andygoodliff

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). 

Creating a list of Baptist 'saints' 2

I have discovered the idea of creating a list of Baptist saints - those exemplars of the Christian life - has been floating around for a while. See Steve Harmon's Towards Baptist Catholicty mentioned in the last post, to which we can also add Steve Holmes' Listening to the Past (Paternoster, 2002), John Colwell's The Rhythm of Doctrine (Paternoster, 2007) and Brian Haymes, Ruth Gouldbourne and Anthony R. Cross' On Being the Church (Paternoster, 2008). All of these theologians argue for the importance in some form or another of the doctrine of the communion of the saints.

Let me quote from On Being the Church, which I think helpfully says what our aim might be in creating some kind of list:

Baptists and others might well look again at the importance of this doctrine. The communion of the saints refers to all who share the holy life in Christ. Some are special exemplars whose lives should not be forgotten, especially the martyrs. Others might be unknown to the majority but honoured by the local congregation and God as those through whom the light of Christ shone. The saints given us insights into gospel living. They remind us that the church is  great than our local congregation, thus expanding our understanding of the church. They are gifts of God to us, helping us on the journey of faith. In Christ we are one, sharing companionship in life and death.

All this might prompt us to review our tradition of keeping the local church anniversary as a time for reflection and memory. We could also look to recall the saints in the great Christian tradition whose story inspires and helps us to understand what following Christ today might mean. There are Baptists of the past whom it would not be wise to forget, such as Thomas Helwys, Dorothy Hazzard, William Carey, William Knibb, Marianne Farningham, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Martin Luther King Jr. Recalling these and others is to be reminded of the gracious work of God in human lives. it is to hear again the call in Christ to be saints (pp.44-45)

As Keith Jones written on the IBTS community blog (and I quickly realised following the initial comments to that post): 'How are we to get this right ? I think Steve and Andy will struggle to compile a global, acceptable list (too few theologians? not enough women? who on earth where they?)'.  I think part of my response to this is to recognise that maybe listls will be created locally, although with some names of those names, which remind us and challenge us from other parts of the world. Most of the names that were offered in the comments of the previous post are entirely unknown to me (although not unimportant). My hope is where ever this discussion goes as Baptists locally, nationally and globally we might remember the lives of those 'saints' whose life and witness have meant that the Baptist way of being church has continued.

New annual Colin Gunton Lecture

I have just heard that the theology department at King's College London are recognising the huge contribution that Colin made to theology at King's and organising an annual public lecture dedicated to his memory and work. The first one will be on the 20th September and will feature Professor Alan Torrance, as well as a number of other papers. More information will be available I imagine from the department's website in due course. I'm gutted that I will miss it this year as I will be in India, but hopefully some or all it will be either recorded or subsequently published.

Baptist theology conference

I'm looking forward to the hearts and minds: baptists doing theology in context conference at Regent's Park College in a few weeks time (post-Greenbelt), where I'm giving a short paper (still to write!) on the 'end' of worship. Other papers look good. This will be the first gathering of this type since 2008 and its got a new feel to it this time being in partnership with the BU and BMS. Steve Holmes and Cathy Ross are the plenary speakers.

Creating a list of Baptist 'saints'

So I was reading a review earlier today of The Origin of Feasts, Fasts and Seasons which will appear in the next issue of Regent's Reviews and then this post by Steve Harmon got me thinking who might appear on a list of Baptist 'saints' - who might we want to recognise for the contribution they have made to life and mission of the church. This would be a supplement to the names of other Christians from other traditions. It might certainly help do some Baptist history in our churches. This is an idea floated by Steve in his book Towards Baptist Catholicity where he says 'Baptist congregations might be able to include in their own weekly worship a few moments for telling stories of men and women who have provided worthy examples of lives lived in the service of God and humanity' (p.170). BMS this year have created some resources to celebrate 250 yrs since the birth of William Carey (Carey Sunday is 21 August), which is a start.

Here's my starter for ten ...

31 January Charles Haddon Spurgeon

23 February   George Beasley-Murray

16 March Marianne Farningham

4 April Martin Luther King

7 May   Andrew Fuller

9 June   William Carey

28 August   John Smyth

30 October   James McClendon

... who else should be added and give us a date?

I'm not sure where to put Thomas Helwys as we don't know when he died.

Two-Day Conference in London with Douglas Campbell

Not to be missed!

Beyond Old and New Perspectives on Paul
A two-day conference critically engaging with Douglas Campbell’s proposals in
The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul

Venue: King’s College London
Dates: Friday 16th and Saturday 17th December 2011
(Daily schedule runs 10 am-5:45 pm)

Major papers by Alan Torrance (St Andrews University), Chris Tilling (St Mellitus College), Eddie Adams (King’s College London) and Douglas Campbell (Duke University, North Carolina)

Respondents to include Graham Tomlin, David Hilborn and Robin Griffith-Jones

Participants in plenary to include Richard Bauckham; Jeremy Begbie, and Richard Burridge
(All sessions will include full plenary discussion)

See here.