of study is happening quite unexpectedly upon amusing choice morsels, even if they come via the help of Google Books. Here’s one that I happened across today on the dangers of engaging in that most womanly of contemporary vices – reading novels!

‘The Novel-Reading Disease’ and ‘Novel-Reading and Insanity’ both appeared in The Sabbath School Magazine, designed for the use of teachers, adult scholars, and parents (ed. William Keddie; Glasgow: John M’Callum, 1872), 34.

Critics, writing, Sudoku and some other interesting stuff …

Oscar Wilde, T. S. Eliot, Matthew Arnold, Randall Jarrell, Lionel Trilling and Walt Whitman.

The New York Times recently ran a fascinating multi-author series on criticism, and on why criticism (still) matters:

• Beyond the Critic as Cultural Arbiter by Stephen Burn
• With Clarity and Beauty, the Weight of Authority by Katie Roiphe
• The Intellectual at Play in the Wider World by Pankaj Mishra
• The Will Not to Power, but to Self-Understanding by Adam Kirsch
• Translating the Code Into Everyday Language by Sam Anderson
• From the Critical Impulse, the Growth of Literature by Elif Batuman
• Masters of the Form by Jennifer B. McDonald
• There’s also a wee podcast with Sam Anderson, Adam Kirsch and Katie Roiphe on the art and importance of literary criticism.

An interesting wee piece by Ed Park on The Art of the Very Long Sentence.

Richard Bauckham has a very witty piece on ‘Reconstructing the Pooh Community’ wherein he has a swipe at some of the speculative sociological readings of the NT that some in the guild are want to become obsessed with.

Ben Myers continues to enthral us with his own fiction, this time with ‘a short story’ called The Shakespearean Death.

Benedict Carey tells me why I’m a Sudoku- and crossword-junkie (and more recently a jigsaw-puzzle-junkie) in his article on Tracing the Spark of Creative Problem-Solving.

Michael Jinkins posts some Nominees for Today’s Niebuhr.

The latest edition of the Journal of Reformed Theology is out. It includes articles by David P. Henreckson (‘Possessing Heaven in Our Head: A Reformed Reading of Incarnational Ascent in Kathryn Tanner’, pp. 171–184), Paul Helm (‘Reformed Thought on Freedom’, pp. 185–207) and Meine Veldman (‘Secrets of Moltmann’s Tacit Tradition: Via Covenant Theology to Promise Theology’, pp. 208–239).

‘Read the old …’

Ben Myers’ latest post, Reading and Progress (which is a wonderful follow-up to his post on writing), reminded me of CS Lewis’ fine ‘Introduction’ to Athanasius’ On the Incarnation: De Incarnatione Verbi Dei, and particularly of Lewis’ advice to ‘read the old’:

‘There is a strange idea abroad that in every subject the ancient books should be read only by the professionals, and that the amateur should content himself with the modern books. Thus I have found as a tutor in English Literature that if the average student wants to find out something about Platonism, the very last thing he thinks of doing is to take a translation of Plato off the library shelf and read the Symposium. He would rather read some dreary modern book ten times as long, all about “isms” and influences and only once in twelve pages telling him what Plato actually said. The error is rather an amiable one, for it springs from humility. The student is half afraid to meet one of the great philosophers face to face. He feels himself inadequate and thinks he will not understand him. But if he only knew, the great man, just because of his greatness, is much more intelligible than his modern commentator. The simplest student will be able to understand, if not all, yet a very great deal of what Plato said; but hardly anyone can understand some modern books on Platonism. It has always therefore been one of my main endeavours as a teacher to persuade the young that firsthand knowledge is not only more worth acquiring than secondhand knowledge, but is usually much easier and more delightful to acquire.

This mistaken preference for the modern books and this shyness of the old ones is nowhere more rampant than in theology. Wherever you find a little study circle of Christian laity you can be almost certain that they are studying not St. Luke or St. Paul or St. Augustine or Thomas Aquinas or Hooker or Butler, but M. Berdyaev or M. Maritain or M. Niebuhr or Miss Sayers or even myself.

Now this seems to me topsy-turvy. Naturally, since I myself am a writer, I do not wish the ordinary reader to read no modern books. But if he must read only the new or only the old, I would advise him to read the old. And I would give him this advice precisely because he is an amateur and therefore much less protected than the expert against the dangers of an exclusive contemporary diet. A new book is still on its trial and the amateur is not in a position to judge it. It has to be tested against the great body of Christian thought down the ages, and all its hidden implications (often unsuspected by the author himself) have to be brought to light. Often it cannot be fully understood without the knowledge of a good many other modern books. If you join at eleven o’clock a conversation which began at eight you will often not see the real bearing of what is said. Remarks which seem to you very ordinary will produce laughter or irritation and you will not see why – the reason, of course, being that the earlier stages of the conversation have given them a special point. In the same way sentences in a modern book which look quite ordinary may be directed at some other book; in this way you may be led to accept what you would have indignantly rejected if you knew its real significance. The only safety is to have a standard of plain, central Christianity (“mere Christianity” as Baxter called it) which puts the controversies of the moment in their proper perspective. Such a standard can be acquired only from the old books. It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones.

Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books. All contemporary writers share to some extent the contemporary outlook – even those, like myself, who seem most opposed to it. Nothing strikes me more when I read the controversies of past ages than the fact that both sides were usually assuming without question a good deal which we should now absolutely deny. They thought that they were as completely opposed as two sides could be, but in fact they were all the time secretly united – united with each other and against earlier and later ages – by a great mass of common assumptions. We may be sure that the characteristic blindness of the twentieth century – the blindness about which posterity will ask, “But how could they have thought that?” – lies where we have never suspected it, and concerns something about which there is untroubled agreement between Hitler and President Roosevelt or between Mr. H. G. Wells and Karl Barth. None of us can fully escape this blindness, but we shall certainly increase it, and weaken our guard against it, if we read only modern books. Where they are true they will give us truths which we half knew already. Where they are false they will aggravate the error with which we are already dangerously ill. The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books. Not, of course, that there is any magic about the past. People were no cleverer then than they are now; they made as many mistakes as we. But not the same mistakes. They will not flatter us in the errors we are already committing; and their own errors, being now open and palpable, will not endanger us. Two heads are better than one, not because either is infallible, but because they are unlikely to go wrong in the same direction. To be sure, the books of the future would be just as good a corrective as the books of the past, but unfortunately we cannot get at them.

I myself was first led into reading the Christian classics, almost accidentally, as a result of my English studies. Some, such as Hooker, Herbert, Traherne, Taylor and Bunyan, I read because they are themselves great English writers; others, such as Boethius, St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and Dante, because they were “influences.” George Macdonald I had found for myself at the age of sixteen and never wavered in my allegiance, though I tried for a long time to ignore his Christianity. They are, you will note, a mixed bag, representative of many Churches, climates and ages. And that brings me to yet another reason for reading them. The divisions of Christendom are undeniable and are by some of these writers most fiercely expressed. But if any man is tempted to think – as one might be tempted who read only con- temporaries – that “Christianity” is a word of so many meanings that it means nothing at all, he can learn beyond all doubt, by stepping out of his own century, that this is not so. Measured against the ages “mere Christianity” turns out to be no insipid interdenominational transparency, but something positive, self-consistent, and inexhaustible. I know it, indeed, to my cost. In the days when I still hated Christianity, I learned to recognise, like some all too familiar smell, that almost unvarying something which met me, now in Puritan Bunyan, now in Anglican Hooker, now in Thomist Dante. It was there (honeyed and floral) in Francois de Sales; it was there (grave and homely) in Spenser and Walton; it was there (grim but manful) in Pascal and Johnson; there again, with a mild, frightening, Paradisial flavour, in Vaughan and Boehme and Traherne. In the urban sobriety of the eighteenth century one was not safe – Law and Butler were two lions in the path. The supposed “Paganism” of the Elizabethans could not keep it out; it lay in wait where a man might have supposed himself safest, in the very centre of The Faerie Queene and the Arcadia. It was, of course, varied; and yet – after all – so unmistakably the same; recognisable, not to be evaded, the odour which is death to us until we allow it to become life: “An air that kills From yon far country blows.”

We are all rightly distressed, and ashamed also, at the divisions of Christendom. But those who have always lived within the Christian fold may be too easily dispirited by them. They are bad, but such people do not know what it looks like from without. Seen from there, what is left intact despite all the divisions, still appears (as it truly is) an immensely formidable unity. I know, for I saw it; and well our enemies know it. That unity any of us can find by going out of his own age. It is not enough, but it is more than you had thought till then. Once you are well soaked in it, if you then venture to speak, you will have an amusing experience. You will be thought a Papist when you are actually reproducing Bunyan, a Pantheist when you are quoting Aquinas, and so forth. For you have now got on to the great level viaduct which crosses the ages and which looks so high from the valleys, so low from the mountains, so narrow compared with the swamps, and so broad compared with the sheep-tracks …’.

– C.S. Lewis, ‘Introduction’ in On the Incarnation: the treatise De incarnatione Verbi Dei (Crestwood: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1993), 3–7.

Stretching the Zonules: 100 years ago today, and more recent exploits

‘The question of providing religious services for summer holiday-makers in the country was before the Dunedin Presbytery at its meeting yesterday in relation, particularly, to the growing popularity of Warrington and contiguous seaside resorts.

A report submitted recommended that a tent be procured at Warrington, but this proposal did not seem to find general favour although the point has not been settled, the matter having been referred to a small committee.

The Rev. J. Chisholm said it seemed to him that more attention should be given to these seaside resorts in the future.

The churches were almost empty for a few weeks in the year, and unless more attention were paid to the young people they would form habits which would doubtless be confirmed, and that would be to the injury of their church.

The Rev. R. Fairmaid brought the matter nearer home than the northern coast by referring to Broad Bay and the Peninsula.

A young man had told him that a kind of pagan life was lived thereby the young people who gathered for week ends.

This was a deplorable condition from the moral point of view, and, so far as he understood, there was no service provided by their people in these quarters.

The committee appointed could perhaps attend to this matter, too.

It was pointed out by the Rev. W. Scorgie, in concluding the discussion, that there was a Methodist Church at Broad Bay and a Presbyterian Church at Portobello’.

[First published in the Otago Daily Times on 7 September 1910. Reprinted in today's ODT]

Also, there’s some good reading around the traps at the moment:

• William Cavanaugh on Christopher Hitchens and the myth of religious violence.
• Matthew Bruce reviews Matthias Gockel’s Barth and Schleiermacher on the Doctrine of Election. [BTW: my own review of this book is available here].
• Richard L. Floyd shares an appreciation of Donald Bloesch.
• Kim Fabricius shares a wonderful Call to Worship.
• Steve Biddulph on fatherhood.
• Robert Fisk on ‘honour’ killings and on the pain of satisfying family ‘honour’.
• Ben Myers shares a note on misreading.
• Robin Parry (shamelessly) plugs a forthcoming book on universalism: “All Shall Be Well”: Explorations in Universalism and Christian Theology, from Origen to Moltmann.
• Luther is still bugging the locals.
• Simon Holt shares a nice prayer from Ken Thompson about pigeon holes, compartments, and other places.
• And Ken MacLeod offers a brilliant solution for distracted writers: ‘One of the major problems for writers is that the machine we use to write is connected to the biggest engine of distraction ever invented. One can always disconnect, of course – there’s even software that locks out the internet and email for selected periods – or use a separate, isolated computer, but I think something more elegant as well as radical is needed. What I’m thinking of is some purely mechanical device, that took the basic QWERTY keyboard with Shift and Return keys and so on, but with each key attached to an arrangement of levers connected to a physical representation of the given letter or punctuation mark. These in turn would strike through some ink-delivery system – perhaps, though I’m reaching a bit here, a sort of tape of cloth mounted on reels – onto separate sheets of paper, fed through some kind of rubber roller (similar to that on a printer) one by one. The Return key would have to be replaced by a manual device, to literally ‘return’ the roller at the end of each line. Tedious, but most writers could do with more exercise anyway. Corrections and changes would be awkward, it’s true, but a glance at any word processor programme gives the answer: the completed sheets could be, physically, cut and pasted’.

BTW: I haven’t abandoned my series on the cost and grace of parish ministry. If all goes to plan, I’ll be back posting on it this week.

You are where you read

‘Too much internet usage fragments the brain and dissipates concentration so that after a while, one’s ability to spend long, focused hours immersed in a single subject becomes blunted. Information comes pre-digested in small pieces, one grazes on endless ready meals and snacks of the mind, and the result is mental malnutrition. The internet can also have a pernicious influence on reading because it is full of book-related gossip and chatter on which it is fatally easy to waste time that should be spent actualy paying close attention to the books themselves, whether writing them or reading them’. – Susan Hill, Howards End is on the Landing: A Year of Reading from Home (London: Profile Books, 2009), 2.

Who’s buying this?

[HT: Jim Gordon and Amazon Reader]

Reading Twentieth-Century Reformed & Presbyterian Thought

Some months back, I posted a list of suggested novels, plays and collections of poetry that I thought theology students and pastors ought to read, and in response received a number of excellent additional suggestions. Thanks heaps to those who offered such! Now, I am putting together a wee course on twentieth-century Reformed & Presbyterian thought for interns training for ordained pastoral ministry, part of which means offering some pre-reading suggestions. So far I’m considering selections from some of the following:

• Karl Barth, The Göttingen Dogmatics: Instruction in the Christian Religion, Evangelical Theology, Church Dogmatics
• Jacques Ellul, What I Believe
• Helmut Thielicke, A Little Exercise for Young Theologians
• Herbert Henry Farmer, The World and God: A Study of Prayer, Providence and Miracle in Christian Experience
• Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God, The Trinity and the Kingdom, The Church in the Power of the Spirit and In the End – The Beginning
• Reinhold Neibuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society and The Nature and Destiny of Man: a Christian interpretation, Volume 1: Human Nature
• Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, Proper Confidence: Faith, Doubt, and Certainty in Christian Discipleship and Trinitarian Doctrine for Today’s Mission
• John Oman, Grace and Personality

I’m also considering some of the following essays:

• Karl Barth, ‘The Word of God and the Task of the Ministry’, in The Word of God and the Word of Man (trans. Douglas Horton; New York: Harper and Brothers, 1957), 183–217.
• Eberhard Busch, ‘The Closeness of the Distant: Reformed Confessions after 1945’, in Toward the Future of Reformed Theology: Tasks, Topics, Traditions (ed. David Willis and Michael Welker; Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1999), 512–31.
• John W. de Gruchy, ‘Toward a Reformed Theology of Liberation: A Retrieval of Reformed Symbols in the Struggle for Justice’, in Toward the Future of Reformed Theology: Tasks, Topics, Traditions (ed. David Willis and Michael Welker; Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1999), 103–19.
• Lynn Winkels Japinga, ‘Reformed and Feminist: Feminist Theology as a Source of Revitalization’, in Reformed Vitality: Continuity and Change in the Face of Modernity (ed. Donald A. Luidens, et al.; Lanham: University Press of America, 1998), 139–54.
• Jürgen Moltmann, ‘Theologia Reformata et Semper Reformanda’, in Toward the Future of Reformed Theology: Tasks, Topics, Traditions (ed. David Willis and Michael Welker; Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1999), 120–35.
• Douglas F. Ottati, ‘The Church In, With, Against, and For the World’, in Reforming Protestantism: Christian Commitment in Today’s World (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), 93–116.
• Choan-Seng Song, ‘Christian Theology: Toward an Asian Reconstruction’, in Toward the Future of Reformed Theology: Tasks, Topics, Traditions (ed. David Willis and Michael Welker; Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1999), 58–74.
• Thomas F. Torrance, ‘The Distinctive Character of the Reformed Tradition’, in Incarnational Ministry: The Presence of Christ in Church, Society, and Family: Essays in Honor of Ray S. Anderson (ed. Christian D. Kettler and Todd H. Speidell; Colorado Springs: Helmers & Howard, 1990), 2–15.
• Daniel L. Migliore, ‘The Spirit of Reformed Faith and Theology’, in Loving God with our Minds: The Pastor as Theologian (ed. Michael Welker and Cynthia A. Jarvis. Grand Rapids/Cambridge: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2004),  352–66.
• Nicholas Wolterstorff, ‘Liturgy, Justice, and Holiness’, Reformed Journal 16 (1989), 12–20.

Am I missing anything really obvious here, particularly stuff that would be important for Presbyterian ordinands to engage with? Keep in mind that this is only one module of seven in an entire course dedicated to Presbyterian and Reformed studies, and that there is a separate module that attends to key New Zealand figures.

So what other texts ought I consider? And – to make it broader – if you’re a Pressie/Reformed minister, or even one from some lesser tribe, what twentieth-century reformed theology do you wish you had read when you were training?

Your Baby Can Read

Trevor Cairney has posted a helpful (and encouraging) review of the ‘Your Baby Can Read!’ program developed by Dr Robert Titzer. While I was unaware of Titzer’s thesis, the concerns Trevor outlines make real sense to me. As I noted in a comment on his post, I spend all day with a 2-year-old. We cook, play, dance, listen to music, read, count the dongs on the grandfather clock, paint, sort through food, and eat leaves in the garden, among other things. It’s learning all the way, and the resultant growth in her is obvious. I can’t imagine how spending an hour a day sitting in front of a TV (which she is not interested in at all) watching DVD’s can compare with sitting on dad’s knee reading, or kicking a football or counting flower buds in the garden, or learning to share toys and attention with friends. I’m keen to hear from others who may have had experience with Titzer’s program, and whether or not their experiences echo any of Trevor’s concerns.

On choosing books

Trevor has posted a helpful piece on The challenges of choosing books for children.

What criteria do you use for selecting books for your kids?

Sure we need to ask about reading levels, enjoyment and appropriate content regarding the child’s development. I also want to be asking questions about …

• How does this book foster my child’s imagination?
• Does this book support or undermine some of the values I’m trying to instill in her?
• Is the artwork good, beautiful and true?
• Is this a book that she might enjoy reading on their own?
• Will I enjoy it? Will I look forward to reading it the 30th time?

What criteria do you use for selecting books for your kids?

How children’s books evolved from morals to madcap fun

During the 18^th century and for much of the 19^th, there wasn’t a whole lot of American literature for children. And when children’s books did get published, they weren’t designed for pleasure. Books were for schooling or for teaching religious and moral lessons—with properly serious illustrations chaperoning the text.

In what became the United States, this somber mode continued through the American Civil War. And then it went poof, dispelled by artists who became children’s illustrators by happenstance. By the end of the 19^th century, the art in kids’ books had become madcap and zany and irreverent. From the postwar period, one can trace the imagery and style that are familiar from the classics of one’s own childhood.

(HT: Slate)

Conversations with Poppi about God: A Review

Robert W. Jenson & Solveig Lucia Gold, Conversations with Poppi about God: An Eight-Year-Old and Her Theologian Grandfather Trade Questions (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2006). 158 pages. ISBN: 97815874321613. Review copy courtesy of Brazos Press.

When was the last time you had a conversation about baptism, temptation, purgatory, time, economics, the Nicene Creed, creation, the Trinity, Christmas, metaphysics, church calendars, evil, indulgences, the Holy Spirit, liturgy, Lucifer, hamsters, a ‘really stupid’ bishop, the disestablishment of the Roman Church, the imago Dei, and a host of other things, all with the same person? When was the last time you did so with a person who just happens to be a world-renowned Lutheran, and ecumenical, theologian? When was the last time you did so with an eight-year-old who knows more about Dante than not a few philosophy undergrads?

In this remarkable book, we are invited to eavesdrop on a spontaneous and unscripted conversation between elementary schoolgirl Solveig Lucia Gold and her septuagenarian grandfather affectionately called ‘Poppi’, more formally known as the Reverend Canon Professor Dr. D. Robert W. Jenson, B.A., B.D., M.A., D.Theol., D.H.L., DD.

The book comprises the verbatim transcripts – with minor editing of ‘Ums’, ‘Well, buts …’ and ‘You knows…’, etc – of conversations recorded on a Radio Shack cassette recorder over a series of weekends in which Solveig visited her grandparents (‘Poppi’ and ‘Mimi’) in Princeton. After each session, Mimi typed it up.

The authors invite us to read their book ‘as you would a Platonic dialogue, though in this one, the role of Socrates goes back and forth’ (p. 10). Their discussion is more wide-ranging than most systematic theologies, and is filled with wit, warmth and wisdom.

Time for an example:

Solveig: How can God pick who goes to heaven or hell?

Poppi: By looking at Jesus, who loves you, Solveig.

Solveig: Can you show me?

Poppi: One way of saying what happened with Jesus is that Jesus so attached himself to you that if God the Father wants his Son, Jesus, back, he is stuck with you too. Which is how he picks you. (p. 20)

The young Episcopalian and her ‘sort of half Anglican and half Lutheran’ (p. 70) Poppi return to some themes a number of times over the weekends. One such theme that offers some of the book’s richest insights concerns the Spirit, or ‘God’s liveliness’ (p. 38), as the good Professor Dr Poppi likes to remind his granddaughter. Solveig tries on more than one occasion to argue a case that the second and third articles in the Creed ought to be reversed not only because ‘all of us share in the Spirit’ (Father and Son included), but also because that’s how you cross yourself. Poppi agrees, ‘Father, Spirit, Son is probably a better arrangement’ (p. 146). The Spirit is also ‘God’s own future that he is looking forward to’ (p. 42). They compare God’s liveliness with Santa Claus who is ‘sort of like a messenger from the Holy Spirit – in a way’ (p. 100), before coming to discern the spirits to see if they are from God, for whom to have Spirit means that he ‘doesn’t stay shut up in himself … but that the goodness and mercy – and wrath, when it comes to that – that is in God blows out from him to hit you and me. And that means that just like your spirit is yours and not mine, even though your spirit effects me, so God’s Spirit is his and not a spirit like Santa Claus’ (p. 101).

In between laughs, they talk about what it is about Holy Communion – Solveig’s ‘favourite part of going to church’ because she gets to ‘stretch and walk around a little’ (p. 31) – that means that ‘the wine should be the very best’ (p. 33) and that dissolvable bread should be banned. The meal should be appetising, and not like those baptisms ‘when they just dribble a couple of drops on the baby’ (p. 34). They also talk about a confirmation service led by ‘this weird bishop guy’ who is ‘really stupid’ (p. 34).

While I’m trying to resist the temptation to share every gem in the book (and there are lots), allow me one more, this time on heaven, purgatory, and hell:

Solveig: Do you think of where you might go after you die as two places or three places? I think of it as three places.

Poppi: What three is that?

Solveig: Heaven, purgatory, and hell.

Poppi: So you hold to the doctrine of purgatory?

Solveig: Yes.

Poppi: You know that is very controversial.

Solveig: Why? It’s in Dante, isn’t it?

Poppi: Well, it’s in Dante, yes. But of course, Dante isn’t exactly in the Bible.

Solveig: No. But he’s still …

Poppi: The thing about purgatory is that it’s a very reasonable idea. It’s just that we don’t know if it is true.

Solveig: Except … Maybe God thinks that you should just go to two places. If you are bad, he has no patience with you at all, and he will just sort you to go to heaven or hell. I think that is reasonable enough.

Poppi: That God is impatient?

Solveig: Yes.

Poppi: That’s where I think the notion of purgatory is reasonable. I don’t think the Bible talks about God’s being impatient in quite that way.

Solveig: If he isn’t impatient, maybe he doesn’t want us to spend time thinking about where we should go.

Poppi: You know that plate that your mother and father gave us that hangs on the wall in the dining room?

Solveig: Yes.

Poppi: Remember what it says on it?

Solveig: I don’t remember what it says.

Poppi: It says, ‘I desire not the death of the wicked.’

Solveig: ‘As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked.’

Poppi: Right. So the biblical God takes no pleasure in sending people to hell, and that’s why I think that purgatory is a reasonable idea. The problem is we don’t have any way of knowing whether the purgatory idea is true or not.

Solveig: It’s just Dante’s idea.

Poppi: Well, it was older than Dante.

Solveig: It was?

Poppi: Yes.

…

Solveig: Yes. Well, see, I think of Dante as a theologian, in a way.

Poppi: He was a very great theologian.

Solveig: Yeah, I know. I’m saying that he kind of liked to make up things he wasn’t quite sure about, if you know what I mean.

The delightful exchanges in this album offer us a model of how good theological dialogue can and should take place: with mutual respect and humility which delights in both the giving and the receiving; with an eye on the scripture, an eye on the tradition, and an eye on the world (for those who possess at least three eyes); and within an environment of safety in which no idea is too whacky and no avenue of enquiry cut off prematurely.

Carl Braaten’s words regarding this book are worth repeating,

Robert Jenson has created a new medium, with his granddaughter Solveig, to teach the basics of the Christian faith. Just as Martin Luther wrote his Small Catechism for children, this book of conversations covers the beliefs and practices of the Christian church – among them the commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and the sacraments – in a way that parents, regardless of their denomination, can confidently read and discuss with their children. Robert Jenson has translated the core convictions of his two volumes of Systematic Theology into simple truths that his eight-year-old grandchild can understand in the course of their unrehearsed and lively conversations. If you want to know what a sophisticated theologian really believes, listen to him explain the mysteries of the Christian faith to a child in simple terms without being simplistic.

Holiday Reading

I will be taking a break from blogging over the next fortnight because I’ll be away enjoying what will probably be my last wee break for a while. I leave my desk with not only a thesis to keep working on (with its related reading), but also a stack of books to read and review. Among the latter (some of which will accompany me) are the following:

Across the Spectrum: Understanding Issues in Evangelical Theology, by Gregory A. Boyd and Paul Rhodes Eddy

An Introduction to Torrance Theology: Discovering the Incarnate Saviour, edited by Gerrit Scott Dawson.

On Being the Church of Jesus Christ in Tumultuous Times, by Joe R. Jones

Protestant Nonconformist Texts: The Nineteenth Century, edited by R. Tudor Jones, David W. Bebbington, and Alan Ruston

Visual Faith: Art, Theology, and Worship in Dialogue, by William A. Dyrness

What Does It Mean to Be Saved?: Broadening Evangelical Horizons of Salvation, edited by John G. Stackhouse, Jr.

Review: Peter Baylies, The Stay-at-Home Dad Handbook

I’ve just finished reading Peter Baylies’ The Stay-at-Home Dad Handbook. Like every book on fathering, this one’s fairly hit and miss in terms of what I found most useful.

Baylies largely treats fathering as a ‘career move’, and the book is shaped to that end – that is, helping fathers enjoy their ‘new career’. While it’s not the way that I like to think of fathering, there are strengths in this (that will no doubt appeal to other personality types), such as helping new father’s approach their responsibilities thoughtfully, purposely and seriously. Adversely, although the book is clearly set out, and somewhat ‘practical’ (including a somewhat useful appendix of resources), it often lacks the personal warmth, and focus on the parent-child relationship, of many parenting books.

Whether it is just cultural or personality or values (and I suspect it’s all three and more), I found Baylies’ book just too basic. Although much of the ground that he covers is useful (the section on playgroups and networking with others for example), it is difficult to believe that most fathers have not thought through most, if not all, of the issues he raises. If you’re after a ‘Fathering 101′ handbook, this one may well be what you are looking for, though it wouldn’t be my first choice. If you feel that you could skip ‘Fathering 101′ and move up a grade or two, you would be better served to look elsewhere.

One of the strengths of the book, however, is that Baylies has clearly spent much time listening to other fathers. Although at times I was left wondering if he has spent too much time doing this – as the inclusion of copious fathering stories betrays – it does give the book a sort of common-sense, communal wisdom (or ignorance?) feel. Of course, it’s easy enough to navigate your way around the material and jump to the next section if you want.

In talking to at-home dads over the last ten years, Baylies has asked dads what they have changed for themselves that made for a more stress-free family. Here are ten useful things that he lists (pp. 152-3) that one can do to make the household a more pleasant environment:

1. Talk to them and listen to them. When your kids know you are listening to them, it makes them realize their input matters, and gives them a feeling of control and self-worth.

2. Treat them with respect. When you respect them, they will respect you back.

3. Give a lot of hugs and kisses. A feeling of being loved gives your kids a feeling of self-confidence.

4. Show you love your spouse in front of your kids. Seeing Mum and Dad show affection toward each other gives them two role models.

5. Allow kids to be self-reliant. Let them try things for themselves, no matter how foolish it may seem to you (provided it’s safe). For example, my kids liked to do experiments by mixing water with several objects and putting it in the freezer to see what happens. They couldn’t wait to see what it would look like the following day. After a while, when we trusted them with the toaster, we encouraged them to make toast. (My oldest son is twelve and is making a pretty good ham and cheese omelet now.)

6. Communicate with your spouse and agree on parenting styles. To avoid a public argument and mixed messages, make sure you and your wife agree on your children’s behavior.

7. Get to know your kids’ friends. As your children get older and a few neighborhood kids start to visit, listen to them and learn what they are like and how mature they are. This will give you better judgment when they start asking to do more outside the house.

8. Don’t expect too much, but don’t be a pushover. Pick your battles: some disagreements may not be worth the argument. For example, if your children want to walk to school without a raincoat, let them do it, and see if the consequences will help
them make a better decision next time. But if you have a serious issue, stand by it.

9. Avoid yelling at them at all costs. Always discipline with reason, not fear. When you don’t like a decision or action your children are making, calmly ask them why they are making the decision. Have them explain what might happen; sometimes they will see why you might be right.

10. Create as much adventure as possible for your kids. Creating adventure, although it may not be a popular pastime for the mums, is one way that many at-home dads deal with burnout. This does not mean taking the kids skydiving or white water rafting. It is amazing what adventures you can find within a few blocks of your house. In fact, many dads find that every time they take their children out of the house it can be an adventure.

Ah! Books

Just having a break at the moment and decided to pick up a book that’s been on my ‘Books I really Want to Read and Hope I Get Around to Doing So One Day’ list. The one I picked up was Mister God, This is Anna. Here’s a few words from Verna Sproxton’s ‘Introduction’:

‘There are good books, indifferent books, and bad books. Amongst the good books some are honest, inspiring, moving, prophetic, and improving. But in my language there is another category: there are Ah! Books …. Ah! Books are those which induce a fundamental change in the reader’s consciousness. They widen his sensibility in such a way that he is able to look upon familiar things as though he is seeing and understanding them for the first time. Ah! Books are galvanic. They touch the nerve-centre of the whole being so that the reader receives an almost palpable physical shock. A tremor of excited perception tipples through the person … Ah! Books give you sentences which you can roll around in the mind, throw in the air, catch, tease out, analyse. But in whatever l way you handle them, they widen your vision. For they are essentially Idea-creating, in the sense that Coleridge meant when he described the Idea as containing future thought – as opposed to the Epigram which encapsulates past thought. Ah! Books give the impression that you are opening a new account, not closing an old one down’. – Vernon Sproxton, ‘Introduction’, to Fynn. Mister God, This Is Anna (London: Fount, 1979), 1–2.

Wow. Now I can’t wait to keep reading …

Developing a Reading List

Here is the series of posts from my series, Developing A Reading List. Please note that this list will be regularly updated as I come across suitable material.

Developing a Reading List – Theological Method and Prolegomena, Systematics/Dogmatics, Biblical Theology, Theology Proper

Developing a Reading List – Patriology, Christology, Pneumatology, Revelation

Developing a Reading List – Creation, Soteriology, Ecclesiology, Anthropology

Developing a Reading List – Prayer and Meditation, Missiology, Ethics, Doxology

Developing a Reading List – Pastoral Ministry, Preaching, Theology and the Arts, Eschatology

Or you can access each category here:

1. Theological Method and Prolegomena
2. Systematics/Dogmatics
3. Biblical Theology
4. Theology Proper
5. Patriology
6. Christology
7. Pneumatology
8. Revelation
9. Creation
10. Soteriology
11. Ecclesiology
12. Anthropology
13. Prayer and Meditation
14. Missiology
15. Ethics
16. Doxology
17. Pastoral Ministry
18. Preaching
19. Theology and the Arts
20. Eschatology

Developing a Reading List – 5

This is the last of a wee series of posts (here, here, here and here) that have been written in an effort to put together some sort of a reading list for various areas of systematic and pastoral theology. The fact that it is listed here does not mean that I endorse any or all of the theology expressed by the various individuals.

This post is concerned with books on Pastoral Ministry, Preaching, Theology and the Arts (BEWARE: a long list), and Eschatology.

Remember, the kind of thing I have in mind is developing a reading list and resource for English-speaking undergraduate theology students – a kind of answer to the ‘where should I start?’ question. What books have you found helpful as either a teacher or a student that ought to be on such suggested a reading list?

Many thanks to those who have made suggestions.

Reading List: 17. Pastoral Ministry:

Christian D Kettler and Todd H. Speidell (eds.), Incarnational Ministry: The Presence of Christ in Church, Society, and Family: Essays in Honor of Ray S. Anderson

Eduard Thurneysen, A Theology of Pastoral Care

Eugene H. Peterson, The Contemplative Pastor: Returning to the Art of Spiritual Direction

Eugene H. Peterson, Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work

Eugene H. Peterson, Under the Unpredictable Plant: An Exploration in Vocational Holiness

Eugene H. Peterson, Working The Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity

Henri J. M. Nouwen, Creative Ministry

Nicholas P. Wolterstorff, Lament for a Son

Ray S. Anderson, The Shape of Practical Theology: Empowering Ministry With Theological Praxis

Ray S. Anderson, The Soul of Ministry: Forming Leaders for God’s People

Ray S. Anderson (ed.), Theological Foundations for Ministry

Richard Baxter, The Reformed Pastor

Thomas Oden, Pastoral Theology

Walter C. Wright, Relational Leadership: A Biblical Model for Influence and Service

Reading List: 18. Preaching:

Bryan Chapell, Christ-Centered Preaching: Redeeming the Expository Sermon

Charles H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Preaching and Preachers

Deane Meatheringham, Gospel Incandescent

Dietrich Ritschl, A Theology of Proclamation

Geoffrey C. Bingham, The Preacher and the Parrot

Geoffrey C. Bingham, True Preaching: the Agony and the Ecstasy

Gerhard O. Forde, Theology is for Proclamation

Graeme Goldsworthy, Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture: The Application of Biblical Theology to Expository Preaching

Gustaf Wingren, The Living Word

Helmut Thielicke, How to Believe Again

Helmut Thielicke, What’s Wrong with the Church?

James Denney, ‘Preaching Christ’, in Dictionary of Christ and the Gospels (ed. J. Hastings), 393-403.

John Stott, I Believe in Preaching

Karl Barth, Homiletics

Peter Adam, Speaking God’s Words: A Practical Theology of Preaching

Peter T. Forsyth, Positive Preaching and the Modern Mind

Sidney Greidanus, The Modern Preacher and the Ancient Text

Sidney Greidanus, Preaching Christ from the Old Testament: A Contemporary Hermeneutical Method

Thomas F. Torrance, Preaching Christ Today: The Gospel and Scientific Thinking

Walter Brueggemann, The Prophetic Imagination

William Perkins, The Art of Prophesying

Reading List: 19. Theology and the Arts

Aidan Nichols, The Art of God Incarnate, Theology and Symbol from Genesis to the 20th Century

Bridget Nichols. Literature in Christian Perspective: Becoming Faithful Readers

Calvin Seerveld, Bearing Fresh Olive Leaves

Calvin Seerveld, Rainbows for a Fallen World

Calvin Seerveld, Voicing God’s Psalms

Christopher Deacy, Screen Christologies: Redemption and the Medium of Film

David Bailey Harned, Theology and the Arts

David Thistlethwaite, The Art of God and the Religions of Art

Dorothy L. Sayers, The Mind of the Maker

E. John Walford, Jacob van Ruisdael and the perception of landscape

Edward Farley, Faith and Beauty: A Theological Aesthetic

Flannery O’Connor, Flannery O’Connor: Collected Works

Frank Burch Brown, Good Taste, Bad Taste, and Christian Taste

Frank Burch Brown, Religious Aesthetics: A Theological Study of Making and Meaning

Gabriele Finaldi, The Image of Christ

Gaye W. Oritz and Clive Marsh (eds.), Explorations in Theology and Film

Gene Edward Veith, Postmodern Times: A Christian Guide to Contemporary Thought and Culture

Gene Edward Veith, Reading Between the Lines: A Christian Guide to Literature

Georg W. F. Hegel, Aesthetics: Lectures on Fine Art

George Pattison, Art, Modernity and Faith

George Steiner, Grammars of Creation

George Steiner, Real Presences

Gesa Elsbeth Thiessen, Theological Aesthetics: A Reader

Hans R. Rookmaaker, Modern Art and the Death of a Culture

Hans Rookmaaker, The Creative Gift

Henri Nouwen, Behold the Beauty of the Lord

Henri Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming

Hilary Brand & Adrienne Chaplin, Art and Soul: Signposts for Christians in the Arts

Jaroslav Pelikan, Bach Among the Theologians

Jeremy Begbie, ‘Christ and the Cultures: Christianity and the Arts,’ in Companion to Christian Doctrine, ed. Colin Gunton

Jeremy Begbie, ‘The Gospel, the Arts and Our Culture,’ in The Gospel and Contemporary Culture, ed. Hugh Montefiore, 1992, 58–83.

Jeremy S. Begbie (ed.), Beholding the Glory: Incarnation through the Arts

Jeremy S. Begbie, Theology, Music and Time

Jeremy S. Begbie, Voicing Creations Praise: Towards a Theology of the Arts

John De Gruchy, Christianity, Art and Social Transformation: Theological Aesthetics in the Struggle for Justice

John Dillenberger, A Theology of Artistic Sensibilities

John Drury, Painting the Word: Christian Pictures and Their Meaning

John Newport, Christianity and Contemporary Art Forms

Karl Barth, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Kathleen Powers Erickson, At Eternity’s Gate: The Spiritual Vision of Vincent Van Gogh

Larry J Kreitzer, Pauline Images in Fiction and Film

Larry J Kreitzer, The New Testament in Fiction and Film

Larry J Kreitzer, The Old Testament in Fiction and Film

Leland Ryken, Culture in Christian Perspective: A Door to Understanding and Enjoying the Arts

Leland Ryken, The Liberated Imagination: Thinking Critically about the Arts

Leonid Ouspensky & Vladimir Lossky, The Meaning of Icon

Margaret Miles, Image as Insight

Ned Bustard, It was Good: Making Art to the Glory of God

Nicholas P. Wolterstorff, Art in Action: Towards a Christian Aesthetic

Nigel Forde, The Lantern and the Looking-Glass: Literature and Christian Belief

Patrick Sherry, Spirit and Beauty: An Introduction to Theological Aesthetics

Paul Corby Finney, Seeing Beyond the Word: Visual Arts and the Calvinist Tradition

Paul Corby Finney, The Invisible God

Paul Fiddes (ed.), The Novel, Spirituality and Modern Culture

Paul Fiddes, Freedom and Limit: A Dialogue between Literature and Christian Doctrine

Paul S. Fiddes, The Promised End: Eschatology in Theology and Literature

Peter Fuller, Theoria: Art and the Absence of Grace

Peter T. Forsyth, Christ on Parnassus: Lectures on Art, Ethic, and Theology

Peter T. Forsyth, Religion in Recent Art: Expository Lectures on Rossetti, Burne Jones Watts, Holman Hunt and Wagner

Richard Harries, Art and the Beauty of God: A Christian Understandin

Richard Harries, The Passion in Art

Richard Viladesau, Theological Aesthetics: God in Imagination, Beauty, and Art

Robert Jewett, Saint Paul at the Movies: The Apostle’s Dialogue with American Culture

Robert Johnston, Reel Spirituality: Theology and Film in Dialogue

Roger Lundin, The Culture of Interpretation

Roland Delattre, Beauty and Sensibility in the Thought of Jonathan Edwards: An essay in aesthetics and theological ethics

Rowan Williams, Grace and Necessity: Reflections on Art and Love

Roy Kinnard & Tim Davis, Divine Images: A History of Jesus on the Screen

Simon Jenkins, Windows into Heaven

St John of Damascus, On the Divine Images

Stanley Porter et al, eds., Images of Christ, Ancient and Modern

Stephen May, Stardust and Ashes: Science Fiction in Christian Perspective

Steve Scott, Like a House on Fire: Renewal of the Arts in a Postmodern Culture

T. R Wright, Theology and Literature

Trevor A. Hart and Steven R. Guthrie (eds.), Faithful Performances

Trevor A. Hart, A Poetics of Redemption Volume 1: Creation, Creatureliness and Artistry (forthcoming)

Trevor A. Hart, A Poetics of Redemption Volume 2: Incarnation, Embodiment, and Art (forthcoming)

Trevor A. Hart, A Poetics of Redemption Volume 3: Holy Spirit, Imagination and the Salvation of Humanity (forthcoming)

William Dyrness, Reformed Theology and Visual Culture: The Protestant Imagination from Calvin to Edwards

William Dyrness, Rouault: A Vision of Suffering and Salvatio

William Dyrness, The Earth is God’s: A Theology of American Culture

William Dyrness, Visual Faith: Art, Theology, and Worship in Dialogue

Reading List: 20. Eschatology:

Adrio König, The Eclipse of Christ in Eschatology: Toward a Christ-Centered Approach

Anthony Hoekema, Bible and the Future,

Alister McGrath, A Brief History of Heaven

Ben Witherington III, Jesus, Paul & the End of the World

David Powys, ‘Hell’: A Hard Look at a Hard Question

Donald G. Bloesch, The Last Things: Resurrection, Judgment, Glory

Edward Fudge, The Fire That Consumes: The Biblical Case for Conditional Immortality

Geerhardus Vos, Pauline Eschatology

Geerhardus Vos, Eschatology of the Old Testament

Hans Schwarz, ‘Eschatology’, in Carl E. Braaten and Robert W. Jenson (eds.), Christian Dogmatics, Volume 2

Hans Urs von Balthasar, Theo-Drama, Vol. 5

Helmut Thielicke, The Evangelical Faith, Volume 3: The Holy Spirit, the Church, Eschatology

Herman Ridderbos, Coming of the Kingdom

James Wm. McClendon, Jr., Doctrine: Systematic Theology, Vol. 2

John F. Walvoord, Zachary J. Hayes, and Clark H. Pinnock, Four Views on Hell

Jürgen Moltmann, The Coming of God: Christian Eschatology

Jürgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope

Jürgen Moltmann, In the End – The Beginning: The Life of Hope

John Polkinghorne, The God of Hope and the End of the World

Michael S. Horton, Covenant and Eschatology: The Divine Drama

Peter T. Forsyth, This Life and the Next

Richard Bauckham, God Will Be All in All: The Eschatology of Jürgen Moltmann

Robert A. Peterson, Hell on Trial: The Case for Eternal Punishment

Wayne Martindale, Beyond the Shadowlands: C.S. Lewis on Heaven and Hell

William H. Katerberg and Miroslav Volf (eds.), The Future of Hope: Christian Tradition amid Modernity and Postmodernity

Podding around

Here’s a few more podcasts that I’ve checked out today that I thought were worth sharing here:

With the rise of the internet many parents are feelings that their kids know more about what goes on in the world wide web than they do. And with community like websites, danger for them is no longer just in the neighbourhood. In this podcast, Paul Wallbank of PC Rescue maps out some of the dangers of cyberspace.

In this podcast on living with drug and alcohol abuse in families, Shirley Smith, author of Set Yourself Free, talks about how we can help people with addictions or overcome our own. All of us know someone with a problem with addiction and it can create chaos in a lot of lives.

The first 9 minutes of this podcast includes a discussion on Boys, Men, and Fathers.

This podcast includes a discussion on reading to your children, this one and this one are discussions on co-parenting and reading to kids, while this one is on Single-sex schools.

This podcast includes an argument for co-ed schools, and this one’s on Political wives, Intensive parenting, and Maths for pre-schoolers.

There’s a discussion here on Kids and Money too, and one here on ‘From Babies to Blokes: The Making of Men’.

So that ought to keep us all busy for a wee while. I usually download podcasts to my MP3 player and listen to them at night while I fall asleep.

Universal preschool, Maths for preschoolers and Reading to your children

Just been listening to this podcast on Universal preschool, Maths for preschoolers and Reading to your children

On Universal preschool (00:00), the argument is that Preschool is the cornerstone of education – everything else is built upon it. That’’s what David Kirp has been telling Australia’s biggest and most profitable childcare company, ABC Learning. Universal preschool is something both major parties have talked about in Australia, but free preschool for all 3 and 4 year olds seems a very long way off – though South Australia is probably furthest along the track

On Maths (00:14) for preschoolers, it’’s usually assumed that kids don’’t start learning too much in the way of mathematics until they start school. Sure they read the odd counting book, or know how many feet they have, but despite the lack of formal learning, pre-school kids actually know a lot more about maths than you might think. Brian Doig has been looking at what sort of mathematical knowledge pre-schoolers have and how everyday tasks are a major part of developing that knowledge.

On Reading to your children (00:22), whilst studying children’’s language development, Susan Colmar found that there are a few key things parents should and should not do when they read to kids. One of her project’s focused on 15 mainly 3-5 year old pre-schoolers with language delay. After their parents made a few tweaks to how and how often they read to their children, there was a significant increase in their language skills.

We’re not up to even thinking about pre-school stuff yet, but I’d be keen to hear what your thoughts are on what is being said in this podcast.

Developing a Reading List – 3

Developing a Reading List – 3

So far I have listed books on (1) Theological Method and Prolegomena, (2) Systematics/Dogmatics (3) Biblical Theology, and (4) Theology Proper, (5) Patriology, (6) Christology, (7) Pneumatology and (8) Revelation. Below is a list of books that I’ve found helpful in thinking about Creation, Soteriology, Ecclesiology, Anthropology. Remember, this series of 5 posts is with a view to developing some sort of a reading list for various areas of systematic and pastoral theology, and that the kind of thing I have in mind is a reading list and resource for English-speaking undergraduate theology students. It is to this end that I am inviting your help.

Reading List: 9. Creation:

Colin E. Gunton, The Triune Creator

Colin E. Gunton, Christ and Creation

David Bentley Hart, The Beauty of the Infinite

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Creation and Fall

Jonathan Edwards, Concerning the End for Which God Created the World

Joseph Ratzinger, In the Beginning

Jürgen Moltmann, God in Creation

Langdon Gilkey, Maker of Heaven and Earth

Reading List: 10. Soteriology:

Albrecht Ritschl, The Christian Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation: The Positive Development of the Doctrine

Anselm, Cur Deus Homo?

Athanasius, On the Incarnation

Colin E. Gunton, The Actuality of Atonement

David Peterson, Possessed by God: A New Testament Theology of Sanctification and Holiness

Edward Schillebeeckx, Christ: The Experience of Jesus as Lord

Geoffrey C. Bingham, Christ’s Cross Over Man’s Abyss

Gustaf Aulén, Christus Victor

Hans Boersma, Violence, Hospitality, and the Cross: Reappropriating the Atonement Tradition

James Denney, The Christian Doctrine of Reconciliation

James Denney, The Death of Christ

John McLeod Campbell, The Nature of the Atonement

John R. W. Stott, The Cross of Christ

John Webster, Holiness

Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics IV/1

Kenneth Grayston, Dying, We Live: A New Enquiry into the Death of Christ in the New Testament

Leon Morris, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross

Michelle A. Gonzalez, Created in God’s Image: An Introduction to Feminist Theological Anthropology

Molly T. Marshall, What It Means to Be Human

Nigel M. de S. Cameron (ed.), Universalism and the Doctrine of Hell

Paul Fiddes, Past Event and Present Salvation: The Christian Idea of Atonement

Peter T. Forsyth, The Cruciality of the Cross

Peter T. Forsyth, The Work of Christ

Reinhold Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny of Man, vol. 1: Human Nature

Stephen C. Barton (ed.), Holiness: Past and Present

Thomas F. Torrance, The Mediation of Christ

Thomas Smail, Once and For All: A Confession of the Cross

Reading List: 11. Ecclesiology:

Colin E. Gunton (ed.), Trinity, Time, and Church: A Response to the Theology of Robert W. Jenson

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Sanctorum Communio: A Theological Study of the Sociology of the Church

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

Donald G. Bloesch, The Church

Geoffrey W. Bromiley, Children of Promise

Hans Küng, The Church

John D. Zizioulas, Being As Communion: Studies in Personhood and the Church

Jürgen Moltmann, The Church in the Power of the Spirit

Donald G. Bloesch, The Church: Sacraments, Worship, Ministry Mission

Miroslav Volf, After Our Image: The Church as the Image of the Trinity

Peter Leithart, Against Christianity

Peter T. Forsyth, The Church and the Sacraments

Peter T. Forsyth, The Church, The Gospel and Society

Reading List: 12. Anthropology:

Alan Torrance, Persons in Communion: an Essay on Trinitarian Description and Human Participation

Christoph Schwobel & Colin Gunton (eds), Persons, Divine and Human

Fyodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment

Harry R. Boer, An Ember Still Glowing: Humankind as the Image of God

Helmut Thielicke, Being Human … Becoming Human

John D. Zizioulas, Being As Communion: Studies in Personhood and the Church

Pope John Paul II, The Theology of the Body: Human Love in the Divine Plan

Randall C. Zachman, The Assurance Of Faith: Conscience in the Theology Of Martin Luther and John Calvin

Ray S. Anderson, On Being Human: Essays in Theological Anthropology

Stanley Grenz, The Social God and the Relational Self

Thomas Smail, Like Father, Like Son

Wolfhart Pannenberg, Anthropology in Theological Perspective

Next on the list: Prayer and Meditation, Missiology, Ethics, and Doxology.

Developing a Reading List – 2

Following on from a previous post on developing a reading list in which I listed books on (1) Theological Method and Prolegomena, (2) Systematics/Dogmatics (3) Biblical Theology, and (4) Theology Proper, I continue on with this exercise of developing some sort of a reading list for various areas of systematic and pastoral theology. Remember, the kind of thing I have in mind is a reading list and resource for English-speaking undergraduate theology students. What books have you found helpful, as either a teacher or student, in these areas?

Reading List: 5. Patriology:

Geoffrey Bingham, Father! My Father!

Helmut Thielicke, The Waiting Father

J. Scott Lidgett, The Fatherhood of God

Peter T. Forsyth, God the Holy Father

Thomas Smail, The Forgotten Father

Reading List: 6. Christology:

C. Norman Kraus, Jesus Christ Our Lord: Christology from a Disciple’s Perspective

Donald G. Bloesch, Jesus Christ: Saviour and Lord

Gerd Theissen, The Shadow of the Galilean

Isaac A. Dorner, History of the Development of the Doctrine of the Person of Christ

John Howard Yoder, The Politics of Jesus

Jon Sobrino, Jesus the Liberator

Joseph Ratzinger, Jesus of Nazareth

Jürgen Moltmann, The Crucified God

Jürgen Moltmann, The Way of Jesus Christ

Kathryn Tanner, Jesus, Humanity and the Trinity

Leonardo Boff, Jesus Christ, Liberator

Marcus J. Borg, Christology in the Making

Peter T. Forsyth, The Person and Place of Jesus Christ

Peter T. Forsyth, The Preaching of Jesus and the Gospel of Christ

Richard Bauckham, God Crucified: Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament

Thomas F. Torrance (ed.), The Incarnation: Ecumenical Studies in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed

Thomas F. Torrance, The Mediation of Christ

Thomas Smail, Once and For All: A Confession of the Cross

Trevor A. Hart and Daniel Thimell (eds.), Christ in Our Place: The Humanity of God in Christ for the Reconciliation of the World: Essays Presented to Professor James Torrance

Walter Kasper, Jesus the Christ

Wolfhart Pannenberg, Jesus – God and Man

Reading List: 7. Pneumatology:

Donald G. Bloesch, The Holy Spirit: Work and Gifts

Gordon Fee, God’s Empowering Presence

James D.G. Dunn, Jesus and the Spirit

John Taylor, The Go-Between God

John Webster, Holiness

Jürgen Moltmann, The Spirit of Life: A Universal Affirmation

Molly T. Marshall, Joining the Dance: A Theology of the Spirit

Thomas Smail, The Giving Gift

Yves Congar, I Believe in the Holy Spirit, Vol. 1

Reading List: 8. Revelation:

Colin Gunton, A Brief Theology of Revelation

Donald G. Bloesch, Holy Scripture: Revelation, Inspiration and Interpretation

Emil Brunner & Karl Barth, Natural Theology: Comprising ‘Nature and Grace’ by E. Brunner & the reply ‘No!’ by Karl Barth

Gerrit C. Berkouwer, Holy Scripture

John Webster, Holy Scripture

Peter F. Jensen, The Doctrine of Revelation

Next on the list: Creation, Soteriology, Ecclesiology, and Anthropology.

Around the blogs

I read some really encouraging things about dadding today. Here’s two of them:

This post outlined six early reading skills that form the base that kids use to learn how to read and write and encouraged us to take our kids to the library more.

This article discussed how fathers’ parenting styles can differ significantly from mums and that it’s important to see the value and contribution that each style makes to our kids well-being and development and to a happier home.

Yes, we all parent differently …

CS Lewis on reading theology

From Lewis’ introduction to Athanasius’ De Incarnatione Verbi Dei:

‘For my own part I tend to find the doctrinal books often more helpful in devotion than the devotional books, and I rather suspect that the same experience may await many others. I believe that many who find that ‘nothing happens’ when they sit down, or kneel down, to a book of devotion, would find that the heart sings unbidden while they are working their way through a tough bit of theology with a pipe in their teeth and a pencil in their hand’.

How true!

Being addressed

In his A Little Exercise for Young Theologians, Helmut Thielicke warns us that the person ‘who studies theology … might watch carefully whether he increasingly does not think in the third rather than in the second person … This transition from one to the other level of thought, from a personal relationship with God to a merely technical reference, usually is exactly synchronized with the moment that I no longer can read the word of Holy Scripture as a word to me, but only as the object of exegetical endeavours’.

Although the Scriptures are addressed to communities, they are also addressed to me, and they come anticipating a response (Heb 3:13-15; 4:13). They do not come permitting me to impose the question, ‘How can I use this in a sermon?’ or ‘How can I find something here for my current projects?’. I recall that the first time someone spoke of God and his word in the third person, that is, about God and not with God, was when the question was posed, ‘Did God say?’ (Gen 3:1).

Vogel warned of coming ‘to the point where we no longer hear what they (the Scriptures) have to say but delude ourselves in the fatal self-deception of listening to the echo of our own way of thinking about God and the world and ourselves’. And I would add, about the nature and forms of ministry.

We would do well to take Forsyth’s advice: ‘Our aim must be an ever fresh immersion in the Bible, an immersion both scholarly and experimental’. And again, ‘Now the ideal ministry must be a Bibliocracy. It must know its Bible better than any other book’. It was said of James Denney that ‘He never reads Scripture as if he had written it: he always reads as if listening for a Voice’. May it be so for us.