Nearly everyone finds beauty compelling, so Christian apologists should devise ways to present an "aesthetic Christian apologetic." Nearly all apologists admit that the beauty of a life well lived and the beauty of the Christian community (along with the use of media and the arts) are not only helpful for apologetics but essential in a postmodern culture. In fact, it is frustrating to see how many apologists mention the need for such an approach but go on devoting most of their energies to traditional approaches. This book is different. It clearly shows the pros and cons of traditional approaches and offers a fresh perspective as well, arguing that beauty is the most compelling apologetic, and suggesting ways to implement such an approach. It demonstrates how Western culture arrived in its current unfortunate situation and uses both Scripture and figures like Athenagoras and Jonathan Edwards to challenge current views on apologetics.

Follow pastor Jim Belcher and his family as they take a pilgrimage through Europe, seeking substance for their faith in Christianity's historic, civilizational home. What they find, in places like Lewis's Oxford and Bonhoeffer's Germany, are glimpses of another kind of faith—one with power to cut through centuries and pierce our hearts today.

Over 2,000 years, Christian art has expressed the truth of the Catholic Faith for generations of the faithful. Learn the language of art to make visible the mysteries of Scripture and traditions through paintings, sculpture, mosaics, stained glass, poetry, and sacred music. Discover art as a visual Gospel that can guide, nourish, and strengthen our daily witness to the Gospel today.

Find beauty and hope by facing and dealing with the messiness of family life. The family is an imperfect institution. Broken people become broken parents who make broken families. But actually, broken is normal and exactly where God wants us. In The Beauty of Broken, Elisa Morgan, one of today’s most respected female Christian leaders, for the first time shares her very personal story of brokenness—from her first family of origin to the second, represented by her husband and two grown children. Over the years, Elisa’s family struggled privately with issues many parents must face, including: alcoholism and drug addiction infertility and adoption teen pregnancy and abortion divorce, homosexuality, and death Each story layers onto the next to reveal the brokenness that comes into our lives without invitation. “We’ve bought into the myth of the perfect family,” says Elisa. “Formulaic promises about the family may have originated in well-meaning intentions, but such thinking isn’t realistic. It’s not helpful. It’s not even kind.” Instead she offers hope in the form of “broken family values” that allow parents to grow and thrive with God. Values such as commitment, humility, relinquishment, and respect carry us to new places of understanding. Owning our brokenness shapes us into God’s best idea for us and enables us to discover the beauty in ourselves and each member of our family.

Summarizing the core beliefs of the Muslim faith, this eye-opening guide counters widely held Western views of Islam as a fierce and fanatical religion by using classical texts to illustrate the truth about three key Islamic principles. Explaining that submission, faith, and beautification complement and complete each other, the study reveals that embodying all three attributes simultaneously is what Muslims strive to achieve in order to meet the Qur'an's definition of fitrah, or true nature. This drastic contrast to many issues and concerns about Muslims--especially the stereotypical attitudes that have arisen since 9/11--is fully explored in the account's quest to foster mutual understanding between cultures. Using a famous encounter between the prophet Muhammad and the angel Gabriel as its outline, this analysis presents a fully holistic view of a world religion that has thrived for more than 1,000 years.

Nearly everyone finds beauty compelling, so Christian apologists should devise ways to present an "aesthetic Christian apologetic." Nearly all apologists admit that the beauty of a life well lived and the beauty of the Christian community (along with the use of media and the arts) are not only helpful for apologetics but essential in a postmodern culture. In fact, it is frustrating to see how many apologists mention the need for such an approach but go on devoting most of their energies to traditional approaches. This book is different. It clearly shows the pros and cons of traditional approaches and offers a fresh perspective as well, arguing that beauty is the most compelling apologetic, and suggesting ways to implement such an approach. It demonstrates how Western culture arrived in its current unfortunate situation and uses both Scripture and figures like Athenagoras and Jonathan Edwards to challenge current views on apologetics.

Not long after Martin Luther’s defiance of the Church in 1517, dialogue between Protestants and Catholics broke down, brother turned against brother, and devastating religious wars erupted across Europe. Desperate to restore the peace and recover the unity of Faith, Catholic theologians clarified and reaffirmed Catholic doctrines, but turned as well to another form of evangelization: the Arts. Convinced that to win over the unlettered, the best place to fight heresy was not in the streets but in stone and on canvas, they enlisted the century’s best artists to create a glorious wave of beautiful works of sacred art — Catholic works of sacred art — to draw people together instead of driving them apart. How Catholic Art Saved the Faith tells the story of the creation and successes of this vibrant, visual-arts SWAT team whose war cry could have been “art for Faith’s sake!” Over the years, it included Michelangelo, of course, and, among other great artists, the edgy Caravaggio, the graceful Guido Reni, the technically perfect Annibale Carracci, the colorful Barocci, the theatrical Bernini, and the passionate Artemisia Gentileschi. Each of these creative souls, despite their own interior struggles, was a key player in this magnificent, generations-long project: the affirmation through beauty of the teachings of the Holy Catholic Church. Here you will meet the fascinating artists who formed this cadre’s core. You will revel in scores of their full-color paintings. And you will profit from the lucid explanations of their lovely creations: works that over the centuries have touched the hearts and deepened the faith of millions of pilgrims who have made their way to the Eternal City to gaze upon them. Join those pilgrims now in an encounter with the magnificent artworks of the Catholic Restoration — artworks which from their conception were intended to delight, teach, and inspire. As they have done for the faith of so many, so will they do for you.

From a world-renowned painter, an exploration of creativity’s quintessential—and often overlooked—role in the spiritual life “Makoto Fujimura’s art and writings have been a true inspiration to me. In this luminous book, he addresses the question of art and faith and their reconciliation with a quiet and moving eloquence.”—Martin Scorsese “[An] elegant treatise . . . Fujimura’s sensitive, evocative theology will appeal to believers interested in the role religion can play in the creation of art.”—Publishers Weekly Conceived over thirty years of painting and creating in his studio, this book is Makoto Fujimura’s broad and deep exploration of creativity and the spiritual aspects of “making.” What he does in the studio is theological work as much as it is aesthetic work. In between pouring precious, pulverized minerals onto handmade paper to create the prismatic, refractive surfaces of his art, he comes into the quiet space in the studio, in a discipline of awareness, waiting, prayer, and praise. Ranging from the Bible to T. S. Eliot, and from Mark Rothko to Japanese Kintsugi technique, he shows how unless we are making something, we cannot know the depth of God’s being and God’s grace permeating our lives. This poignant and beautiful book offers the perspective of, in Christian Wiman’s words, “an accidental theologian,” one who comes to spiritual questions always through the prism of art.

Farley (theology, Vanderbilt U.) offers in this slim volume a satisfyingly profound exegesis on the question of beauty's relation to faith within the Christian tradition. No stranger to contemporary theory, and well versed in philosophy, Farley writes from a Christian perspective as he examines faith and beauty's tumultuous relationship to build a case for the innate presence of the divine within the beautiful.

Have you stood in front of a painting and thought, What does this mean? The Art of Faith answers this question again and again, with insight, wit, and verve, providing a thorough reference to Christian art through the centuries. Practical and easy to read, this book unfolds the ancient world of Christian images for believers who want to enrich their faith, college students studying art history, and travelers to religious sites. With this book in hand, you can visit museums, churches, or other sacred places and identify a work of art's style and meaning. Or even explore the signs and symbols of your local church. Whatever your relationship to art or Christianity, open this book when you're curious about a painting, sculpture, symbol, or other sacred work. It will answer your questions about The Art of Faith. "Couchman offers a readable and user-friendly guide to deciphering and interpreting Christian visual art. She is rightly keen to meet the urgent need for a new depth of theological vision in the church and beyond." —Jeremy Begbie, Duke Divinity School; Author of Voicing Creation's Praise: Towards a Theology of the Arts