An introduction to the theology of art and the art of theology.

God’s Good Earth offers Christians and their communities an engaging resource for prayer, reflection, and worship that reflects and nourishes their efforts to serve God and care for God’s creation. Compilers Anne and Jeffery Rowthorn have prepared 52 beautiful, ready-made prayer services, each around a specific theme, drawing from a rich variety of ecumenical resources: psalms and other responsive readings, Scripture, hymns, prayers, and reflections from the world's most engaging nature writers and interpreters of the social and cultural landscape. Each section can be used in full, or the user may select smaller sections; permission is granted to the purchaser to reproduce for use in public prayer. God's Good Earth forms hearts and minds to know that transformation is not only possible but essential if the Earth is to survive, healthy and whole. Those who enter into the book’s praise and prayer will have their faith in God the Creator strengthened, their gratitude for the wonders of God's creation deepened, and their commitment to act on behalf of God's good earth enhanced. The print edition is printed with high production standards on recycled, FSC-certified paper.

"A fine collection of probing and imaginative discussions on the relation between the Incarnation and the arts." --Nicholas Wolterstorff, Yale Divinity School

"Walter Brueggemann is the master of finding fresh and compelling dimensions of meaning in texts so familiar they barely scratch the surface of our consciousness. In this exciting collection, Brueggemann finds that when we admit we are dust, we can be liberated. Why? Because we are free from acting like God. We are free to choose obedience to the one living, true Sovereign. The idols lose their grip on us and we live faithfully and in authentic joy." --Ronald J. Allen, Christian Theological Seminary "According to Walter Brueggemann, the autonomy, secularity, and individualism that characterize modernity have 'exiled' the contemporary believer. Always concerned with the manner in which one is to live in the world, he argues for a subversive imagination similar to that found in the biblical wisdom writings, the Psalms, and the Prophets. One comes away from this book both energized by the vision presented and challenged to make it a reality." --Dianne Bergant, Catholic Theological Union in Chicago "There is a reason why Walter Brueggemann remains, for preachers and pastors, the most loved and trusted of all biblical scholars--and that is simply because he writes for us. In every season and heartbreak of life and ministry, he writes for us. And over the years, we have come to see that when Brueggemann goes to the text before God, with his signature passion, candor, and ferocious energy, he goes not for our enlightenment or edification, but for our life and for his. Read this book and take off your shoes, because you will enter onto holy ground." --Anna Carter Florence, Columbia Theological Seminary .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; }

These fourteen specially commissioned essays provide an exciting new introduction to the content of Christian theology.

Imaginatio et Ratio (www.imaginatioetratio.org) is a peer reviewed journal primarily focusing on the intersection between the arts and theology, hoping to allow imagination and reason to be seen as intimately intertwined-as different expressions of the same divine truth. Imaginatio et Ratio was started in the hopes that it could serve a growing community of artists and thinkers and strives to present accessible but high quality art, literary fiction, creative non-fiction, and theology/philosophy-as well as interviews and book, film, art and music reviews. The journal is published twice a year and is available in print and digital formats.

How do the arts in worship form individuals and communities? Every choice of art in worship opens up and closes down possibilities for the formation of our humanity. Every practice of music, every decision about language, every use of our bodies, every approach to visual media or church buildings forms our desires, shapes our imaginations, habituates our emotional instincts, and reconfigures our identity as Christians in contextually meaningful ways, generating thereby a sense of the triune God and of our place in the world. Glimpses of the New Creation argues that the arts form us in worship by bringing us into intentional and intensive participation in the aesthetic aspect of our humanity—that is, our physical, emotional, imaginative, and metaphorical capacities. In so doing they invite the people of God to be conformed to Christ and to participate in the praise of Christ and in the praise of creation, which by the Spirit’s power raises its peculiar voice to the Father in heaven, for the sake of the world that God so loves.

A theological framework for the liturgical arts rooted in John Calvin Both detractors and supporters of John Calvin have deemed him an enemy of the physical body, a pessimist toward creation, and a negative influence on the liturgical arts. But, says W. David O. Taylor, that only tells half of the story. Taylor examines Calvin's trinitarian theology as it intersects his doctrine of the physical creation in order to argue for a positive theological account of the liturgical arts. He does so believing that Calvin's theology can serve, perhaps surprisingly, as a rich resource for understanding the theological purposes of the arts in corporate worship. Drawing on Calvin's Institutes, biblical commentaries, sermons, catechisms, treatises, and worship orders, this book represents one of the most thorough investigations available of John Calvin's theology of the physical creation—and the promising possibilities it opens up for the formative role of the arts in worship.

Listening is an essential skill for healthy relationships, both with God and with other people. But it is more than that: listening is a way of life. Adam McHugh places listening at the heart of our spirituality, our relationships and our mission. Heed the call to the listening life, and hear what God is doing in you and the world.

This book brings the emerging fields of practical theology and theology of the arts into a dialogue beyond the bias of modern systematic and constructive theology. The authors draw upon postmodern, post-secular, feminist, liberation, and dialogical/dialectical philosophy and theology, and their critiques of the narrow modern emphases on reason and the scientific method, as the model for all knowledge. Such a practical theology of the arts focuses the work of theology on the actual practices that engage the arts in their various forms as the means of interpreting and understanding the nature of the communities and their members, as well as the mechanisms through which these communities engage in transformative work, to make persons and neighborhoods whole. This book presents its theological claims through the careful analysis of several stories of communities around the world that have engaged in transformational practices through a specific art form, investigating communities from Europe, the Middle East, South America, and the U.S. The case studies explored include Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Druze, indigenous, and sometimes agnostic subjects, involved in visual art, music, dance, theatre, documentary film, and literature. Theology and the Arts demonstrates that the challenges of a postmodern and post-secular context require a fundamental rethinking of theology that focuses on discrete practices of faithful communities, rather than one-dimensional theories about religion.