andygoodliff

Book Review: Tradition and the Baptist Academy

Roger A. Ward and Philip E. Thompson (eds.), Tradition and the Baptist Academy (Paternoster, 2011), xviii + 225pp (with thanks to Paternoster for a review copy)

This is the thirty-first volume in the excellent Studies in Baptist History and Thought Series. This important Baptist series is still alive. This latest volume is a set of essays arising from the 2006 conference of Young Scholars in the Baptist Academy, which is based in the United States and where the scholars who participate do not always seem that young! As its title suggests, the topic of the book is that thorny question (for Baptists anyway) of the role and place of tradition - Philip Thompson comments that 'Baptists have made 'a tradition of rejecting tradition (p.58)! The popular Baptist claim to sola scriptura means historically Baptists have appeared either to have been not that sure about tradition or not that bothered. Mark Medley makes the comment in a footnote that from a study of leading American Baptist theologians, past and present, only two - Grenz and McClendon - 'offer constructive theological reflection on tradition' (p.67n.3). He also makes the comment in a previous essay that his theological education spent as little as five minutes on tradition! (p.48n.7) Here it would be interesting to do a comparison with the British and European experience, which I would contend has not been as suspicious or as indifferent to the place and role of tradition (a recent example study would be Stephen Holmes' Listening to the Past, Paternoster, 2001). This set of essays is focused on offering an argument of why tradition is vital to Baptist churches and theology and the claim that Baptists are part of the historic catholic tradition - that while the early Baptists separated ecclesiologically, they did not, in large part, separate theologically. 

After a 'Preface' by Paul Fiddes, which sets the book partly in the contecxt of the recent BWA-Roman Catholic theological conversations (which we await with interest for the published report) and an 'Introduction' by the editors Ward and Thompson (which feels it could have done with some editing - it refers to a paper by Curtis Freeman, not included in the book), we are offered four good papers by leading North American Baptist theologians. Barry Harvey claims Baptists have 'been caught up in alien disciplinary regimes' that have failed to form us as 'citizens of God's pilgrim city in the way of the cross' (pp.8-9). The answer says Harvey is for Baptists to learn again that we are dissenting Catholics: 'fellow travellers with a host of sisters and brothers in a communal way of life' (p.20) and to escape what he calls the 'authorial void', that is, the stress on the individual and soul competency as made each person an authority unto themselves. He wants to encourage Baptists to see how much they have learn from the the catholic tradition and also what they have to offer other communions (p.27).

E. Glenn Hinson, a Baptist historian (and a former student at Regent's Park College) makes the same argument with Harvey that Baptists need to see themselves as part of a larger Christian tradition and have contribution to make. This is followed by exploring how this might happen in Baptist academies. I think a lot of this is directed at the Southern Baptists. From a UK perspective, there is no where near the suspicision of the wider church. We may not always like the way the Church of England sometimes throws its weight around, but there is denying that many Baptists feel a loss with Rowan Williams retiring at the end of the year.

Philip Thompson explores the relationship between memory and tradition and its impact on Baptist identity. (One conversation partner is Charles Pinches' A Gathering of Memories: Family, Nation and Church, which from this and Hauerwas mentioning it in his recent War and the American Difference, I've ordered). The chapter should be seen as building on his earlier work which explored the 'myth of changelessness' in Recycling the Past or Researching History? In this present chapter, Thompson distinguishes between two ways of considering history. While the first way might be characterised by the present controlling the past, where history becomes fictitious, sentimental - 'creates a world its writers wish for but doesn't exist' (p.61), the second way is more 'genuninely critical', its treats the past as strange and other at the same time as being part of our story (p.63). It is the latter he favours, following Rowan Williams, claim that this is 'good history' compared to the former which is 'bad history'.

The final paper of the four is by Mark Medley (a version can also be found in the journal Pro Ecclesia). After describing tradition as it has been understood by two Catholic theologians, Terrence Tilley and John Thiel, Medley makes his own contribution to the practice of tradition, by arguing for the foundational skills of stewardship, interrogation and invention, which are all required if engagement with, and living out of, the Christian tradition is to be done well. Stewardship is about tradtion being received with 'charity and cherishing its wisdom' (p.83), interrogation asks questions of the tradition and calls us 'to think again about the consensus of the tradition' (p.84) - Medley gives the example of interrogating the Baptist claim to soul competency and indepedence. The last skill, invention, perhaps appears incompatible with the practice of tradition, but Medley argues that if tradition is to be kept alive it must also engage invention - in constructive theology - of course the other skills are necessary here to correct unfaithful inventions. Medley pulls the three skills together around the idea of improvisation, borrowed from the work of Sam Wells.

The later essays explore transubstantiation, a theology of beauty, the Barmen declaration, the work of A. T. Robinson, the Regula Fidei and preaching and Baptist baptismal theology.

This is a strong collection of essays. There are some minor editoral niggles, which probably are the result of the book taking a long time from the original conference to publication. It certainly contributes to the wider renewed interest in tradition from Baptists (see the work of Holmes mentioned above, Steven Harmon, D. H. Williams and others) and provides a positive view of tradition not just as that which is handed down, but that which is alive, that which is inevitable (however we strong we disavow it) and that which when engaged with keeps faithful in the present and to the names Baptist', 'catholic' and 'Christian',

Book Review: Learning To Speak Christian | War and the American Difference

Stanley Hauerwas, Learning To Speak Christian (SCM, 2011 published in the United States as Working With Words, Cascade, 2011)

Stanley Hauerwas, War and the American Difference: Theological Reflections on Violence and National Identity (Brazos, 2011 / SPCK, 2012)

At nearly 72, Stanley Hauerwas is still writing and writing a lot. There are thirty-three essays in these two latest books.

Hauerwas suggests Learning To Speak Christian is a 'kitchen sink' type book, meaning it is a collection of essays, sermons and other bits, rather than a sustained chapter by chapter argument developing (so in that regard like lots of his books!). Hauerwas sees the connections between the essays to be around seeing 'theology as work and work with words'. The book is divided into three sections Learning Christian: To See and To Speak; The Language of Love: From Death to Life; and Habits of Speech Exemplified: Some Teachers. As with every Hauerwas book there is much to enjoy and much to be challenged by. Two chapters stand out for me: the address 'Speaking Christian' is wonderful exploration of the task of ministry as teaching people to speak Christian. The chapter 'Why did Jesus have to die?' originated as a lecture to young people on the gospel and makes helpful (and challenging) reading for those engaged in youth ministry of some kind or another.

War and the American Difference is a book, which offers some of Hauerwas' most developed discussion of war and violence, especially in the context of America. The first section demonstrates how closely war is embedded in American history, experience and identity. The second section includes his appeal (co-written with Enda McDonagh) and reflections to abolish war, a discussion of sacrifice in the context of war, and essays on C. S. Lewis and Martin Luther King. The final section explores the role of the church in terms of justice (comparing Daniel Bell and Nicholas Wolterstoff), Pentecost as a language of peace (engaging with Jonathan Sacks and Herbert McCabe - I heard Hauerwas deliver this Amensty International 2008 lecture in Oxford - much easier to follow on paper than at the time!), the common good, the future of parish ministry (be interesting to offer some Baptist reflections on this) and mission (this paper includes a response to Nathan Kerr's criticisms of Hauerwas' ecclesiology).  

The book hangs together much better than Learning to Speak Christian, which makes it an easier and more satisfying read - like Hauerwas' collections of essays on The State of the University. He takes the reader on a journey around a common theme approaching it from different angles. I think this may well become one of Hauerwas' important books. Hauerwas certainly seems to be moving towards an ecclesiology more in engagement than in separation, that is, I wonder if he is now exploring more, as Yoder did, what it means for the church to be for the nations and not just against the nations (the title of his 1985 book). The oft-made claim of sectarianism just won't stick now (not that I think it ever really did).  Hauerwas' friends and students I think ground his work in the everyday life of being church (Sam Wells is the exemplar of this) in ways that answer the question of what does this look like.

I think everyone should read Hauerwas and both these new books give examples of why.

Book Review: The Holy Trinity: Understanding God's Life

Stephen R. Holmes, The Holy Trinity: Understanding God's Life (Paternoster, 2011), 231pp

The Holy Trinity is the first in a new series from Paternoster looking at Christian Doctrines in Historical Perspective. In his introduction Steve Holmes, quoting Chaucer, suggests that this is a 'little book'. It is anything but. At 231 pages it is at least medium-sized book and its content - the history of doctrine of the Trinity - means its a book that covers a large amount of history and ideas. Holmes has recently said in a editorial for the International Journal for Systematic Theology (January 2012) that a lot of theology is about engaging with the history of ideas, that is, its about careful reading of the past and present, rather than doing novel and constructive theology. The Holy Trinity is an excellent example of careful reading.

The book begins with a discussion of the 'revival' of Trinity theology in the twentieth century that was initiated by Barth, Rahner and Zizioulas and developed by Pannenberg, Moltmann, Jenson, Boff and Volf (there are of course others that could be mentioned, e.g. Gunton, Cunningham, Fiddes). Then it travels back in history with chapters on the Trinity in the Bible, in the Early Fathers (Irenaeus, Tertullian, Origen), and then two chapters on the later Fourth-Century (Arius, Athanasius, Cappadocians, John of Damascus), the West and Augustine, the Medieval period (Anselm, Richard of St Victor, Aquinas), followed by a chapter on Anti-Trinitarianism in the period between the Reformation and the Eighteenth century, and then concludes with a final chapter on the doctrine in the last two hundred years (Hegel, Coleridge, Schleiermacher, Hodge, Dorner). 

The book has two aims. First it seeks to provide a book-length (affordable) treatment of the doctrine of the Trinity in the historical tradition. It this way if operates as a textbook for theological students seeking to understand the doctrine's development (perhaps only Paul M. Collin's The Trinity: A Guide for the Perplexed does a similar kind of job). The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity and The Cambridge Companion to the Trinity have recently been published and perhaps Holmes' book should be read alongside these - the obvious strength of Holmes' book being it's price (!) and it is one theologian's reading of the tradition, rather than the multiple author approach of the other books.

Second it argues that rather than the doctrine of the Trinity being recovered in the twentieth century, the doctrine as stated and developed by those coming after Barth offers a departure from the Patristic tradition, that is, a revision. Holmes argues that trinitarian doctrine is largely agreed (there is no East/West Cappadocian/Augustine divide) right up to the eighteenth/nineteenth centuries, that is, theologians restate the earlier tradition. The twentieth century, partly in response to the nineteenth century, does not revive trintiarian doctrine from past (despite its claims), but is doing some different. Holmes does not argue that more recent trinitarian doctrine is wrong or that earlier ages were right. He leaves these questions unanswered.

The doctrine of the Trinity is not the easiest of doctrines (probably true for more than most!), because it can get quite technical in terms of language. Holmes is therefore to be congratulated on providing a help introduction and analysis of how the tradition makes it confession in God as Trinity. He is an able reader of these early and later theologians and presents a compelling case for his main argument. It will surely find its way onto many reading lists. In addition to the text itself, Holmes provides an excellent set of indexes (biblical texts cited, technical terms cited, and index of authors and subjects), which are always welcome to this reader. Having provided this historical study of trinitarian doctrine, we await perhaps a more critical work which explores the theological questions, which this present work does not seek to answer.

Book Review: Presence: Giving and Receiving God

J. Alexander Sider and Isaac S. Villegas, Presence: Giving and Receiving God (Cascade, 2011), 217pp

This is a good book. A treat. A collection of sermons and reflections on scripture from two younger theologians (one - Sider - who got his PhD from Duke under Stanley Hauerwas). I like good preaching. I like to read it as well as hear it. In a week since Driscoll accused the UK of having no good preachers, this book is a reminder that good and faithful preaching is not getting on a big enough stage, getting a name, and a book and a stadium tour, but its about the week to week searching the scriptures, listening to the world, and preaching the word of God. Now Sider and Villegas have a book out, but there will be no accompanying tour and they probably won't sell many copies (although they should!), but what they offer us is theology made real for Chapel Hill Mennonite Fellowship in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. In eight sections (with the headings: hope, communion, desire, power, money, salvation, strangers and conclusion) and thirty-five sermons we are offered theological reflections on the scripture, that open up new avenues of thought (Sider and Villegas lean on the learning and wisdom of Tom Wright, Rowan Williams, Stanley Hauerwas and Herbert McCabe and also Barth, Bonheoffer, Luther, and many others) and sometimes remind us again of why we need to hear an old thought again.

The introduction challenged me with the Mennonite practice of the congregation responding after the preacher has returned to his 'pew'. 'The congregation is asked to discern whether or not the gospel was preached, and if it was indeed preached, then to discern what this gospel many mean for our lives' (viii). The sermons we are offered them present us with the scripture, but leave some, if not a lot, of work for the congregation to ask what this means (the preacher doesn't overdo the application). I like that kind of preaching, its what I think preaching should be.

Food for the soul and another example of why Wipf & Stock (with their 3 imprints, of which Cascade is one) are publishing some of the best theology out there.

 

New Books on the Shelf

Anne Phillips, The Faith of Girls: Children's Spirituality and Transition into Adulthood (Explorations in Practical, Pastoral and Empirical Theology; Ashgate, 2011)

This is a revised version of Phillips PhD dissertation. It is a study of the faith and spirituality of girls aged 11-13, an area ignored. Building on the work of the likes Nicola Slee (Women's Faith Development), Phillips listens to the voices of young girls in conversation with current psychological, philosophical and sociological thinking and contemporary theological and biblical scholarship. One of the bits I really like about the book is the discussions of the few biblical passages which include girls at the beginning of several of the chapters. This is an important study. It is, as often the case with published dissertations, fairly academic, which may put some readers off (unfortunately along with the price - a paperback version would be must welcome), but it is worth perserving with. My only dissapointment is that must of the comment and discussion about Baptists has been removed. Phillips is a Baptist minister and Co-Principal of Northern Baptist Learning Community. I hope Phillips shares her work more broadly within Baptist structures.

Doug Gay, Remixing the Church: Towards an Emerging Ecclesiology (SCM, 2011)

This is a very welcome book and out just in time for Greenbelt. I've been looking forward to the book since Gay gave a seminar at Greenbelt a few years back outlining the major argument. Where so much of the emerging church conversation seems to be dominated by the United States, this is a helpful study from a UK perspective. Remixing the Church picks up 'five moves' of an emerging ecclesiology: auditing, retrieval, unbundling, supplementing, and remixing. In this Gay tells the story of how alternative worship and emerging church developed, setting it in the wider conversations that have been taking place over the last fifty years in worship, mission, church and culture and church and politics. This provides some academic rigour and helpful maps what the emerging church is all about and the reasons behind it. The book is partly a defence of the emerging church, but without agression and with a desire to help people understand what the emerging church has and is doing. The book is also wanting to be a positive contribution to those primarily involved and those outside the emerging church to what the this remixed church and worship has to offer the future of the Christian church. One slightly annoying feature is in places it is fairly repetitive regarding certain books, in particular After Our Likeness by Volf and With the Grain of the Universe by Hauerwas.

James B. Krabill and Stuart Murray (eds.), Forming Christian Habits in Post-Christendom: The Legacy of Alan and Eleanor Kreider (Hearld Press, 2011)

This is a fairly gentle book that has collected over forty different friends of Alan and Eleanor Kreider to reflect on their theology and witness around the themes of mission, community and worship. I say gentle because it is largely uncritical and unacademic and lots of the contributors tell stories (this is intentional as the editors explain in their chapter). This makes the book an easy read and is also a good example of embodied theology. However, I had also hoped for something that wrestled a little more deeply and critically with the Kreiders. The theme of the book, as the title suggests, Forming Christian Habits in Post-Christendom, is most apt in terms of what the Kreiders are about and the current conversation in the church around habits and practices (see Wells and Hauerwas, The Blackwell Companion to Christian Ethics; James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom; and Dorothy Bass and Craig Dykstra, Practicing Our Faith). 

Book Review: Prayers of the People

Karen E. Smith and Simon P. Woodman (eds.), Prayers of the People (Regent's Park College, 2011)

In 2005 the Baptist Union published Gathering for Worship: Patterns and Prayers for the Community of Disciples edited by Chris Ellis and Myra Blyth. This was a fantastic collections of liturgies for communion, baptism, marriages, funerals, etc, plus a section of prayers for general worship. In more recent years, I've silently hoped that there might be a sequel which included a wider range of prayers for worship. In this collection edited by Smith and Woodman, that need is fulfilled. Pulling together nearly a hundred contributors - so a wide range of voices (reflecting the diverse traditions that Baptists draw on) - the book offers prayers of gathering, adoration, confession,  thanksgiving, petition, intercession, sending out, prayers for liturgical seasons and prayers for special services. The book will quickly find its place on my shelf - and hopefully many more - next to Gathering for Worship as resource in planning worship. 

Paul Fiddes provides a helpful introduction on the theology of public prayer around themes of inspiration and sincerity, divine dialogue, divine dance, intercession and prayers written and spontaneous. Another inclusion that I liked was each chapter begins with some short quotes from Baptists on prayer, which demonstrates we have said quite a lot! Too much public prayer in Baptist worship is poor - sadly more often than not at the Baptist Assembly (on which can I cheekily suggest each worship leader is given a copy of Prayers of the People) - in that it lacks shape and depth. Prayers that are prepared or borrowed can provide worship with a more intentional shape and help form the particular prayer lives of those gathered. Good prayer teaches us how to pray freely - so this book gives lots of examples of thoughtful and theological prayer which will enrich the church.

The book is also in honour of John Weaver on his retirement from Principal of South Wales Baptist College. While the usual festschrift of collected essays is also an interesting read (see recent collections in honour of Nigel Wright and Brian Haymes), Prayers of the People I think will make a long lasting contribution to Baptist life and worship, in both its accessibility and its practical usage, and for that reason it a fitting tribute to John Weaver who has sort to be a practical theologian of the church.

I do have a few quibbles - the chapters of prayers of sending out is pretty sparse compared to the other chapters, which perhaps reflects we struggle to end worship well (something I'm planning a short paper on for the hearts and minds conference) and it would have been nice to see some prayers of illiumination before scripture is read or sermon is preached, which reflects another concern of mine that we don't acknowledge that reading of scripture is a key moment in worship.

At £10 don't miss this bargain. It will be well used.

Book Review: New Monasticism as Fresh Expression of Church

Graham Cray, Ian Mobsby and Aaron Kennedy (eds.), New Monasticism as Fresh Expression of Church (Canterbury Press, 2010), 155pp

This is the second in a new series called 'Ancient Faith, Future Mission' from Canterbury Press, which is bringing together some of those involved in Fresh Expressions, to tell something of their story and reflections from it. The first book was Fresh Expressions in the Sacramental Tradition (2009) and there is a third book - Fresh Expressions and the Kingdom of God due out later this year. The series is not critical, but looking to the positives and wanting to collect some of the experiences of recent years. For a more critical examination of 'Fresh Expressions' see Evaluating Fresh Expressions:explorations in emerging church (Canterbury Press, 2008) and For the Parish: A Critique of Fresh Expressions (SCM, 2010).

This is the first book I've read on the New Monasticism, although I've been interested from afar, and have since also got myself a copy of School(s) of Conversion: 12 Marks of the New Monasticism, which is a study from a solely United States perspective. The strength of the book under review here is its collection of British voices - Ian Adams (MayBe, Oxford), Pete Askew (Northumbria Community), Mark Berry (Safespace, Telford), Andy Freeman (24-7 Prayer), Ian Mobsby (Moot, London), amongst others - although they are all coming out of an Anglican context. Shane Claiborne and Tom Sine appear as American voices. Claiborne's contribution is a summary of the 12 Marks of the New Monasticism referred to above, while Sine sets the new monasticism in a more historical context.

For the uninitiated, the New Monasticism is a collection of groups of Christians attempting to live out their discipleship with a stronger sense of community and shared worship and prayer life, sometimes with a common rule, not apart from the world in a monastery, but very much in the different urban contexts in which they find themselves. In some cases, like Mark Berry in Telford, this has a very missional focus, in other cases, its a desire for a rhythm of worship and prayer, and in others, a living in and amongst the poor.

This short book is a good place to start for those wanting to engage with the New Monasticism, both those just wanting to have some sense of what it all is, and those who maybe wanting to explore new monasticism in their own contexts.

Book Review: Questions of Identity

Anthony R. Cross and Ruth Gouldbourne (eds.), Questions of Identity: Studies in Honour of Brian Haymes (Centre for Baptist History and Heritage Studies Vol. 6; Regent's Park College, 2011), 272pp

This is an excellent set of essays written in honour of the Baptist theologian Brian Haymes. Gathered together are a range of Baptist voices, as well as a Mennonite in the form of Alan Kreider and an Anglican in Chris Rowland.

Here's a flavour of what you can find. John Colwell's essay builds on his contribution to Nigel Wright's FS and further tests the Baptist belief in freedom of conscience. Paul Fiddes historically shows the Baptist involvement in the founding of University College London and explores the role of academic theology in the church. Nigel Wright attempts to build on the atonement debate following Chalk-gate. Sean Winter offers a study of 2 Cor 5.20, which in some ways is a promising taster of a larger piece of work he is doing on 2 Corinthians. Steve Holmes offers some rare, but welcome thoughts on the practice of church meetings - by rare I mean, although Baptists like to moan about church meetings, in recent times they have offered little in the way of constructive contributions to their renewal and their practice.

The collection demonstrates that Baptist theology has come a long way since Haymes short essay on A Question of Identity in 1986. While we don't - and dare say ever will - have the depth of theologians like the Church of England, we do have a number of theologians working on creative, interesting theology, which serves the church, as can be seen in this collection. The question of identity for Baptists will be whether we as churches are willing to listen and engage as we seek to be faithful to the Baptist way of being church. A good place to start would be to read this book, which is a fitting tribute to Brian and his theology.

Book Review: Gods Behaving Badly by Pete Ward

Pete Ward, Gods Behaving Badly: Media, Religion and Celebrity Culture (SCM, 2011), 163pp (with thanks to SCM for a review copy)

Pete Ward began his academic career writing about Christian youthwork (for example, Worship and Youth Culture, 1993; Growing Up Evangelical, 1996; Youthwork and the Mission of God, 1997),but more recently as branched out into cultural studies and its relationship to church, worship and theology (Liquid Church, 2002; Selling Worship, 2005; Participation and Mediation, 2008). This latest book is a study of celebrity culture and its similiarities to religion and its use of religious language.

Ward, here and in previous work, has a positive view of culture as something with which the church should engage and embrace. So the argument of Liquid Church claims that the church should embrace a more consumer-shaped and fluid way of being church reflecting the shape of contemporary culture. Selling Worship is a study of the contemporary worship music industry, which does not seek to be overly critical. While his most ambitious work to date, Participation and Mediation argues that church needs to pay attention to the way it participates in, and is mediated by, cultural expression.

God's Behaving Badly has five chapters, the first describing the pheonoma of celebrity worship. The second develops this through the concept of 'representation', which argues that around celebrities, the media is 'mean-making' - celebrities begin to represent certain dreams, lifestyles, desires and in fact are only celebrities because the media determine (represent) them as such. So Ward says 'celebrity images and stories present possibilities, ways of being human, of being individuals' (p.54). The third chapter examines how celebrity worship 'is a kind of religion, or at least has religious elements' (p.57). Ward uses the term 'para-religion'. Chapters four and five, explore what kind of gods celebrities are - their attributes, and the use of theological language - sin, heaven, judgement, revelation, redemption, etc.

This is largely a descriptive piece of work, which is important - it's the first study I know if its kind - but the implications, for example, what does this mean for the church's mission, are generally left unexplored and open for further research and reflection. What emerges from the book is the pervasiveness of this para-religion of celebrity and the need to take it seriously.

 

Book Review: Unsettling Arguments

Charles R. Pinches, Kelly S. Johnson and Charles M. Collier (eds.), Unsettling Arguments: A Festschrift on the Occasion of Stanley Hauerwas's 70th Birthday (Cascade, 2010), 356pp

There are few (if any?) theologians who are honoured with three festschrifts in their lifetime, but then Hauerwas is no ordinary theologian. In 2000, a group of British theologians (Forrester, Gunton, Milbank, Biggar, Loades, Woodhead, Wells, Nation) contributed to Faithfulness and Fortitude (T & T Clark, 2000). Five years later Hauerwas was honoured again with a collection edited by L. Gregory Jones and others, God, Truth and Witness (Brazos, 2005), with essays from the likes of Jenson, Bellah, Lindebeck, Burrell and Wannenwetsch. This latest collection on Hauerwas' 70th birthday are a group of essays from his graduate students, some of which are already established theological voices - Cavanaugh, Long, Cartwright, Shuman, Bader-Saye, McCarthy, and Bell, while others are newer voices emerging - J. Alexander Sider, Peter Dula, Jonathan Tran, Chris K. Huebner and Kelly S. Johnson.

While previous festschrifts have included both essays which directly engaged with Hauerwas and others less so, every chapter of Unsettling Arguments is a conversation between Hauerwas' theology and the criticisms made of him. This makes for a fantastic book as Hauerwas' own theology is dissected on issues such as race, bioethics, war, friendship, democracy, Judaism, family, feminism, higher education, discipleship, worship, reading, as well as the influences of Wittgenstein, Aquinas, Scotus and Yoder. Immediately one recognises the breath of topics that Hauerwas has addressed over his long career.       

The person new to Hauerwas would do well to start elsewhere (e.g. The Hauerwas Reader, The Peaceable Kingdom, A Community of Character or After Christendom?), but those who have some knowledge of the shape and content of Hauerwas' many writings, are in for a treat with this book, as his former students open up his theology in ways that both challenge it and push it to new places.  In many of the essays we get glimpses of the way Hauerwas teaches and helps produce such interesting dissertations from his students - in this way the book perhaps works well as a companion to Hauerwas' memoir Hannah's Child, especially the emphasis in that book on friendship. These are students turned friends, but friends who are happy to question and pick away at the positions and the arguments of their teacher. I come away from this book feeling their is much to learn not only from Hauerwas' theology, but also his way of doing theology in community. As Sam Wells puts it on the back cover:

Stanley Hauerwas is a public provocateur, a ravenous reader, a restless wrestler with the truth, and an eccentric devotee of baseball, murder mysteries, and liturgically-shaped discipleship. But most of all is he is a devoted, demanding, and dogged academic father to dozens of doctoral students. The breadth of his character takes a community to display. Here, more than ever before, that community of character does in public what Hauerwas and his students do best: tussle, and refine, and introduce new interlocutors, and dismiss out of hand, and rephrase more charitably, and rediscover ancient wisdom, and go back to Aquinas, and quote Barth, and dismantle platitudes, and unsentimentally face the gift and demands of Christ for church, academy, and politics today. This is a work of love turned into a call to renewal, a family reunion transformed into a symposium, a tribute in the guise of a challenge. Admirers and critics of Hauerwas will be enriched by these compelling essays, an ordered array of disagreements in love.