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Pope Francis and the Caring Society is a thoughtful exploration of the Pope’s earnest call for a dialogue on building a truly compassionate society. Francis’s fervent support for uplifting the poor and protecting the environment has inspired far-reaching discussions worldwide: Do capitalism and socialism have positive or negative social consequences? What is the most effective way to fight poverty? And what value does a religious perspective offer in addressing moral, political, and economic problems?

Pope Francis and the Caring Society is an indispensable resource for consideration of these vital questions. Edited by Robert M. Whaples, with a foreword by Michael Novak, the book provides an integrated perspective on Francis and the issues he has raised, examining the intersection of religion, politics, and economics. Readers will discover important historical and cultural context for considering Francis’s views, along with alternative solutions for environmental preservation, a defense of Francis’s criticism of power and privilege, a case for market-based entrepreneurship and private charity as potent tools for fighting poverty, and an examination of Francis’s philosophy of the family. Pope Francis and the Caring Society is essential reading for anyone interested in creating a better, more caring, and prosperous world.

Pope Francis and the Caring Society is outstanding and absolutely essential reading for those seeking to engage the theology and values of Pope Francis on the issues of our day: the economies in contemporary democratic republics, the wealth and poverty of peoples, the political implications of a Christian theology of care and compassion, the values of liberty and family, and, of increasing importance for national and international relations, the challenge of addressing climate change. It will also be of great interest for non-Catholic and general readers seeking an intelligent, critical guide to the interrelationship of politics, economics, and religious faith.

Pope Francis and the Caring Society is a stunning achievement. It is high-level scholarship put in prose that is accessible to the lay reader. And it is must reading for biblical exegetes, theologians, pastors and Christian leaders in general because, in a fair and careful way, the book brings conceptual economic clarity to those who often speak to and for the church about matters economical without the training to do so. One main purpose of the book is to clarify and defend the proposition that the teachings of Jesus (and scripture generally) set the ends for Christians (and many of these ends are set for everyone by way of natural law) regarding a cluster of related issues taken up within its pages, but it is the science of economics that provides knowledge of the best means to reach those ends. Much—usually unintentional—harm has been done by people who have failed to learn the economic justification for those means, but with the publication of Pope Francis and the Caring Society, that problem can now be laid to rest. A marvelous book.

Augustine's dominant image for the human life is peregrinatio, which signifies at once a journey to the homeland (a pilgrimage) and the condition of exile from the homeland. For Augustine, all human beings are, in the earthly life, exiles from their true homeland: heaven. Only some become pilgrims seeking a way back to the heavenly homeland, a return mediated by the incarnate Christ. Becoming a pilgrim begins with attraction to beauty. The return journey therefore involves formation, both moral and aesthetic, in loving rightly. This image has occasioned a lot of angst in ethical thought in the last century or so. Augustine's vision of Christian life as a pilgrimage, his critics allege, casts a pall of groaning and longing over this life in favor of happiness in the next. Augustine's eschatological orientation robs the world of beauty and ethics of urgency. In Pilgrimage as Moral and Aesthetic Formation in Augustine's Thought, Sarah Stewart-Kroeker elaborates Augustine's understanding of moral and aesthetic formation via the pilgrimage image, which she argues reflects a Christological continuity between the earthly journey and the eschatological home that unites love of God and neighbor. From the human desire for beauty to the embodied practice of Christian sacraments, Stewart-Kroeker reveals the integrity of Augustine's vision of moral and aesthetic formation, which is essentially the ordering of love. This study develops an Augustinian account of the relationship between beauty and morality.

Questions of religious liberty have become flashpoints of controversy in virtually every area of life around the world. Despite the protection of religious liberty at both national and supranational levels, there is an increasing number of conflicts concerning the proper way to recognize it – both in modern secular states and in countries with an established religion or theocratic mode of government. 

This book provides an analysis of the general concept of religious liberty along with a close study of important cases that can serve as test beds for conflict resolution proposals. It combines the insights of both pure academics and experienced legal practitioners to take a fresh look at the nature, scope and limits of religious liberty. Divided into two parts, the collection presents a blend of legal and philosophical approaches, and draws on cases from a wide range of jurisdictions, including Brazil, India, Australia, the USA, the Netherlands, and Canada.

Presenting a broad range of views, this often provocative volume makes for fascinating reading for academics and researchers working in the areas of law and religion, legal philosophy and human rights.

On the heels of the advance since the twentieth-century of wholly physicalist accounts of human persons, the influence of materialist ontology is increasingly evident in Christian theologizing. To date, the contemporary literature has tended to focus on anthropological issues (e.g., whether the traditional soul / body distinction is viable), with occasional articles treating physicalist accounts of such doctrines as the Incarnation and Resurrection of Jesus cropping up, as well. Interestingly, the literature to date, both for and against this influence, is dominated by philosophers. The present volume is a collection of philosophers and theologians who advance several novel criticisms of this growing trend toward physicalism in Christian theology. The present collection definitively shows that Christian physicalism has some significant philosophical and theological problems. No doubt all philosophical anthropologies have their challenges, but the present volume shows that Christian physicalism is most likely not an adequate accounting for essential theological topics within Christian theism. Christians, then, should consider alternative anthropologies.

The main argument of my book is that communal reading events were widespread during the time of Jesus (i.e., the first century AD). Practically speaking, this brings the academic conversation back at least one century, overturning the predominant idea that the communal reading of written texts, and even the use/demand for written texts, were a second century or later phenomenon (or trend). In other words, the simplistic notion that only a small segment of society in certain urban areas could have been involved in such communal reading events during the first century has been overturned.

In one sense, developing my argument was the hardest part of the book because I was mostly navigating in uncharted territory within New Testament studies, and identifying these events is more complex than merely looking for some key terms or in one corpus of literature. But in another sense, developing the argument was the easiest part of this work. Every time a location was identified, like Jesus reading communally in a synagogue in Nazareth (Luke 4:16–30), it automatically advanced my main argument to some extent. As the evidence quickly multiplied, I then placed it within the political, social, and economic context of the day. I believe this enhanced the strength of my argument that communal reading events were widespread because such factors did not necessarily hinder them in the Roman Empire.

I note several factors in my work that enhance the notion that the earliest Christian communities were distinct in forming communal identity. The picture more often than not is of a didactic community that used texts in forming communal identity, while emphasizing such things as the office of teacher, gift of teaching, commands to teach, traditions passed on, and communal reading. In fact, I note several outsiders who attended and tried to imitate Christian communal reading events in certain ways. I also show the distinctiveness of Christian reading culture by noting such things as the inclusion of new writings. But let me conclude by giving just one verse as a distinct example. Paul states, “I put you all under oath before the Lord to have this letter read aloud to all the brothers” (1 Thess. 5:27).

I would say without hesitation that those criticisms are correct. I did do a survey of the entire NT instead of  narrowing my focus onto one author, book, or verse. I did have to establish parameters and make certain selections of the evidence that might initially seem arbitrary and will not please every academic reviewer. Nevertheless, I would respond to the first one by saying that I cast a wider net than many modern scholars do because I’m asking and answering only the first of a series of important historical questions regarding communal reading: how widespread were they? As for the second one, I would say that other selections could always have been made. What I don’t think can be denied, however, is that I have provided more evidence for first-century communal reading events in my book then anyone has thus far. Therefore, I don’t think those types of critiques will jeopardize my main argument that communal reading events were widespread and an available conserving force within literary traditions in the first century AD.

It is quite ironic (or well-timed) that you ask me this question. A few days ago, I just received a courtesy copy of Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard’s Introduction to Biblical Interpretation, which is in its third edition (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2017). As I flipped through the Table of Contents, I was reminded of how much my book applies to many aspects of hermeneutics and the authority of Scripture. For instance, and using their work as just one representative example of the various categories, I could see my work illuminating nine out of their 12 chapters. If I were to pick just one section to illustrate my point and answer your question, though, the one that keeps popping into my mind right now is their discussion on presuppositions and preunderstandings. I think my book will help interpreters identify and evaluate some of their preconceptions regarding the social and cultural matrix of Jesus’s day, especially as they relate to literacy and literate behavior.

D. A. Carson said of my book, “One wonders why these things have not been brought to light before.” I think he is exactly right to note this because, although the evidence has been around a long time, our knowledge (or incorporation) of it has not. Thus, beyond what I mentioned earlier regarding its contributions to hermeneutics and the authority of scripture conversations, and the freshness of the evidence as Carson noted, let me mention one more major takeaway communities of Christian scholars can glean from early Christian reading practices. The regular practice of reading texts communally points us in the direction of a more stable textual tradition.

Did the universe begin to exist? If so, did it have a cause? Or could it have come into existence uncaused, from nothing? These questions are taken up by the medieval-though recently-revived-kalam cosmological argument, which has arguably been the most discussed philosophical argument for God's existence in recent decades. The kalam's line of reasoning maintains that the series of past events cannot be infinite but rather is finite. Since the universe could not have come into being uncaused, there must be a transcendent cause of the universe's beginning, a conclusion supportive of theism. This anthology on the philosophical arguments for the finitude of the past asks: Is an infinite series of past events metaphysically possible? Should actual infinites be restricted to theoretical mathematics, or can an actual infinite exist in the concrete world? These essays by kalam proponents and detractors engage in lively debate about the nature of infinity and its conundrums; about frequently-used kalam argument paradoxes of Tristram Shandy, the Grim Reaper, and Hilbert's Hotel; and about the infinity of the future.

The debate about biological origins continues to be hotly contested within the Christian church. Prominent organizations such as Biologos (USA) and Faraday Institute (UK) insist that Christians must yield to an unassailable scientific consensus in favor of contemporary evolutionary theory and modify traditional biblical ideas about the creation of life accordingly. They promote a view known as “theistic evolution” or “evolutionary creation.” They argue that God used—albeit in an undetectable way—evolutionary mechanisms to produce all forms of life. This book contests this proposal. Featuring two dozen highly credentialed scientists, philosophers, and theologians from Europe and North America, this volume provides the most comprehensive critique of theistic evolution yet produced. It documents evidential, logical, and theological problems with theistic evolution, opening the door to scientific and theological alternatives—making the book essential reading for understanding this worldview-shaping issue.

Oliver O'Donovan's Ethics as Theology project began with Self, World, and Time, an "induction" into Christian ethics as ordered reflection on moral thinking within the life of faith. Volume 2, Finding and Seeking, shifted the focus to the movement of moral thought from a first consciousness of agency to the time that determines the moment of decision. In this third and final volume of his magnum opus, O'Donovan turns his attention to the forward horizon with which moral thinking must engage. Moral experience, he argues, is necessarily two-directional, looking both back at responsibility and forward at aims. The Pauline triad of theological virtues (faith, love, and hope) describes a form of responsibility, and its climax in the sovereignty of love opens the way to a definitive teleology. Entering into Rest offers O'Donovan's mature reflections on questions that have engaged him throughout his career and provides a synoptic view of many of his main themes.

Many contemporary theologians seek to retrieve the concept of beauty as a way for people to encounter God. This groundbreaking book argues that while Martin Luther's view of beauty has often been ignored or underappreciated, it has much to contribute to that quest. Mark Mattes, one of today's leading Lutheran theologians, analyzes Luther's theological aesthetics and discusses its implications for music, art, and the contemplative life. Mattes shows that for Luther, the cross is the lens through which the beauty of God is refracted into the world.

Is the faith journey a matter of reflection, of emotion, or of obedience? Is there valid and convincing evidence that does enable human beings to assent to Jesus Christ and his message? What is the influence of cognitive assumptions and of affective tendencies in the art of believing? Should we distinguish faith and belief? And do we need more than one kind of conversion? 

Taking account of the widespread indifference, skepticism, and distrust of organized religion in the West, Louis Roy begins The Three Dynamisms of Faith with the human concern about hope and about a reachable happiness, both in our contemporary world and in the Bible. He then traces these themes in three historic giants of Christian thinking: Thomas Aquinas, John Henry Newman, and Bernard Lonergan, presenting their converging descriptions of the three dynamisms of Christian faith: the quests for meaning, for fulfillment, and for truth. 

Fr. Roy shows how The Three Dynamisms of Faith are lived in today's culture and how they are systematically related; sometimes in alliance and sometimes in apparent opposition. Having led the reader to a plausible answer to the human condition in Catholicism, in his final chapter he discusses some classic issues that result: possible tensions between meaning and truth, between feelings and insight, and about the role of religious experience in becoming attuned to Christian revelation. 

All along, Fr. Roy describes concrete examples of problems that may occur in the journey of faith: blindness and distortions, the varieties of self-deception, the limitations of natural reason. Logical stages on the way to faith are also identified. A pastoral conclusion brings those multiple threads together; it insists on the legitimate diversity of emphases in people's journeys, and it proposes a balance between the rich strengths available in persons and groups.

Wisdom plays an important role in the Old Testament, particularly in Proverbs, Job, and Ecclesiastes. This major work from renowned scholar Tremper Longman III examines wisdom in the Old Testament and explores its theological influence on the intertestamental books, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and especially the New Testament.

Longman notes that wisdom is a practical category (the skill of living), an ethical category (a wise person is a virtuous person), and most foundationally a theological category (the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom). The author discusses Israelite wisdom in the context of the broader ancient Near East, treats the connection between wisdom in the New Testament and in the Old Testament, and deals with a number of contested issues, such as the relationship of wisdom to prophecy, history, and law.

The modern age has produced global crises that modernity itself seems incapable of resolving―deregulated capitalism, consumerism, economic inequality, militarization, overworked laborers, environmental destruction, insufficient health care, and many other problems. The future of our world depends on moving beyond the modern age. Bob Goudzwaard and Craig G. Bartholomew have spent decades listening to their students and reflecting on modern thought and society. In Beyond the Modern Age they explore the complexities and challenges of our time. Modernity is not one thing but many, encompassing multiple worldviews that contain both the source of our problems and the potential resources for transcending our present situation. Through an archaeological investigation and critique of four modern worldviews, Goudzwaard and Bartholomew demonstrate the need for new ways of thinking and living that overcome the relentless drive of progress. They find guidance in the work of René Girard on desire, Abraham Kuyper on pluralism and poverty, and Philip Rieff on culture and religion. These and other thinkers point the way towards a solution to the crises that confront the world today. Beyond the Modern Age is a work of grand vision and profound insight. Goudzwaard and Bartholomew do not settle for simplistic analysis and easy answers but press for nuanced engagement with the ideologies and worldviews that shape the modern age. The problems we face today require an honest, interdisciplinary, and global dialogue. Beyond the Modern Age invites us to the table and points the way forward.

Much of the contemporary discussion of the Jesus tradition has focused on aspects of oral performance, story telling, and social memory, on the premise that the practice of communal reading of written texts was a phenomenon documented no earlier than the second century C.E. Brian J. Wright overturns that premise by examining evidence that demonstrates communal reading events in the first century. Wright disproves the simplistic notion that only a small segment of society in certain urban areas could have been involved in such communal reading events during the first century; rather, communal reading permeated a complex, multifaceted cultural field in which early Christians, Philo, and many others participated. His study thus pushes the academic conversation back by at least a century and raises important new questions regarding the formation of the Jesus tradition, the contours of book culture in early Christianity, and factors shaping the transmission of the text of the New Testament. These fresh insights have the potential to inform historical reconstructions of the nature of the earliest churches as well as the story of canon formation and textual transmission.

This book presents a strong case for substance dualism and offers a comprehensive defense of the knowledge argument, showing that materialism cannot accommodate or explain the 'hard problem' of consciousness. Bringing together the discussion of reductionism and semantic vagueness in an original and illuminating way, Howard Robinson argues that non-fundamental levels of ontology are best treated by a conceptualist account, rather than a realist one. In addition to discussing the standard versions of physicalism, he examines physicalist theories such as those of McDowell and Price, and accounts of neutral monism and panpsychism from Strawson, McGinn and Stoljar. He also explores previously unnoticed historical parallels between Frege and Aristotle, and between Hume and Plotinus. His book will be a valuable resource for scholars and advanced students of philosophy of mind, in particular those looking at consciousness, dualism, and the mind-body problem.