In addition to updated demographic information, Clendenin examines at length a particular aspect of Orthodoxy's intersection with Protestantism—its growing exchange with evangelicalism.

    All human beings, knowingly or not, minister as priests to one another. All of us, knowingly or not, receive priestly ministrations from one another. Unless we begin here, we are not likely to understand the confusions and uncertainties and opportunities we have been encountering in the life of the church itself in recent years. We shall be in danger, in fact, of creating makeshift solutions to half-understood problems, easy answers to misleading questions, temporary bandages for institutions that need to be healed from the ground up. - L. William Countryman There is a lot of tension in churches today about whose ministry is primary-that of the laity or of the clergy. L. William Countryman argues that we can only resolve that problem by seeing that we are all priests simply by virtue of being human and living, as we all do, on the mysterious and uncertain border with the Holy. Living on the Border of the Holy offers a way of understanding the priesthood of the whole people of God and the priesthood of the ordained in complementary ways by showing how both are rooted in the fundamental priestly nature of human life. After an exploration of the ministry of both laity and ordained, Countryman concludes by examining the implications of this view of priesthood for churches and for educating those studying for ordination.

    Some Christians have responded to this trend with fear and derision, while some Pagans have reacted to that fear with anger and mistrust. Much of the problem is due to misunderstandings and lack of communication. This can change with Gus diZerega's "Pagans & Christians." Here you will find a penetrating and illuminating comparison, showing that neither path has the single correct approach to the Divine. Rather, either or both can be authentic and legitimate expressions of the appreciation of the Ultimate Source of All. "Pagans & Christians" is an ideal way to help bridge what at time seems a wide chasm between Christian and Pagan beliefs. By sharing core ideas of both paths, this book provides a way to give deeper mutual understanding and unity among the religions of the world. Although "Pagans & Christians" accepts both paths as valid, the book provides a more in-depth explanation of Paganism o  the minority religion because in some ways, Paganism demands a greater defense and explanation of its beliefs and ideas to dispel misunderstandings. The author is a Third Degree Gardenerian Elder and in "Pagans & Christians" has presented nothing less than a brilliant defense of Paganism, clearly showing how it should stand beside all of the major religions of the world as an equal. As part of this defense, diZerega gives a listing of biblical contradictions and Christian philosophical difficulties which can help any Pagan responding to a negative attack, and will help any Christian to view his or her religion as a way, not the way. Winner of the 2001 Coalition of Visionary Resources (COVR) Award for Best Non-fiction Book

    In the light of new knowledge and the ever-increasing interest in African religions, this popular introduction has now been revised and updated to include:a section on African proverbs, showing the religious and ethical insights handed down through oral tradition; new photographs reflecting the spread of African religions across the African continent; and a fully expanded reading list.

    The main worldviews each tend to stress a different central question. Secular humanism focuses on: What is the inherent value of human beings? Pantheism emphasizes: How do we escape suffering? Islam's main concern is: How is God great? Abdu Murray digs deeply into these three representatives of major worldviews of our day: secular humanism, pantheism and theism (specifically in the form of Islam). This lawyer and former Muslim brings compassion, understanding and clarity to his analysis, comparing the answers of each view to the central message of Christianity.

    In fact, 95% of Americans believe in God--a level of agreement rarely seen in American life. The greatest divisions in America are not between atheists and believers, or even between people of different faiths. What divides us, this groundbreaking book shows, is how we conceive of God and the role He plays in our daily lives.America's Four Gods draws on the most wide-ranging, comprehensive, and illuminating survey of American's religious beliefs ever conducted to offer a systematic exploration of how Americans view God. Paul Froese and Christopher Bader argue that many of America's most intractable social and political divisions emerge from religious convictions that are deeply held but rarely openly discussed. Drawing upon original survey data from thousands of Americans and a wealth of in-depth interviews from all parts of the country, Froese and Bader trace America's cultural and political diversity to its ultimate source--differing opinions about God. They show that regardless of our religious tradition (or lack thereof), Americans worship four distinct types of God: The Authoritative God--who is both engaged in the world and judgmental; The Benevolent God--who loves and helps us in spite of our failings; The Critical God--who catalogs our sins but does not punish them (at least not in this life); and The Distant God--who stands apart from the world He created. The authors show that these four conceptions of God form the basis of our worldviews and are among the most powerful predictors of how we feel about the most contentious issues in American life.Accessible, insightful, and filled with the voices of ordinary Americans discussing their most personal religious beliefs, America's Four Gods provides an invaluable portrait of how we view God and therefore how we view virtually everything else.

    For many years Powers's nearly 600-page Introduction to Tibetan Buddhism has served as the field's most authoritative and comprehensive overview of Tibet's distinctive Buddhist tradition. A Concise Introduction to Tibetan Buddhism explains the core Buddhist doctrines and the practices of meditation and tantra and provides a survey of the four main schools of Tibetan Buddhism.

    

    And because of modern medicine, many of us don't often see death up close. That makes it easy to live as if death is someone else's problem. It isn't.Ignoring the certainty of death doesn't protect us from feeling its effects throughout the lives we're living now. But this avoidance can hold us back from experiencing the powerful, everyday relevance of Jesus's promises to us. So long as death remains remote and unreal, Jesus's promises will too.But honesty about death brings hope to life. That's the ironic claim at the heart of this book. Cultivating "death-awareness" helps us bring the promises of Jesus from the hazy clouds of some other world into the everyday problems of our world--where they belong.

    It differs from moral philosophy in that biblical ethics is distinctively Christian, and it is more specific than Christian ethics proper because it specifically focuses upon the application of the moral law -- as it is revealed in Scripture -- to daily living. Introduction to Biblical Ethics explains the nature, relevancy, coherency, and structure of the moral law as revealed throughout the Bible. In addition to covering the foundational elements of biblical ethics, major issues investigated in this volume include: different types of law in Scripture, the relationship between the law and the gospel, and issues related to the prospect of conflicting moral absolutes. Additionally, after a discussion of ethical methodology, and using the Ten Commandments as a moral rubric, author David W. Jones explores the place of the moral law in the lives of believers. In the final chapters, the events surrounding the giving of the Decalogue are surveyed, and the application of each of the Ten Commandments to Christian living is explored.

    It is also a study of gender, that is, a study of how sex roles and possibilities are conceptualized by both men and women, even though asymmetric power relationships and men's greater access to knowledge have informed the cultural construction of categories such as "male" and "female," "heretic" and "saint." Finally, these essays are about the creativity of women's voices and women's bodies.Bynum discusses how some women manipulated the dominant tradition to free themselves from the burden of fertility, yet made female fertility a powerful symbol; how some used Christian dichotomies of male / female and powerful / weak to facilitate their own imitatio Christi, yet undercut these dichotomies by subsuming them into humanitas. Medieval women spoke little of inequality and little of gender, yet there is a profound connection between their symbols and communities and the twentieth-century determination to speak of gender and "study women."

    Drawing from the best in both classical and contemporary discussions, the authors examine religious experience, faith and reason, theistic arguments, the problem of evil, Reformed epistemology, miracles, and religious language. They also treat subjects not often included in competing texts, such as process theism, religious pluralism, religion and science, and the relationship between religion and morality. The third edition retains the engaging style and thorough coverage of previous editions and also takes into account the latest contributions in the field by such thinkers as Plantinga, Alston, Martin, Murphy, Dembski, M. Adams, and Swinburne. Integrating a variety of perspectives, it adds a chapter on the openness of God debate, several sections on feminist concerns, and frequent comparisons of how Eastern religions compare with Western theism. A sophisticated yet accessible introduction, Reason and Religious Belief, 3/e is ideally suited for use with the authors' companion anthology, Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings, 2/e (OUP, 2000).

    Plus introductions to UU history, religious education and social justice.Praise for Welcome: A Unitarian Universalist Primer:"A thoughtful and spirit-filled introduction to our liberating and nourishing faith." Rob M. Hardies, senior minister, All Souls Church, Unitarian, Washington, DC“This Primer is precisely what a newcomer needs: a brief, lucid history; commonly used readings and prayers; and inspirational quotations that indicate something of our theological diversity and devotion to justice.” Marilyn Sewell, senior minister, First Unitarian Church, Portland, Oregon

    Peeling away notions of a rigid pre-modern Islamic gender system, Afsaneh Najmabadi provides a compelling demonstration of the centrality of gender and sexuality to the shaping of modern culture and politics in Iran and of how changes in ideas about gender and sexuality affected conceptions of beauty, love, homeland, marriage, education, and citizenship. She concludes with a provocative discussion of Iranian feminism and its role in that country's current culture wars. In addition to providing an important new perspective on Iranian history, Najmabadi skillfully demonstrates how using gender as an analytic category can provide insight into structures of hierarchy and power and thus into the organization of politics and social life.

    He carefully opens the literature of the books, sketching a narrative filled with historical realism but also bursting with an awareness that more than human action is being presented.