Do you value reason, science, and independent thinking, yet you hope there could be a greater purpose to the universe? Beginning with his own story of losing the belief in any ultimate purpose in life, philosopher Joshua Rasmussen builds a bridge to faith. Using only the instruments of reason and common experience, Rasmussen constructs a pathway that he argues can lead to meaning and, ultimately, a vision of God.

Since Oxford University Press's publication in 2000 of Michael Emerson and Christian Smith's groundbreaking study, Divided by Faith (DBF), research on racialized religion has burgeoned in a variety of disciplines in response to and in conversation with DBF. This conversation has moved outsideof sociological circles; historians, theologians, and philosophers have also engaged the central tenets of DBF for the purpose of contextualizing, substantiating, and in some cases, contesting the book's findings. In a poll published in January 2012, nearly 70% of evangelical churches professed adesire to be racially and culturally diverse. Currently, only around 8% of them have achieved this multiracial status. To an unprecedented degree, evangelical churches in the United States are trying to overcome the deep racial divides that persist in their congregations. Not surprisingly, many of these evangelicals have turned to DBF for solutions. The essays in Christians and the Color Line complicate the researchfindings of Emerson and Smith's study and explore new areas of research that have opened in the years since DBF's publication. The book is split into two sections. The chapters in the first section consider the history of American evangelicalism and race as portrayed in DBF. In the second sectionthe authors pick up where DBF left off, and discuss how American churches could ameliorate the problem of race in their congregations while also identifying problems that can arise from such attempted amelioration.

A challenge to the doctrine of biblical inerrancy that calls into question how Christians are taught more about the way of Whiteness than the way of Jesus Angela Parker wasn’t just trained to be a biblical scholar; she was trained to be a White male biblical scholar. She is neither White nor male. Dr. Parker’s experience of being taught to forsake her embodied identity in order to contort herself into the stifling construct of Whiteness is common among American Christians, regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation. This book calls the power structure behind this experience what it is: White supremacist authoritarianism. Drawing from her perspective as a Womanist New Testament scholar, Dr. Parker describes how she learned to deconstruct one of White Christianity’s most pernicious lies: the conflation of biblical authority with the doctrines of inerrancy and infallibility. As Dr. Parker shows, these doctrines are less about the text of the Bible itself and more about the arbiters of its interpretation—historically, White males in positions of power who have used Scripture to justify control over marginalized groups. This oppressive use of the Bible has been suffocating. To learn to breathe again, Dr. Parker says, we must “let God breathe in us.” We must read the Bible as authoritative, but not authoritarian. We must become conscious of the particularity of our identities, as we also become conscious of the particular identities of the biblical authors from whom we draw inspiration. And we must trust and remember that as long as God still breathes, we can too.

If there is a God and He loves us like the Bible tells us, then why can’t we see, hear and touch him? Since we cannot see Him, does this mean that He wants to be distant or capricious, or wants to make things difficult for us? Of course, if we could see Him, then everyone would believe fully in God and probably be on their way to heaven. There would be no need whatsoever for faith, and probably no need for a Savior. Who would sin standing in the visible presence of God? Adam and Eve did choose to sin, but God was not visibly with them at the time, and they also had not yet realized the full consequences of sin. In this book we will explore what God designed and intended for humankind, and what caused Him to become invisible, and why. My hope is that for many this will give a better understanding of God, His unfailing love for us, and why things are the way they are. I pray it also brings some comfort in life’s often difficult journey that requires such an exercise of faith. We will do this by looking at the words of God, himself. In my life I have heard many teachings about the temptation and fall of man, and many times studied the scriptures concerning Eden. One day a few years ago God revealed to me something new and profound I had never noticed. There is no doubt the living Word and the Holy Spirit are famous for that, but this one blew me away. God will very soon reveal Himself to all whether we like it or not. Millions of Christians and Bible scholars worldwide agree that that all the necessary prophecies have been fulfilled and the signs of the return of Christ are undeniably upon us. But until the day Christ returns for His Church, let us see if God gave us any clues as to why we can’t see Him, and explore the origin and necessity of faith.

Do you value reason, science, and independent thinking, yet you hope there could be a greater purpose to the universe? Beginning with his own story of losing the belief in any ultimate purpose in life, philosopher Joshua Rasmussen builds a bridge to faith. Using only the instruments of reason and common experience, Rasmussen constructs a pathway that he argues can lead to meaning and, ultimately, a vision of God.