LITMIR.BIZ

This bibliography and resource consists of a chronological introduction to the development of Lewis's works, a copious bibliography and a guide to the study of Lewis, an introductory essay on Christology in Lewis, and a glossary for those unfamiliar with some of the background and terms to Lewis's understanding of revelation and the Christ. It will be an invaluable resource for all scholars of C. S. Lewis.
The bibliography stands alone but it also serves to complement the three volumes of the series C. S. Lewis, Revelation, and the Christ.

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The academy and pop culture alike recognize the great symbolic and teaching value of the undead, whether vampires, zombies, or other undead or living-dead creatures. This has been explored variously from critiques of consumerism and racism, through explorations of gender and sexuality, to consideration of the breakdown of the nuclear family. Most academic examinations of the undead have been undertaken from the perspectives of philosophy and political theory, but another important avenue of exploration comes through theology. Through the vampire, the zombie, the Golem, and Cenobites, contributors address a variety of theological issues by way of critical reflection on the divine and the sacred in popular culture through film, television, graphic novels, and literature.

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In the early 1970s, living in inner-city St. Louis, Paul Gilk asked his friends to explain why small farms were dying. The answers did not satisfy. Years of study followed.
Through the reading of history, Gilk began to grasp the origins of both horticulture and agriculture, their blossoming into Neolithic agrarian village culture, and the impoundment of the agrarian village by bandit «aristocrats» at the formation of what we now call civilization. Getting a grip on the relationship between agriculture and civilization was one thing; but, as a person strongly influenced by Gospel stories, Gilk also wanted to know what the connection might be between the «kingdom of God» proclamation in the canonical Gospels and the peasant world from which Jesus arose.
Aided in his thinking by the works of biblical scholars Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, Gilk began to realize that the «kingdom of God» was both a harkening back to the peace and freedom of precivilized agrarian village and a revolutionary anticipation of a postcivilized village-mindedness organized organically on the basis of radical servanthood and radical stewardship. We are, Gilk says, entering the dawn of this Green culture simultaneously with the deepening of civilized world disaster.

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In this book Marianne Bjelland Kartzow suggests that ideas taken from recent discussions of multiple identities and intersectionality, combined with insights from memory theory, can renew our engagement with biblical texts. Some marginal early Christian passages, and what the scholarly community has reconstructed of their historical contexts, are encountered, looking for alternative ways these texts can produce meaning. A fresh look at some marginal biblical figures–such as male and female slaves who are beaten by a fellow slave, the queer figure of the Ethiopian eunuch, foreign Egyptian women, rebellious widows, or a possessed fortune-telling slave girl–can help biblical users to talk in more critical and creative ways about responsibility, identity, injustice, violence, inclusion/exclusion, and the intersections of gender, sexuality, race, and class. These perspectives may be relevant for those who see the New Testament as Christian canon or as cultural canon, or as both.

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A person cannot create a butterfly out of non-living components and breathe life into it. Neither can he construct a star like our sun nor a magnificent celestial body like planet Earth. God, however, can do these things and more! Although a human being cannot create a butterfly, he can live a good and decent life and serve as God's representative on Earth by becoming the gardener and governor of Nature. The one thing we know of our spiritual element, or soul, is that it's derived from God and sustains our biological and non-biological realms. In A Pen Named Man: Our Essence we focus on the worldly components of man, that is, those components we can sense, touch, and feel. Hence, we identify and discuss the physical side of man with its several body systems as well as the mental side with its rational and emotive elements. A central theme involves the need to synthesize the physiological and psychological components into a compatible and workable union, such that the drives and needs of neither realm dominate one's behavior in an unrealistic, unattainable manner. Human values are debated relative to being permanent and good for all time vs. temporary and adjusted with time and circumstance. Two significant values under review deal with the justification for taking another person's life and the morality of sexual involvement inside and outside of marriage. The emotion of love is discussed in detail.

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As the world watched the biggest global epidemic in history evolve, many anticipated that Christians would embrace those who were affected just as Jesus during his time embraced those who were sick and dying. Mostly, the Christian church stood back and observed. Sometimes Christians responded with stigma and discrimination. Many who sought refuge in the churches–churches where they had served the sick and the poor–were turned away as they now sought refuge for themselves and their children.
Individual authors address the critical issues related to the HIV epidemic, women, and the Christian church: how the HIV epidemic affected so many women and children; what the Old and New Testaments teach about our responsibility to the poor, the needy, the sick, the widow, and the orphan; and how difficult it should be for Christians to ignore these teachings.
The HIV epidemic continues, and millions of women and children bear a disproportionate share of the pain and suffering without a refuge. Although HIV is a specific disease, it serves as a paradigm for all Christians to ask what other needs they may be ignoring.

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Through the available patristic writings Caesar and the Lamb focuses on the attitudes of the earliest Christians on war and military service. Kalantzis not only provides the reader with many new translations of pre-Constantinian texts, he also tells the story of the struggle of the earliest Church, the communities of Christ at the margins of power and society, to bear witness to the nations that enveloped them as they transformed the dominant narratives of citizenship, loyalty, freedom, power, and control.
Although Kalantzis examines writings on war and military service in the first three centuries of the Christian Church in an organized manner, the ways earliest Christians thought of themselves and the state are not presented here through the lens of antiquarian curiosity. With theological sensitivity and historical acumen this companion leads the reader into the world in which Christianity arose and asks questions of the past that help us understand the early character of the Christian faith with the hope that such an enterprise will also help us evaluate its expression in our own time.

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Christians are called to minister to people in prison. But most know next to nothing about prisons, the needs of the people in them, or the biblical basis for addressing those needs. Love in a Cauldron of Misery fills that void. This book provides a brief historical perspective that orients the reader and a discussion, mainly in the words of people with real experience, of what prisons and prisoners are really like and why the need for ministry is so great. It then explores the biblical charge for Christians to meet these needs and discusses ways in which they can do so. Love in a Cauldron of Misery is an invaluable resource for any pastor, teacher, or lay-person who is participating in, considering, or just wants to know more about prison ministry.

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This is a book about Christianity in one particular region in Kenya. It walks into churches, listens to sermons, dances to music, and interviews the people sitting in the pews, all with the aim of understanding how spiritual power enables these churches to function as agents within their contemporary society.
Ecclesiastical communities in Africa draw upon divine power in order to engage in modernity-related topics. Humans are not unresponsive to global flows of meaning; they are integrative agents who fashion their world by living in it. The kind of modernity arising from these churches does not blindly follow Western forms, but flows from its own internal logic in which spiritual power occupies central hermeneutical function. Theological resources contribute to the formation of sociological expressions. Divine power pertains directly to human constructs, which then allows the churches to actively «image» God for the development of unique forms of modernity arising on the continent.

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Utilizing resources from Martin Luther and the Lutheran tradition, this study offers an understanding of the gospel as promise as key to addressing the challenge of relating the missio Dei to a generous, constructive approach toward the religious other. In its construction of a Lutheran missiology, it retrieves and reappropriates four resources from the Lutheran tradition: the gospel as promise, the law/gospel distinction, a theology of grace as promise of mercy fulfilled, and a theology of the cross utilizing the hiddenness of God. The law of God as accusing yet webbing humanity to its Creator; the gospel as the comforting promise of mercy; and the hiddenness of God as mystifying form the overarching framework within which the Lutheran missiology presented here seeks to engage the religious other by dialectically relating gospel proclamation and dialogue. Such a view of «mission shaped by promise» offers the paradox of God being both revealed and hidden in the cross as a distinctive contribution to an interreligious dialogue centered on the ambiguity and hiddenness of God.

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