In this masterful analysis of the religious and political dilemmas at the end of the modern age, world-renowned theologian J rgen Moltmann assays the vaulting dreams and colossal failures of our time. He asks how we came to this point, and he argues strenuously for Christian discipleship and public theology that take sides. In both critical and creative ways he advances the specific relevance of Christian messianic hope to today's thorniest political, economic, and ecological questions-including human rights, environmental rights, globalization, market capitalism, fundamentalisms, and Jewish-Christian relations-and the deeper values contested therein.In a world reeling between utopia and disaster, Moltmann here passionately and provacatively shows how Christian discipleship, through engagement and solidarity, can blaze a redemptive path.

For the first time in human history, a significant percentage of the world's population no longer believes in God. This is especially true in developed nations, where in some societies nonbelievers now outnumber believers. Unless religion collapses completely, or undergoes a remarkable resurgence, countries across the globe must learn to carefully and effectively manage this societal mix of religious and irreligious. For in a world already deeply riven by sectarian conflict, this unprecedented demographic shift presents yet another challenge to humanity. Writing in an engaging, accessible style, philosopher and lawyer Ronald A. Lindsay develops a tightly crafted argument for secularism—specifically, that in a religiously pluralistic society, a robust, thoroughgoing secularism is the only reliable means of preserving meaningful democracy and rights of conscience. Contrary to certain political pundits and religious leaders who commonly employ the term secularism as a scare word, Lindsay uses clear, concrete examples and jargon-free language to demonstrate that secularism is the only way to ensure equal respect and protection under the law—for believers and nonbelievers alike. Although critical of some aspects of religion, Lindsay neither presents an antireligious tirade nor seeks to convert anyone to nonbelief, reminding us that secularism and atheism are not synonymous. Rather, he shows how secularism works to everyone's benefit and makes the definitive case that the secular model should be feared by none—and embraced by all.!--?xml:namespace prefix = "o" ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /--

An updated edition showcasing the social health of the least religious nations in the world Religious conservatives around the world often claim that a society without a strong foundation of faith would necessarily be an immoral one, bereft of ethics, values, and meaning. Indeed, the Christian Right in the United States has argued that a society without God would be hell on earth. In Society without God, Second Edition sociologist Phil Zuckerman challenges these claims. Drawing on fieldwork and interviews with more than 150 citizens of Denmark and Sweden, among the least religious countries in the world, he shows that, far from being inhumane, crime-infested, and dysfunctional, highly secular societies are healthier, safer, greener, less violent, and more democratic and egalitarian than highly religious ones. Society without God provides a rich portrait of life in a secular society, exploring how a culture without faith copes with death, grapples with the meaning of life, and remains content through everyday ups and downs. This updated edition incorporates new data from recent studies, updated statistics, and a revised Introduction, as well as framing around the now more highly developed field of secular studies. It addresses the dramatic surge of irreligion in the United States and the rise of the “nones,” and adds data on societal health in specific US states, along with fascinating context regarding which are the most religious and which the most secular.

Many lay people in the Christian churches have not been kept up to date with the latest scholarship about their faith._ Many have left the churches because a faith expressed in ancient mythological language and images no longer seems credible in our postmodern, secular, scientific world. God, Ethics and the Secular Society not only re-examines Christian faith in terms of the best contemporary scholarship, and its relationship to modern scientific knowledge, but shows how one can re-interpret the faith without losing its essential and original meaning. It suggests that the critical question is not what we believe, but how we should live, and it sets out a new form for the life of the church, if it is to survive into the future. Consequently Gunson hopes that many people of good will, who have no interest in religion, may also want to join this ethical community, to help nurture and prosecute the ethical life in a desperately needy world.

Are lawyers, by their very nature, agents of the state, of capital, of institutions of power? Or are there ways in which they can work constructively or transformatively for the disempowered, the working class, the underprivileged? Lawyers in a Postmodern World explores how lawyers actively create the forms of power which they and others deploy. Through engaging case studies, the book examines how lawyers work within and for powerful institutions and provides suggestions--both general and practical--for ways in which the practice of law can be made to work with and for the powerless. Individuals chapters address such subjects as the contradictions of radical law practice; legal work in South Africa; the economics and politics of negotiating justice; feminist legal scholarship and women's gendered lives; the overlapping worlds of law, business, and politics; theories of legal practice; and how lawyers are constitutive of gender relations. Contributing to the book are Maureen Cain (University of West Indies), Yves Dezalay (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France), Martha Fineman (Columbia University), Sue Lees (University of North London), Doreen McBarnet (Wolfson College, Oxford), Frank Munger (SUNY, Buffalo), Wilfried Scharf (University of Cape Town), Stuart Scheingold (University of Washington), David Sugarman (Lancaster University), and Sally Wheeler (University of Nottingham).

Conservative religious figures routinely warn against the dangers of secularization, just as proponents of the modern secular state decry the theocratic tendencies of religion. Both sides assume that the sacred and the secular are diametrically opposed. Gabriel Vahanian rightly calls such misbegotten assumptions into question. The problem lies elsewhere. In the light of the biblical dialectic of holiness and the secular, Praise of the Secular deftly "vindicates" the secular, weaving together philosophy, history, and theology in fine Derridean, yet reinforced, deconstructionist fashion. Vahanian argues that religion, far from being opposed to the secular, finds its fulfillment in the secular world. Armed with a compelling interpretation of Christ's incarnation, he claims that "we have not grasped John's notion of the word become flesh, even of God as wording, until or unless we realize it must so expand as to demand the worlding of that very word, extending it into secular relevance." In other words the holy, if not the sacred, demands its own secularization. In this poetically written and profoundly life-affirming work, Vahanian reinvigorates the secular against the claims of fundamentalism, which makes the relative absolute, and against the ideology of a kind of atheism ("secularism" is his term), which makes the absolute relative.

"It's hard to be the only one." That single sentence from a teenage congregant sums up the conviction that motivated Christian Theology for a Secular Society. In these dying days of Christendom, the reality that most Western Christians face is living out their faith as a minority in the midst of a culture that is at every level--personal, institutional, and societal--secular in nature. While most living in Western societies still affirm belief in God and often other vaguely recognizable Christian beliefs, these affirmations frequently have little to do with how daily life is lived. The idea that the God best known to us in Jesus Christ is actually in charge of life is foreign. For most, Christianity simply does not form an overarching system of meaning that shapes life. Instead, life is lived largely without reference to God. And to live any other way is often "hard." In this volume, Mark McKim sets out to "do" theology in this context. How does one explain the core historic Christian doctrines in a way that makes sense in a secular culture--and in a way that will gain a hearing? What does it mean to be the church in this new situation? Throughout, McKim asks the question, so what? as he relates Christian teachings to a secular society and to what is actually happening in the local church. McKim's goal is to enable the singing of the Lord's song in the new and strange land of a secular society.

After 2000 years of ascendency the Christian Churches are in terminal decline.This book is a brilliant summary of what most Christians (and their clergy) don't know about Christian faith, yet ought to know, before it is too late.The best contemporary Biblical scholarship clearly shows that Jesus of Nazareth had a very different understanding of his life and mission from that of his disciples and of the institution that followed. As Jesus (rather than his disciples) is at the heart of Christian faith, then since he did not believe that he was Son of God and Saviour, the disciples and the church must be wrong.For the church then, it's time for a rethink. This book tells you how.