Articles on the Gospel and Western culture

Below is a descriptive list of over 600 articles and passages from books which deal helpfully with a diversity of themes relating to missionary engagement with culture. Some of these are quite popular in style while others are more suitable for readers familiar with academic theology or mission studies. The source of an item will often give an indication of the level at which it is pitched: for example, you will find popular articles in Third Way (U.K.) and in Christianity Today (U.S.).

Where the publication in which an article is printed has a web-site this is given. Some of these web-sites contain archives displaying the content of past issues. For example, articles from First Things which attract your interest can be viewed on the web and downloaded as desired.

AAGAARD, Johannes. The Soft Age Has Gone. Missiology 10(3), July 1982, pp.263-77. {www.asmweb.org} [Senior Danish missiologist — on disintegration (political, national, ecclesiastical, denominational and missionary) into pluralism and new polarizations. Separation of theory and praxis in Western missiology by ignoring mission to our own culture; identification with the "sinned against" and consequent persecution.]

ADIE, Kate, OBE, interviewed by Roy McCloughry, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk} December 2003, pp. 18-21. [The TV news correspondent reflects on religion, sects, war reporting, her own RC upbringing, and much else. Some remarkable stories told in passing. Offers interesting material for reflection.]

ALBIN, Tom, Finding God in Small Groups, Christianity Today, August 2003, pp. 42-44. [Interview with, about his doctoral research on John & Charles Wesley's use of small groups - different sorts of groups for people at different stages of Christian formation. We need more groups and networks today for serious seekers, offering voluntary accountability.]

ALEXANDER, Denis R, God of Gadgets, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, April 2004, pp. 22-25. [Popular Christian overview of technological development from the chair of a molecular immunology programme. Pursuit of technology has a biblical mandate and reflects 'God's passion for techne'. Francis Bacon's vision of using science for the benefit of humankind was a Christian vision. Technology amplifies human choices for good or bad and can incorporate idolatry and corruption. Ends with an endorsement of GM crops.]

AL-QARADAWI, Sheikh Yusuf, Sage Green, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, September 2004, pp. 20-21 [Interview with the man whom newspapers wanted banned from Britain but who is seen by many Muslims as a moderate. He is popular on Al-Jazeera and is author of over 50 books. His hatred of colonialism and occupation leads him to condemn American policy in Iraq and Israeli policy in Palestine. Al Qaeda, however, wrongly sees its enemies; so, too, does the U.S. when it sees Islam as its enemy.]

ANDERSON, Herbert, and FOLEY, Edward, Experiences in need or ritual, Christian Century, Nov. 5th 1997, pp.1002-1008 [Church ministers should freely improvise rituals to mark significant events and transitions in peoples' lives. Rituals are recounted from occasions of leaving home, miscarriage, divorce, withdrawal of life-support, and for couples facing an 'empty nest'. Worth reflection - whether or not you agree with all the rituals described.]

ANDERSON, Leith & BROWN, Harold, The Christian Future of America: Two Views, Christianity Today, August 2004, pp. 39-42. [Contrasting views by two U.S. authors on whether their country is Christian today. In ‘A Steady Christian Influence’ Anderson traces evidence of such influence; in ‘A Decisive Turn to Paganism’, Brown traces evidence of such a turn notably in the legalizing of abortion and sodomy. Not deep, but a reminder of conflicting concerns and arguments on this topic.]

ANDERSON, Terry, For the Life of the Spirit: Practice, Touchstone, Vol.15 No.3, September 1997, pp.10-21. [Popular reflections on the hunger for 'spirituality' today. Many anecdotal stories. The distinctives of Christian spirituality include waking to One who is real and present - rather than summoning one's inner powers; being drawn into a relationship with God marked by faith, hope and love; and showing steadfast, community-forming love towards others.]

ANDREWS, Dave, Paradigms of Salvation, Stimulus, Vol.7, No.4, November 1999, pp.19-23. [The author of Christi-Anarchy contrasts the 'Closed Set' model for Christianity, in which it is defined by clear boundaries in belief and behaviour, and the 'Centred Set' model in which it is understood as turning, facing and journeying towards Christ who is at the centre. A clear presentation of this provocative analysis.]

ATKINS, Martyn D., The Timeless Gospel for the New Millennium: 'Missiological Perspectives', Epworth Review, July 2001, pp. 48-57 [Contemporary missiology is shaped by the concept of missio Dei, by commitment to inculturation, and by the insights of human and social sciences. Methodist theological resources (Wesleyan Arminian) bring a needed evangelical sharpness to the missio Dei concept; they present challenges to Methodist today while signalling hope for the future.]

AVIS, Paul, Establishment and the Mission of a National Church, Theology, Vol. CIII No.811, Jan/Feb. 2000, pp.3-12 [The idea of a national church; careful consideration of meanings of 'establishment'; the mission of an established church to all, 'a presence conveying memory and continuity'. Greater unity among churches would enhance this mission]

BAILYES, Alan. J., Evangelical and Ecumenical Understandings of Mission, International Review of Mission, Vol. LXXXV, 1996, No. 339, pp.485-503 [Traces developments in evangelical and ecumenical understandings of mission since 1948 through conference reports, manifestos etc. Statements in the Lausanne covenant, and statements by John Stott and David Bosch illustrate how tension between evangelicals and the WCC moderated after 1974. But tensions remain. Concluding remarks on the current situation.]

BARKER, Montagu, The Cross and Counselling, Anvil, Vol. 12, No. 2, 1995, pp.111-120 [A consultant psychiatrist encourages theologians to engage more closely with the issues which arise for Christians who provide counselling. The importance in this setting of extending hope and encouraging forgiveness - not appealing to mere self-interest but to the vocation of dying to oneself. Very readable]

BARNETT, Paul, The Uniqueness of Christ in a Multi-faith Society, Crux, Vol. XXXIV, No.4, December 1998, pp.32-40 [the religiously and ethically plural contexts of Old and New Testaments; Paul's proclamation of the uniqueness of Christ in the context of pluralism at Corinth. Tends towards an 'exclusivist' stance]

BARNS, Ian, Christianity in a pluralist society: a dialogue with Lesslie Newbigin, St Mark's Review, Winter 1994, pp.27-37 ['Pluralism' variously connotes a social fact, a fragmentation of common culture, a relativist philosophy and a political framework. Newbigin 's missionary engagement with pluralism presents the Gospel in dialogue with pluralist society and its scientistic 'plausibility structure'. From this Australian author, a fine discussion of major themes in Newbigin, with valuable cross-references to wider contemporary debate.]

BARNS, Ian, Public Issues in a Gospel Frame, unpublished, February 2003. [Engagement with public issues, as a missionary responsibility, involves recovering a Christian framework for engagement, critique of the dominant post-Enlightenment framework, and developing dialogue within public debate. The author explored dimensions of these tasks. He then shows how particular issues can be opened up for such debate using the methodology of frame analysis developed by policy analysts. Solid, drawing on many writers including Newbigin, Oliver O'Donovan, and Ellul.]

BARNS, Ian. Postmodernism and Public Theology, Interface, Vol.2 No.1, May 1999, pp.63-77 [the postmodern challenge to modernist notions of truth provides Christians with (1) the challenge of facing up to their domestication to modernism and (2) the opportunity 'to recover a publicly visible way of life that is distinctively Christian.' Wide-ranging dialogue with Newbigin and others. A fine introductory article.]

BARROW, Simon, From Management to Vision: Issues for British Churches Negotiating Decline and Change, International Review of Mission, Vol. XCII, No.364, Jan 2003, pp.8-17. [The historic denominations in Britain are often too caught up in denial and self-absorption to talk honestly about church decline. When they do so, they sometimes adopt over-optimistic assessments of the growth of interest in 'spirituality'; often their own response is essentially technocratic and managerial in ethos rather than spiritual and theological in shape. A more faithful response will involve the church in new movements both of gathering (centripetal re-formation and of dispersal/engagement (centrifugal re-formation)]

BARTH, Karl. Church And Culture, Theology and Church. (London: SCM Press, 1962), pp.334-54 [A lecture in 1926. Seven theses on their theological relationship.]

BARTHOLOMEW, C. Post/Late? Modernity as the Context for Christian Scholarship Today. Themelios, vol 22.2, January 1997, pp.25-37 [From a post-doctoral fellow in the Centre for the study of Religion, Gloucester College of Higher Education, a very good survey of Postmodernity with bibliography. Well worth a read.]

BATSTONE, David, Virtual Civility, Zadok Perspectives {www.zadok.org.au}, No.64, Winter 1999, pp.17-22. [An enthusiastic commendation of a coming world of 'digital citizenship' in which '"net" will replace "community" as a meaningful way to name our existence as citizens'. Suggests twenty essentials for living in this new world. See if you are persuaded….]BAUM, Gregory. Two Question Marks: inculturation and multiculturalism, Christianity and Cultures. eds. N. Greinacher & N. Mette (London: SCM Press, 1994), pp.101-06. [Canadian experience of two levels of culture — "primary and secondary"; differential assimilation by immigrants.]BEEBY, H. Dan, No Loose Canon, International Review of Mission, Vol. LXXXIX, No. 355, October 2000, pp.572-583. [The urgency of recovering the canonical status of the bible in the face of 'totalitarian' liberal methodologies. Newbigin and canon; the inseparability of unity and mission for understanding canon; the dual friction within the canon and between the canon and cultures. The renewal of canon entails a mission to our own minds, to the Church, and to wider culture.]

BEGBIE, Jeremy, The Gospel, the arts and our culture, in Hugh Montefiore (ed), The Gospel and Contemporary Culture, SPCK {spck@spck.org.uk}, 1992, pp.58-83.[excellent introductory essay from the now out-of-print collection compiled for the 1992 Swanwick Consultation 'The Gospel as Public Truth']

BEGBIE, Jeremy. The Trinity And The New Age Movement. Third Way 14(6), July-August, 1992, pp.29-31. {thirdway.org.uk} [Penetration of the churches by New Age views due to unitarian, authoritarian, God-of-power beliefs; countered by re-discovery of trinitarian God-of-love, and Christ-related work of the Spirit producing a true "creation spirituality" avoiding dualism. Good, brief theological critique picking up Harold Turner's ocean/ network /pebbles images.]

BELLAH, Robert N. Cultural Barriers To The Understanding Of The Church And Its Public Role. Missiology 19 (4), Oct.1991, pp.461-73. {www.asmweb.org} [Leading American sociologist. pp.461-65, disastrous influence of John Locke's theory of "social contract to protect individual property"; pp.465-67, rise of totalitarian state to deal with the "Lockean-chaos" resulting; pp.467-72, the new "market — totalitarianism" and its effects on "consumer churches " and "consumer universities" — all contrary to biblical religion.]BELLAH, Robert, MADSEN, SULLIVAN, SWIDLER and TIPTON, Individualism and the crisis of civic membership, Christian Century, May 8, 1996, pp. 510-515 [Since the publication of the authors' classic Habits of the Heart, a decline in civic commitment (Putnam's 'social capital') has become discernible and disconcerting. While the culture and language of individualism has contributed to this, structural factors (notably economically driven ones) are also important. Neither the 'renewal of family values' nor of small-scale voluntary community-building activity will be sufficient to check this without also tackling the dominant ideology of neocapitalism.]

BENEDICT XVI, Pope, Europe and Its Discontents, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, January 2006 [A map and assessment of the history of Europe in engagement with Christian faith from pre-Islamic times when lands facing the Mediterranean from all sides formed a true ‘continent’, through the division of Latin and eastern churches, to the 20^th century rise of secular totalitarianisms, and now to a contemporary ‘self-hating’ and seemingly ‘hollow’ Europe. Vital to European identity in the future are its affirmation of (1) unconditional human rights and dignity, (2) marriage and the family, and (3) genuine respect for religion.]

BERGER, Peter (interviewed), Epistemological Modesty, Christian Century, October 29, 1997, pp. 972-975,978. [Berger asserts that capitalism is a condition of democracy, that civic life in the U.S. has not declined but changed in form, that mediating structures are not always good, that U.S. individualist are actually quite conformist, and that the classical secularisation thesis was mistaken although elites around the world tend to be secular humanists. He favours a liberal theology based on modest epistemological claims.]

BERGER, Peter. Cakes For The Queen of heaven: 2,500 years of religious ecstasy, The Christian Century, 25 December 1974 [Influential Lutheran sociologist of religion: the resurgence of "Astarte-ism" or "sacred sexuality" in cults of nature and the body, linked to "expanding consciousness" towards the divine; a new-old ideology to be distinguished from genuine sexual liberation.]

BERGWALL, James, Shakespeare and Sin, Crux, Vol. XXXV, No.4, December 1999, pp.30-39 [Looks at three Shakespeare plays - one historical (Richard III), one comedy (The Merchant of Venice) and one tragedy (Othello) - and asks 'what sense of sin's reality is the audience left with after watching this play?' Bergwall stresses that the reality of sin is pervasive in human life.]

BEVANS, Stephen B., S.V.D., Unravelling a "Complex Reality": Six Elements of Mission, International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 27, No. 2, April 2003, pp. 50-53. [The author surveys some accounts of the elements of mission before proposing six for himself: witness and proclamation; liturgy, prayer and contemplation; justice, peace and the integrity of creation; dialogue with people of other faiths and ideologies; inculturation; and reconciliation. Brief reflections on each.]

BEVANS, Stephen, Inculturation of Theology in Asia, Studia Missionalia, Vol. 45, 1996, pp.1-23. [Investigates how the question of inculurating the Gospel has been addressed, explicitly or implicitly, by the four-yearly meetings of the Federation of (R.C.) Asian Bishops' Conferences and its sponsored bodies since 1970. Inculturation and issues of methodology, practice, grace and authenticity. Asian emphasis upon spirituality, harmony, and the local church as microcosm of the whole.]

BIGGAR, Nigel, Should Pastoral Theology become Postmodernist?, Contact 126, 1998, pp. 22-27. [Review article of Elaine Graham's book Transforming Practice. Finds that she assumes, rather than argues for, the postmodern denial of transcendent foundations for values, while herself assuming universal norms of justice such as gender equality and individuality. A concise response to basic issues raised by much postmodern thinking in theology.]

BISHOP, Steve, Science and faith: boa constrictors and warthogs?, Themelios, Vol 19, No.1, Oct 93, pp.4-9 [Basic introduction to the faith and science debate, expounding some of the basic myths and introducing some of the key players.]

BLAMIRES, Harry. The Christian Mind, (London: SPCK, 1963) {www.spck@spck.org.uk}, pp.125-27 [Extract from one before his time. Revolt against authority and objectivity of truth, seen in rejection of testing by examinations.]

BLOCH, Maurice, and PARRY, Jonathan, Money and the morality of exchange, in the book of this title edited by these authors, Cambridge University Press, 1989, pp.1-32 {www.cup.cam.ac.uk} [scholarly account of the impact of money on traditional cultures; the individual pursuit of material gain as a sphere of activity set within, and in contrast to, the sphere of the long-term culture order]

BODA, Mark J., The Delight of Wisdom, Themelios 30/1, Autumn 2004, pp. 4-11. [The biblical Wisdom tradition offers a creation theology consistent with covenantal theology: the 'fear of the Lord' which it extols means 'utter seriousness' about the God of the covenant. Wisdom calls Christians to public engagement, while whispering (like post-foundationalism) to academia of wider horizons]

BOERS, Arthur Paul, Learning the Ancient Rhythms of Prayer, Christianity Today, January 8, 2001, pp.38-45 [Popular piece by an anabaptist pastor on his discovery of traditional discplines of prayer in an age when many people 'are formed by a weekly average of 28 hours of television'. Personal reflections on Taize, Iona, Holy Isle and the Northumbrian Community. A 'new monasticism' ministers to those who feel estranged form the established church.]

BOERS, Arthur Paul, The Office of Prayer, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, March 21-28, 2001, pp. 14-17 [While monastic vocations continue to decline, the number of lay people affiliating themselves with religious orders grows, and with it, use of the daily office or prayer. This article reviews six prayer books published in the past decade. Also attached are reflections by Brother Jean Marie who prepares daily prayer at Taizé.

BOEVE, Liewen, Market and Religion in Postmodern Culture, Theology, Vol.102 No.805, Jan/Feb 1999, pp.28-36[The decline of modernity's master narratives has opened the way for the purely negative freedom of relativism and arbitrary choice. The market's 'primacy of arbitrariness' becomes a religion which privatises not only authentic religion but also its resistance to this market ideology.]

BOOKBINDER, Alan, Religious Broadcasting Challenges the Churches, Epworth Review, Vol. 30 No. 4, Oct 2003, pp. 7-13. [The agnostic Head of BBC Religious Programming describes the public space given by the BBC to religion as big, welcoming, important and quality; as at time a space like a cathedral, debating chamber or market place. Despite vigorous Christian engagement with programmes (correspondence flows constantly) it can be hard to find good contributors for programmes: for the good of religious broadcasting, this needs to change.]

BOOTH, Alan R. Christian Witness In The New Europe. Theology, no.756, vol.93, Nov.-Dec. 1990, pp.444-448, abbrev. [Methodist, U.K. Christian Aid director, d.1990. The vacuum after Marxism's fall; a pragmatic era replaces the "age of ideologies", but is inadequate to direct the spread of democracy, the rule of law and a market economy. Can the Church lead beyond a new "Dark Ages" as it did under Charlemagne?.]

BORSOOOK, Paulina (interviewed), Silicon Values, Christianity Today, August 6, 2001, pp.42-43, [Popular interview with an early U.S. critic of the 'religion' of wealth and technology as the highest goods. The author of 'Cyberselfish' argues that the libertarian values of high-tech culture affect much of society. 'Stockholder value' has wrongly become the dominant value system in the U.S. Media saturation fosters an imbalanced dependence on technology; even spirituality gets incorporated as a 'technology'.]

BOTTUM, J. Christians And Post-Moderns. First Things (New York) no.40, February 1994, pp.28-32 [Definitions of pre-modern, modern and post-modern; the relation of Christianity to each; the affinity between Christian and post-modern criticisms of modernity. An eloquent account.]

BOTTUM, J. What T.S.Eliot Almost Believed. First Things (New York) no.55, August-September, pp.25-30. [The influential modern poet's late development of Christian spirituality that remained too intellectual, aesthetic, and self-conscious.]

BOTTUM, J., What Violence Is For, First Things, {www.firstthings.com}, 118, December 2001, pp.31-33. [The violence of 9/11 wasn't "senseless"; it had the logic of sacrificial violence. 'We have lived so long with the Christian alternative to the sacrificial logic by which mythical cultures are founded that we've fallen into two massive and dangerous self-deceptions' (1. that we can maintain the Christian alternative without explicit Christianity, and 2. forgetfulness that Christianity is an alternative to anything). Thought-provoking reflections drawing on Rene Girard.]

BOURDEAUX, Michael, In sacred groves, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, October 18, 2000, pp.1036-37. [Varieties of paganism in Russia today. Following the spiritual hunger left unfulfilled by seventy years of communist rule, Orthodoxy has revived in the Western heartland but paganism more in the East. Beliefs and commandments of the latter are described. Orthodoxy tends to accommodate such paganism whereas Baptists and Pentecostals seek converts. From the Director of the Keston Institute, following travels widely around Russia compiling material for an encyclopaedia of religion in contemporary Russia.]

BOUSQUET, François, The Enlightenment: The Foundation of Modern Europe, International Review of Mission, Vol. 95 Nos. 378/9, July/October 2006 [Reflections on the Enlightenment as it affected Europe, and where it has led us today. We continue its pursuit of freedom, happiness and individual rights. But the medieval exploitation of power which involved religion and which was opposed in the name of Enlightenment rationality has not disappeared; it has shown itself in blind, monstrous forms of rationality itself. Fertile thoughts on post-Enlightenment Europe in general.]

BOWEN, John P., Evangelism in Augustine’s Confessions: Ancient Light on a Contemporary Subject, Toronto Journal of Theology 22/2, 2006, pp. 149-158. [Carefully, well-written piece on the nature of evangelism as reflected in the personal experience of St Augustine. Evangelism involves more than preaching the Gospel and calling for a decision; it may be compared to farming or education, and typically involves the convert in a journey with complex elements. Its agent, for Augustine, is God. The church has a unique vocation co-operating with God in this, while God also works through unforeseeable wider providence.]

BOWLES, Adam, A Cry in the Nuclear Wilderness, Christianity Today, October 2, 2000, pp.66-68. [Senior engineer George Galatis blew the whistle on cost-cutting safety violations at Millstone Nuclear Power Station in the U.S. 'This is business', he was told, 'This isn't church'. His campaign eventually made the front page of Time Magazine - but without reference to the Christian source of his perseverance in the face of harassment and vilification.]

BOYLE, Nicholas, 'After Thatcherism: Who Are We Now?', in Boyle, Who Are We Now?: Christian Humanism and the Global Market from Hegel to Heaney, T & T Clark, 1998 [Following on 'Understanding Thatcherism', the author explores the contradiction between the vision of globalisation and of a strong nation-state which marked Margaret Thatcher's politics. Increasingly we are all both consumers and producers, and the tension between the demands of these runs through each of us. Meanwhile older social relations, rights and responsibilities dissolve.]

BOYLE, Nicholas, Understanding Thatcherism, in Boyle, Who Are We Now?: Christian Humanism and the Global Market from Hegel to Heaney, T & T Clark, 1998 [Vital analysis in service to a theological critique of Thatcherism. Centralisation of government, the development of a consumer outlook and the erosion of mediating structures mark the impact of the European Enlightenment and subsequently of globalisation. This impact, felt in Europe for over 100 years, has not been felt in Britain before because of its preoccupation with running an empire.]

BRAGUE, Remy. Christ, Culture And The New Europe. First Things No.25, Aug.-Sept. 1992, pp.36-40. [Philosophy professor, Paris, after a consultation of European intellectuals called by Rome in 1991; the Church as only place where peoples can speak to one another, and receive forgiveness; need new witness to a holistic morality rejecting totalitarian power.]

BRENNAN, Margaret, Christology and Spirituality, Toronto Journal of Theology 16/1, 2000, pp. 27-38. [Two cultural shifts within postmodernity - new sensitivity towards the environment, and concerning a century of unsurpassed violence - influence our understanding of spirituality both popular and Christian. The spirituality associated with Christology can incorporate these new sensitivities which resist any dichotomy between sacred and secular. Postmodernity seen as carnival and wasteland (Ann Astell), haunted by what the carnival masks and the wasteland buries.]

BRIA, Ion, A New Typology for Gospel and Culture Syntax: from an Eastern Orthodox perspective, International Review of Mission, Vol.LXXXIV No.334, July 1995, pp.273-283. [The Eastern European Orthodox Churches do care about witness. Their recent totalitarian past has brought ignorance of faith and liturgy among the young, trivialisation of Christian culture and fragmentation of community. Witness must engage these issues, in cultural ferment. Liturgy has a role in such witness.]

BRIGGS, Richard S., Getting Involved: Speech Acts and Biblical Interpretation, Anvil {www.anvil-journal.co.uk}, Vol. 20 No. 1, 2003, pp. 25-34. [In How To Do Things With Words, J. L. Austin analysed the performative character of words. 'Speech-act' theory developed out of this. Its value for biblical interpretation has been explored by various authors. Briggs introduces and commends this theory as a hermeneutic of self-involvement in the Scriptures.]

BROWNING, Don, BROTZMAN, Kelly and CLAIRMONT, David, Marrying Well, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, February 21, 2001, pp. 20-23. [Review article of The Case for Marriage: Why Married People are Happier, Healthier and Better Off Financially, by Linda Waite and Maggie Gallagher. The view that marriage is a bad deal for women - propagated by some 30 years ago - is contradicted by recent research. Intriguing statistics are presented here from Waite and Gallagher's book. However, the religious meaning and motivation of marriage must remain its bedrock, claim Browning et al., and not its benefits.]

BROWNSON, James V. Speaking The Truth In Love: elements of a missional hermeneutic. International Review of Mission no.330 = 83, July 1994, pp.479-504. [N.T. professor, Western Theol. Seminary, Michigan. Interpretation is provisional, and locally and ecumenically shaped; similarly the N.T. diversity is controlled by a single Gospel of the identity, death and resurrection of Jesus and its claim upon us.]

BRUEGGEMANN, Walter, The liturgy of abundance, the myth of scarcity, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, March 24-31, 1999, pp. 342-346. [Polemic against consumerism as a 'demonic spiritual force' displacing trust in the abundance of God with a fearful perception of scarcity breeding covetousness. In the bible, pharoah was the first to exploit scarcity through Joseph. Today the church must shun the 'fast food' of moralism and power, and live by God's abundant gift of the bread of life]

BRYAN, Timothy L., The New Consciousness in America, Studia Missionalia, Vol. 41, 1992, pp.27-47. [Four examples from the U.S. of 'New Age'-related phenomena: the channelled guidance of a spiritual master, a course for spiritual growth, the pursuit of self-discovery and pursuit of harmony. US$ 100 million is spent annually on New Age books while corporations invest US$4 billion a year of New Age consultants. Problems and opportunities presented by this to Christian faith and theology.]

BUCHANAN, Mark, Trapped in the Cult of the Next Thing, Christianity Today, September 6, 1999, pp.63-72 ['If ever there was a cult that gave us stones when we asked for bread, this is it.' The author's winning article in Christianity Today's writing contest on faith and consumerism. Colourful autobiographical tales of belonging to 'the cult of the next thing' which effectively has its own sacred words, liturgy, evangelists, shrines and sacraments. The challenge of resisting this, of seeking simplicity, and saying thank you to God for having 'enough'.]

BUDZISZEWSKI, J., Feeling Moral, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, November 2002, pp.9-11. ['Listen to your feelings' is common advice in moral and religious matters today. Dramatic illustrations are offered of where this can lead. The association of this with romanticism, determinism, hedonism, utilitarianism, aestheticism and 'transgressivism'. It appeals because it avoids the demands of moral law (although biological 'laws' get invoked). A polemical piece which would make a good discussion starter.]

BUNTING, Madeleine. The Media and Religion. A lecture presented at Gresham College, London, 11 November 1996 [From the Religious Affairs Editor of The Guardian this excellent lecture identifies and explores five factors that contribute to the bias of the media against religion: loss of deference, conflict of values, ingrained hostility, nature of modern media, illusions of consumer culture. This needs to be read!]

BURKE, Donald E., Walter Brueggemann's Bountiful Harvest, Touchstone, January 1999, pp. 25-36. [Appreciative survey of Brueggemann's writings on the Old Testament: 'from a secure foundation in the study of the individual texts he considers, he is able to utter a word that resonates with the life of the Church'. His acceptance of the tension between multiple witnesses to God in scripture, and between Israel's testimony and its 'countertestimony' to God as hidden, ambiguous or negative.]

BURNS, Stephen, Mission-Shaped Worship, Anvil, Vol.22 No.3, 2005, pp. 185-198. [The classical fourfold shape of Christian liturgy – gathering, word, table, sending – is offered as a basic framework within which the church might nurture a shared sense of mission. Practical suggestions are offered on each, in the application of this framework both within ‘solid’ and ‘liquid’ forms of church.]

BUTCHER, Andrew, “The Whole World in His Hands”, Stimulus, Vol. 15 No. 1, February 2007 [Returning from the Younger Leaders Gathering in Malaysia, 2006 (organised by the Lausanne Movement), the author shares his inspiration at encountering ‘the whole Gospel, the whole church, the whole world in God’s hands’ as God makes all things new. His encounter was an engagement with Christian unity, worship, witness, suffering and hope. The author reflects on each of these in turn, in an adapted sermon.]

BUTCHER, Andrew, The Gospel and our culture(s), Stimulus, Vol. 12 No. 3, August 2004, pp. 39-40 ['We are all strangers. It goes with the territory. This is not our home and it never will be'. Brief, prayerful meditations on the contemporary 'longing to belong' and on the compulsive imitation in a culture marked by 'disbelief that there is actually an arrival'. A good starter for group reflection on the Gospel and postmodern culture.]

CAMPBELL, Charles L., Principalities, Powers and Preaching: Learning from William Stringfellow, Interpretation, 51, October 1997, pp.384-401 [Immersion in the Bible and listening to the poor and to victims shaped Stringfellow's theological ethics. Principalities and powers effectively use diversion (including busy-ness) to stifle conscience and maintain their sway over us. In this context, preaching can be understood as 'raising the dead', as resistance, and as offering hope]

CANNON, Dale, Construing Polanyi's Tacit Knowing as Knowing by Acquaintance Rather than Knowing by Representation: Some Implications, Tradition & Discovery, www.missouriwestern.edu/orgs/polanyi/, Vol. XXIX, No. 2, 2002-2003, pp. 26-43. [A substantial, careful presentation of the thesis that Michael Polanyi's theory of tacit knowing is fundamentally about knowing by acquaintance and not just about the subsidiary component of explicit representational knowledge. This fact makes Polanyi's theory of knowledge More radical for epistemology once it is recognised that knowing by acquaintance - first-hand knowledge - is the primary form of human knowledge. Valuable for Christians who are appreciative of Polanyi's work and the resources it provides for describing religious knowledge.]

CAREY, George, Islam and the West: The Challenge to the Human Family, 7th Annual Sternberg Lecture at Leicester University, 12 May 2004. [The last of four lectures by Lord Carey on Islam and the West (the third attracted media coverage for supposedly being 'anti-Muslim'). Concerned that popular stereotyping may make the clash of civilisations a self-fulfilling prophecy, the former archbishop pursues a not-yet-achieved 'real and fruitful dialogue based on understanding and truth'. This includes airing grievances of Muslims towards the West and vice-versa, which are here identified.]

CARROLL, Colleen, The good news about generations X & Y, Christianity Today, August 5, 2002, pp. 41-45. [The author of The New Faithful: Why Young Adults are Embracing Christian Orthodoxy interviewed by Agnieszka Tennant about her U.S. research leading to this book. A significant minority of young adults choose faith - maybe the first generation personally to do so - often from a spiritual hunger not met by their family, church, or saturation by 'greed, sex and all the decadent forces in our culture'.]

CARSON, D.A., Christian Witness In An Age Of Pluralism, God and Culture. D.A. Carson & J.D. Woodbridge eds. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1993), pp.32-64. [Increasing pluralism leads to decreasing tolerance of ideas and less debate, and intellectual nihilism. Yet Israel lived in a plural context, and religious pluralism around early Christians is analogous to our new context. Critical questions of God and revelation have been sidestepped by dominance of hermeneutical issues, which avoid the truth issue. Necessity of alternative full biblical world view as basis.]

CARTER, Stephen L., Beyond neutrality, Christian Century, October 11, 2000, pp. 996-1001. [On state neutrality and state accommodation towards religion as two competing theories determining the application of the First Amendment in the U.S., but of relevance also in the U.K. and elsewhere. Secular neutrality is impossible in practice, and as a policy it can have a destructive bias towards religion. A policy of accommodation still shapes religion towards its own social parameters but leaves it freer to keep and develop its own voice.]

CARTER, Stephen L., Liberalism's Religion Problem, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 121, March 2002, pp.21-32[Secular liberalism tends towards triumphalism, and sees religion as threatening its own pretensions. It claims to resist religion as bringing babel to public debate, but historically religious-backed ideas have often won in such debate. 'Christian Parties', by contrast, often lose their religious cutting edge. A lengthy but readable article suitable for discussion.]

CARTWRIGHT, Michael G., Radical Catholicity, Christian Century, {www.christiancentury.org},January 21 1998, pp.44-46. [reflections on John Howard Yoder following his death. Yoder's life ; his achievement in bringing anabaptism into engagement with, and to the awareness of, mainstream protestantism; his challenge to modern assumptions in biblical interpretation. His Politics of Jesus, influential for a generation of evangelicals; his criticism of Richard Niebuhr's Christ and Culture; his influence on Stanley Hauerwas.]

CASEY, M. A., How to Think About Globalization, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, October 2002, pp. 47-56. [wide-ranging reflections on globalisation, and Islam and Muslim ambivalence towards the West. The effects of each upon mediating structures in society. Free market ideology ultimately undermines freedom when it severs it from its source in transcendent truth. If Islam is to embrace democracy, it will not be based upon such relativistic freedom. Numerous writers considered including John Gray and John Paul II.]

CASTRO, Emilio, On Evangelism and Culture: some reflections, International Review of Mission, , Vol.LXXXIV No.335, October 1995, pp.365-378 [From the WCC General Secretary 1985-92, reflections on the vital importance of the topic: 'there is no way to love God… without assuming responsibility for the shaping of the human culture'; the heritage of history; the challenge of justice; the contemporary explosion of cultures]CHADWICK, Owen, The Secularisation of the European Mind in the Nineteenth Century, Cambridge University Press {http://www.cup.cam.ac.uk}, 1975, Introduction: pp.1-18 [Historical reflections preliminary to his Gifford Lectures, noting the appearance of social science perspectives and their influence on the study of the history of ideas, and questions which arise with regard to any study of 'secularisation' and its relation to the Enlightenment.]

CHAMBERLAIN, Paul, Truth and Tolerance in an Age of Pluralism, Crux, March 2002, pp. 14-21. [basic article on the opposition, in contemporary North American society, between truth (seen as exclusive and oppressive) and tolerance (seen as agreement). At root Christian faith (1) upholds the reality of truth and its knowability (including historical truth) and (2) tolerates disagreement over this. However not everything should be tolerated and proper tolerance can itself be demanding.]

CHAN, Simon, Asian Pentecostalism, Social Concern and the Ethics of Conformism, Transformation Vol.11 No.1, Jan-March 1994, pp.29-32 [Modernisation has tended to subvert traditional Asian religions and open the way for a 'rational' faith such a Christianity. However modern Pentecostalism in Asia is compromised by the modern: it echoes the conformism which has enabled rapid economic development and is vulnerable to the rapid 'transfer of spiritual technology' in the form of New Age supernaturalism which resonates with older spiritualisms. Meanwhile social concerns are neglected.]

CHAPMAN, Colin, Time to Give Up the Idea of Christian Mission to Muslims? Some reflections from the Middle East, International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 28, No. 3, July 2004, pp. 112-117. [Having set out five common challenges raised against Christian mission to Muslims, the author reflects on seven more fundamental issues by reference to which these challenges should properly be evaluated. He ends by defining some immediate Christian priorities. A wide ranging article containing much wisdom.]

CHARRY, Ellen T., Formative years: The seminary experience, The Christian Century, Nov 19-26, 1997, pp. 1068-1073. [Review article of Being There: Culture and Formation in Two Theological Colleges, by Carroll, Wheeler, Aleshire and Marler. The experience of students at two contrasting colleges - a Reformed Evangelical college and a mainline church college offering a radical liberation/justice agenda. Good insight into key issues for theological education in the U.S. and other western societies today.]

CHARTRES, Caroline, Happy ever after?, Third Way, February 2002, pp.14-15. [popular reflections on the fortunes of children since the industrial revolution; the rise of the concept of 'childhood' and later the 'cult of the child'. Today children are increasingly attributed their own private, individual space and rights; however, faith offers another basis and vision for the dignity of the child.]

CHAVES, Mark, Are we ‘bowling alone’ – and does it matter?, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, July 19-26, 2000, pp. 754-756. [Review article of Robert Putman’s Bowling Alone: The Collapse and revival of American Community, which documented a decline in civic engagement across a wide range of activities (e.g. newspaper reading, family meals, playing sport, donating blood) since the 1960’s. Chaves suggests a parallel in the change in forms of social capital at the turn of the twentieth century. But what will generate new social capital in the 21^st century?]

CHRICHTON, Douglas, Dietrich Bonhöffer: A Spirituality for Today, Touchstone, September 2001, pp.17-25. [General account of Bonhöffer's rich spirituality. Central for him was the (costly) grace of God. Our task is the participate in and prepare the way for grace. Recognising and conforming to Christ in his present action, and in his suffering; removing four obstacles to grace. Important in prayer (which God initiates) is silence; so too is the 'purifying bath' of intercession].

CLARK, Tony, Polanyi on Religion, Tradition & Discovery, {www.missouriwestern.edu/orgs/polanyi/}, Vol.XXXVII No.2, 2005-6, pp. 25-36. [Whereas Michael Polanyi’s theory of knowledge has been picked up by various theologians, his writing on religion itself raises difficulties leading to disagreement between Harry Prosch, Richard Gelwick and Tom Torrance among others regarding e.g. whether Polanyi really believed in the existence of God independently of human imagination. These difficulties can be seen as reflecting Polanyi’s lack of sustained participation in the actual worship, practices and theological explorations of the Church in any manner comparable with his participation in scientific endeavour. However, some helpful leads on religion can be found from him.]

CLEMENTS, Keith, Bonhoeffer and the British, Epworth Review, Vol. 33, No. 4, October 2006, pp.23-38 [Illuminating exploration of Bonhoeffer’s engagement with the British way of life and British attitudes. His visits to, and ministry in, Britain in the 1930’s; his efforts to secure recognition for the Confessing Church and his efforts against those who wanted the National Nazi Church at the table; his criticism of a British obsession with religious freedom at the expense of truth. An article which arguably raises important questions for today.]

CLEMENTS, Keith, The Churches of Europe - "Are we still of any use?", International Review of Mission, Vol. XCI No. 362, July 2002, pp. 312-327. [General Secretary of the Conference of European Churches asks Bonhoeffer's question today. Faced with church decline and Christian marginalisation, we must avoid denial, introversion or 'aggressive restorationalism'. We are called to mission which is above all witness - to peacemaking, to cultural inclusiveness, and to pointing to meaning in life.]

COHEN, Eric, The Ends of Science, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, November 2006 [‘Science is power without wisdom about the uses of power’. reflections on the human project of science, the attitudes found among scientists towards science, and the contradictions which have marked common beliefs in the meaning and value of science from the vision of Francis Bacon onwards.]

COLEMAN, John. The Homosexual Revolution And Hermeneutics, Concilium. The Sexual Revolution. (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1984), pp.55-64. [Development since the 1950's of a self-generating homosexual public culture, the first in history; its political and social force effective in the law, the media, the churches and medicine, albeit with internal weaknesses; its "hermeneutic of suspicion" frames a debate with which the churches must and can cope.]

COLLIER, Jane, Contemporary culture and the role of economics, in Hugh Montefiore (ed), The Gospel and Contemporary Culture, SPCK {spck@spck.org.uk}, 1992, pp.103-128 [The dominance of economic thinking in Western culture today. But economic realities reflect human values and action rather than impersonal forces. The formulations of economists, their limitations, and their influence on our actions as economic and social agents; the 'conversion' to which the Gospel calls us in this context.]

COLLIS, Dave, The Abuse of Consumerism, Zadok Paper S101, Winter 1999 {www.zadok.org.au} [Consumerism dominates us as a gripping spectacle and a fragmented, abusive, authoritarian narrative. It propagates the myth of consumer inadequacy, implanting needs and creating a 'hyper-reality' which diverts us from the real world. This paper is a 22-page breathless tour-de-force drawing upon both wide-raging theoretical resources (including notably marxist) and pop lyrics to bring consumerism into focus as an oppressive system to be resisted. A demanding read, but worth it!]

COLSON, Charles, Modernist Impasse, Christian Opportunity, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, June/July 2000, 104, pp.17-20. [Today we see 'a cosmic struggle over first principles'. Great harm has been done by the exaltation of autonomy, but there are signs of new moral concern. 'Christianity is a worldview', he says, appealing to the vision of Abraham Kuyper. References to Colson's own involvement in 'Evangelicals and Catholics Together'.]

COLSON, Charles. Postmodern Power Grab. Christianity Today. 20 June 1994, p.80. [White House staff, converted in prison after "Watergate". Enlightenment rationality undermined by post-modern relativity which treats every argument merely as ideological promotion of vested power interests]

CONDIC, Maureen L., Stem Cells and False Hopes, First Things {www.firstthings.com), 125, Aug/Sept 2002, pp. 21-22 [Those wishing to pursue stem cell research and human cloning circumvent the lack of justification for and moral arguments against this by exploiting the passion of terminally ill individuals to contribute to a cure for themselves and others. 'How can you deny me a cure?' is the trump-card exploited; but the cure exists only in the hope of the desperate and the speculations of a minority of scientists.]

CONFESSING CHRIST movement (joint signatories), Letter to Pastors and Teachers, May 31, 2004 (unpublished). [A statement issued on behalf of this movement linked to the United Churches of Christ, on the 70th anniversary of the Barmen Declaration which confronted the cultural drift into Naziism among German Christians. American Christians go similarly astray, it is claimed, when 'counting on God to bless their crusades and praying to "Jesus, the warrior"']

COOPER, Michael, Missiological Reflections on Celtic Christianity: Implications for Ministry in Western Culture, Mission Studies, Vol. XX No.2, 2003, pp. 35-56. [Introductory account of Celtic Christianity, its beginnings and history. Druid belief in the goodness of nature and in the divine destiny of humanity was engaged by Celtic Christian mission which was at once evangelical, contextual and social. Such mission might connect today with those seduced by neo-paganism.]

COOPER, Tim, At our disposal?, Third Way, {www.thirdway.org.uk}, January 2002, pp.13-16. [Succinct review of factors at work in expanding consumption, the role of fashion and obsolescence, and the symbolic power of purchases. A Christian voice must be heard resisting the throwaway culture, the 'therapeutic' claims for shopping, the wastage of the 'high-maintenance man', and cynical marketing to children.]

CORNEY, Tim, The Silver Anniversary of Punk, Zadok Perspectives, September 2002 [brief popular reflections on the fortunes of Punk, from the Sex Pistols' hit 'God Save the Queen' ('so different, so raw, so real') to the capture of Punk by the forces of commodification to which it had arisen as a radical challenge. Meanwhile Punk has changed mainstream culture. Can the Church, once a radical movement, do the same while resisting the forces of commodification?]

CRAGG, Kenneth, Cross meets crescent: An interview with Kenneth Cragg, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, February 17 1999, pp. 180-183. [The hope of peaceful co-existence between Christians and Muslims explored with this veteran interlocutor. Whereas biblical revelation is mediated through the human person, Muslims understand the Qur'an as literal revelation; however, ambiguities within it can leave scope for (contextual) interpretation. Emphasises the new and formative Muslim experience of living as a minority in non-Islamic states.]

CRAY, Graham, Reaching for the Stars, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, October 2000, pp.12-16. [Reflections on the place of celebrities at the heart of popular culture - stars without the character of heroes, who mesmerise those who in postmodern culture find themselves lacking purpose or personal history or secure identity. Worship of celebrities requires no commitment to moral action and complements a sense of self-righteous victimhood. Christians must respond by growing and acclaiming true heroes - among whom Jesus is unique. Full of pertinent insight.]

CREEGAN, Nicola Hoggard, Freedom and the missional church, Stimulus Vol. 13 No. 1, February 2005, pp. 31-36. [Freedom, like justice, is not so much an individual possession as a corporate gift; and the church is called to be such freedom-endowing space. Freedom involves release from moral bondage, unreality, fear and death. Insights are drawn from Zizioulas, Kierkegaard, Brueggemann and Schleiermacher in a suggestive, loosely woven argument.]

CROUCH, Andy, and others, Postmoderns, Christianity Today, November 13, 2000, pp.75-80. [popular interview with five 'rising Christian thinkers' (young U.S.) on their reactions to postmodern ideas and what opportunities they see in them for the Gospel. A light introductory piece]

CROUCH, Andy, Campus Collisions, Christianity Today, October 2003, pp. 60-64. [Not without parallel in some English universities, U.S. evangelical student organisations have been challenged as discriminatory and threatened with exclusion from official university recognition and use of facilities. In one case this was because a Christian Fellowship's constitution required that its officers be Christian (!); in another case a sexually active lesbian was not allowed to pursue leadership. Several such cases are documented and discussed. Ultimately, says Crouch, reconciliation comes through the cross rather than political coercion, and sometimes human division cannot be solved, only suffered.]

CROUCH, Andy, The Emergent Mystique, Christianity Today, November 2004, pp. 37-41. [Impressions from the ‘emerging church’ scene in the U.S, starting with Mars Hill Bible Church, 10,000 strong and espoused by Evangelicals looking for a faith ‘colourful enough for their culturally savvy friends, deep enough for mystery, big enough for their doubts’. While drawing theological inspiration from Brian McLaren’s A New Kind of Christian and the ‘postmodern’ sensitivities of Newbigin, Polanyi and MacIntyre, the results - so far – appear disparate and quite possibly transient.]

DART, John, Simpsons have soul, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, January 31, 2001, pp. 12-14. [Religious content appears in nearly 70% of 'The Simpsons' shows, reflecting the significance of religion in American life. The programme pokes fun at religious foibles and hypocrisies - like others. Religious people are among those who appreciate the programme. Some entertaining examples are recounted of religious content.]

DAVIE, Grace, Anticipating the Millennium: The Institutional Churches - a non-statistical perspective, Epworth Review, 27/2, April 2000, pp.19-27 [Brief consideration of the Dunblane massacre, Princess Diana's death, Glen Hoddle's sacking, and the success of Cliff Richard's millennium song of the Lord's Prayer, leading to theoretical reflections on current changes in Britain and on how the lack of religion in Western culture appears from other parts of the world.]

DAVIES, John, Reading the Everyday, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, October 2006, pp. 12-15. [In a society obsessed with the striking and extraordinary, we need a spirituality which celebrates the ordinary. Attentiveness to our everyday cultural landscape – ‘held together by stonewalls and subsidies, ragas and Northumberland pipes’ – enables us to affirm them deeply in a spirituality at once playful and creative, and respectful of the real and gritty.]

DAWES, Stephen, The Spirituality of 'Scriptural Holiness', Epworth Review, Vol.30 No.2, April 2003, pp. 51-57. ['Scriptural holiness' was the spirituality of John Wesley as he moved from the faith of a 'servant to that of a 'son'. This is described by reference to Marie McCarthy's six criteria for authentic spirituality: contemplative awareness, effective action in the world, community, openness, non-dualistic thought and action, and discernment.]

DAWN, Marva (interviewed), Marva Dawn on Worship, Stimulus, Vol.10 No.3, August 2002, pp.7-10. [churches in panic over loss of membership and prestige have sometimes changed their worship uncritically to reflect a consumerist, entertainment-led culture. This is the opposite of truly inculturated worship in Spirit and in truth. Worship shapes everything else in the Christian life; worship is the end of evangelism - not vice-versa; worship which is multimedia must supplement rather than abandon reflection on texts.]

De MESA, Jose M., Re-rooting Mission in the Family, Mission Studies, Vol. XIX, No. 1-37, 2002, pp. 137-153. [Lay theologian from the Philippines brings recent RC celebration of the family to the question of mission. Mission and 'saving unity' are linked in the intimacy, fellowship and solidarity of the family, which represents a way of being church and even a sacrament of ministry. Foundational for mission, the household increasingly replaces the temple as an image for the Kingdom in the New Testament.]

DE SANTA ANA, Julio, Cultures in Tension and Dialogue, International Review of Mission, Vol.LXXXV, No. 336, 1996, pp.93-102. [Intercultural relations in our age are extremely tense. A dominant culture has emerged from the modern West in which commercial logic, a calculating approach and the market are central. Lively opposition to this from other cultures, and from 'postmodern' thinking in the West itself. The emergence, for the good, of 'hybrid' cultures in discerning dialogue with Western culture.]

de SOUZA, Raymond J., The Politics of Incivility, First Things, 111, {www.firstthings.com}, March 2001, pp. 15-18 [R.C. seminarian recounts the political fortunes of the evangelical Stockwell Day in Canada as 'the chattering classes… bared their fangs'. Nevertheless Day had wide support from social conservatives. Evangelicals must in future be ready to defend themselves when cast as bogeymen.]DOLEJSOVA, Ivana, Fundamentalism and Liberalism: Churches before and after the Velvet Revolution, Epworth Review, 26/3, July 1999, pp.76-84 [Polarisation in the Czechoslovakian churches reflects a concern more for identity than truth. Its origins can be seen partly in past persecutions under communism which forced a stark choice between co-operation (which was often rewarded) and costly resistance]

DRANE, John, Feeling the Way Ahead, Third Way {http://www.thirdway.org.uk}, Sept 1999, pp.23-25 [A short popular piece tracing our culture's spiritual search today. Five features shared by public reactions to Princess Diana's death and to the 1999 eclipse express a personal search for meaning in which religious institutions 'probably have no future'.]

DREW, Gavin, The Gospel as Public Truth in a Pluralist World, Stimulus, Vol.13 No.3, August 2005, pp. 21-30. [Wide-ranging reflections on secularisation, the privatisation of religion, Marxism and liberation theology, public theology, and consumerism, with reminders of the perspectives opened by Newbigin’s work. Mission must engage culture at the deep level of the assumptions which shape our vision of human well-being and determine the rules of the game for public policy formulation.]

DULLES, A. Evangelizing Theology. First Things (New York) no.61, March 1996, pp.27-32 [Noted Catholic theologian. "Evangelical" now referring to Catholics also. Seven trends in Catholic theology that inhibit this transition (including faith as human construct, pragmatically true relativism and pluralism, freedom as individual choice, anti-authority & institution) also mark our culture in general.]

DULLES, Avery Cardinal, Mere Apologetics, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 154, June/July 2005, pp. 15-20. [An appreciation of C. S. Lewis as apologist. Lewis' threefold apologetics is presented and discussed, with respect to (1) the existence of God (appealing to philosophical arguments from morality, reason and desire), (2) the pre-eminence of divine revelation in Christ, and (3) the defensibility of Christianity against common objections such as the problem of evil. Closing remarks of regret over Lewis lack of celebration of the Church.]

DULLES, Avery Cardinal, S. J., The Deist Minimum, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 149, January 2005, pp. 25-30. [Arising in 17th-Century England, Deism adopted the inherited distinction between reason and revelation and framed a God known by 'reason' alone. Spreading to the U.S. (Jefferson's beliefs are described) it bequeathed a minimal civil religion and moral foundations for society which are contested today by a more widely pluralist vision.]

DULLES, Avery, S. J., The Rebirth of Apologetics, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 143, May 2004, pp. 18-23. [Christian apologetics has passed through a number of phases (here indicated) before collapsing in the mid 20th-century through reactions to its excessive claims and in response to social plurality. The author calls for a renewal of apologetics, and records signs of this happening. This must draw from personalism and an epistemology appropriate to testimony.]

DULLES, Avery, The Church in a Postliberal Age, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 136, October 2003, p. 57-61. [Review of the book of this title, which is a collection of articles by George Lindbeck. A brief, informative overview of Lindbeck's 'cultural-linguistic' theory of doctrine. Dulles finds him over-influenced by Hans Kung and Thomas Kuhn: 'it would be better to deny the doctrines than to interpret them so relativistically'. Dulles Invokes Polanyi to urge the necessary connection between meaningful language and reality.]

DULLES, Avery,, S.J., John Paul II and the New Evangelization, Studia Missionalia, Vo. 48, 1999, pp. 165-180. [following an inward-looking period in the Roman Catholic Church during the modern period, Vatican II re-affirmed the responsibility of evangelization, but this was neglected until John Pail II began urging 'The New Evangelization'. Ten defining traits of this; 'each of the new worlds of science and technology, mass media and popular culture, is an Aeropagus awaiting the arrival of a new St Paul'. Good paper for reference.]

DUNLOP, John, Science and Faith: a close embrace?, Stimulus, Vol. 8, Issue 3, August 2000 [Popular reflections encouraging Christians to show interest in science and its integration with faith. Includes an annotated list of relevant web-sites and books.]

DUPRE, Louis (interviewed): Seeking Christian interiority, Christian Century, July 16-23, 1997, pp. 654-660 [Being Christian today is difficult because faith is seen publicly as merely a part of culture, which is the real religion. But faith must be everything, integrating all the elements of life, or it is nothing. In the past this integration was mediated by tradition; today the Christian must achieve it personally through interior spirituality. St Augustine offers a model, achieving a new inner integration at the collapse of the Roman Empire.]

DURIEZ, Colin, The Theology of Fantasy in Lewis and Tolkien, Themelios, vol.23.2, February 1998, pp.35-51 [A shared theory of imagination as apprehending meaning enabled these two authors to disclose, through fantasy, reality which is hidden to 'modern' discourse. Lewis' theology of romanticism; paganism as preparation for the Gospel; tales of nature and grace reconciled to each other]

DYER, Fraser, Why You Hate Your Job, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, May 2005, pp. 22-24. [A popular survey of work frustrations today. Low self-esteem resonates with the collapse of career structures, loss of loyalty among employers, replacement of work requiring personal judgement by bureaucratic procedure, and lengthening work hours. When even workers in health and education feel like drones, we need to worry.]

EASTHAM, Mary, The Church and the public forum: John Courtney Murray’s method, Stimulus, Vol. 13 No. 4, November 2005, pp. 2-6. [John Courtney Murray made a significant contribution to U.S. domestic and foreign policy debates from the 1940’s to 1960’s and shaped Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae (1966). His public philosophy, rooted in the theology of natural law and the framework of the four ‘truths’ of the American constitution, aimed to provide a common language for political debate which could be owned by Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Secularists. An introduction to this Catholic philosopher’s method, which remains of interest today.]

EBERSTADT, Mary, The Family: Discovering the Obvious, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 140, February 2004, pp. 10-12 [The post-'60's celebration of 'alternative' households has in the U.S. turned to defensiveness as the empirical evidence for harm to children has gained acknowledgement. The new celebration of same-sex households will go the same way (the author predicts) when statistics on pathology among homosexual and lesbian persons remain high despite the fading of social censure towards them.]

EDWARDS, Peter, Church Decline: showing what matters most?, Epworth Review, Vol. 29.2, April 2002. [The continuing decline in church statistics since the 1981 census. Four features of Church bucking the trend: (1) a clear theologically framed identity; (2) an awareness of, and engagement with, pervading culture; (3) the nurture of spirituality through close fellowship; (4) a concern for mission and evangelism.]

ELLUL, Jacques. The Fight of Faith. Violence. (London: SCM Press, 1969), pp.127-44, 160-75. [The great French lawyer layman; profound biblical and theological analysis of violence as "natural" and "necessary", but not therefore justifiable on Christian grounds. The background of the demonic in social evils, and the radical Christian answer in "spiritual warfare", with the Resurrection as the supreme "spiritual violence" in over-coming death.]

ELLUL, Jacques. The Theological Foundation of Law. (London: SCM, 1961), ch.4, Law, State and Church, pp.122-40. [The "greatest European lay-theologian" — law prof., Bordeaux. Theology and law in relation to divine law and justice, and unique function of the Church in relation to rights & justice.]EMBERLEY, Peter C., The Role of Political Correctness in the Decline of Liberal Education, (discussion paper arising from a forum sponsored by the Centre for Cultural Renewal, Canada, held in Vancouver in 1996). [A liberal university education once aspired to cultivate the longings and dreams of students in the direction of intellectual exploration and moral judgement. This reflected a medieval understanding of the university as both 'universitas' (a common enterprise) and 'civitas' (an open enterprise within civic bounds). Since the 1960's the latter has eroded, leading to polarisation between moral license and politicised, highly regulating moralism. Public conflict over sexual issues illustrates this. 'We are hearing the death rattle of the university as an idea and an institution'.]

ESHLEMAN, Paul A., The "Jesus" Film: A Contribution to World Evangelism, International Bulletin of Missionary Research, April 2002, pp. 68-72. [The Director of the "Jesus" film project recounts its origins in John Heyman's Genesis Project and the New Media Bible. In two decades, the film has been translated into all major languages in 35 versions for differing audiences. Its usefulness in church planting; efforts at follow-up discipling; a worldwide strategic plan; difficulties arising in translation and distribution.]

EVANGELICALS AND CATHOLICS TOGETHER, Your Word is Truth, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 125, August/September 2002, pp.38-42. [Formal statement by this North American group on the relationship between scripture and tradition. Tradition is not a second source of revelation alongside the Bible but must be corrected or informed by it, and scripture itself is not understood in a vacuum apart from the historical existence and life of the community of faith. Disagreements are plainly acknowledged, however, over the Church and the exercise of teaching authority within it.]

EVANS, C. Stephen. Healing Old Wounds And Recovering Old Insights: toward a Christian view of the person for today, Christian Faith and Practice in the Modern World. eds. M.A. Noll & D.F. Wells. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988), pp.68-75. [Current cultural replacement of behaviourist reductionism by self-deification views; newer relational views congruent with Christian view but notion of substance of a self also needed to BE in relation.]

FACKRE, Gabriel, The Church of the Center, Interpretation, April 1997, pp.130-142. [Drawing from Richard Niebuhr's Christ and Culture, and in the spirit of the Barmen Declaration, a church is sought which is centred on Christ rather than committed to a habitual stance - whether in conformity or opposition - vis-à-vis cultural categories. The story of the struggle for such a 'Church of the Centre' in the United Church of Christ in the U.S.]

FACKRE, Gabriel, Theology and Culture Newsletter, Advent 2002, unpublished [popular Christian reflections on current affairs (mostly in the U.S.) during 2002: (1) original sin and pyramids of power in politics and the church: from the personal sins of priests and televangelists (the '60's brought both fresh air and pollutants, now apparent) to the corporate sins of Enron etc. (2): being gracious to other religions: the need both to honour commonalities and to respect particularities including the claims of each to universality]

FAGERBERG, David, Chesterton on Ritual, Worship, May 1997, pp.194-205 [Chesterton's appreciation of ritual and liturgy had to do with his conversion being 'that of the pagan and not the Puritan'. Ritual conveys meaning. It must be central if Christian religion is to be practical and widely accessible. Useful reading for those exploring 'alternative worship services' or concerned with 'neo-paganism']

FARLEY, Edward, Transforming a lukewarm church, Christian Century, Aug 27 - Sept 3, 1997, pp. 754-757 [review article of John B. Cobb, Reclaiming the Church: where the mainline churches went wrong and what to do about it. Cobb is not concerned with statistical decline as such but with the lukewarm church: 'indifferent to its own theological confusions, uninterested in responding to challenges that confront the traditions, and isolated from the major problems and issues of the social environment'. Good, constructive, thoughtful piece, with relevance also to the U.K.]

FINN, Daniel, Thinking religiously about economic life, Christian Century, April 24, 1996 [substantial review article of On Moral Business: Classical and Contemporary Resources for Ethics in Economic Life, ed. Max Stackhouse et al. Finds the book strong on morality in personal and business life but giving insufficient attention to the moral dimensions of the market as itself a construction of governments through law]

FINNEY, John, Culture Clash, in Finney, Recovering the Past: Celtic and Roman Mission, Darton, Longman and Todd, 1996, Chapter 6, pp.75-89 [on mission which takes seriously Christian engagement with culture as a meeting of 'tectonic plates'. Illustrated by Christian meeting with and conversion of Anglo-Saxon culture. Popular, readable]

FLETT, John, From Jerusalem to Oxford: Mission as the Foundation and Goal of Ecumenical Social Thought, International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vo. 27 No. 1, January 2003, pp. 17-22. [WW1 raised new issues for mission theology, described by J. H. Oldham. At the IMC assembly in Jerusalem, 1928, Rufus Jones' paper drew attention to secularism as a challenge. Reflection followed, and by the time of the 1937 Oxford conference the need was accepted to engage with Western social and cultural presuppositions as an integral part of mission.]

FORD, David, British Theology after a trauma: Divisions and conversations, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, April 12, 2000, pp. 425-431. [The assault, by logical positivists and analytical philosophers, upon British theology. A brief but masterly survey, for mainly U.S. readers, of British theologians and their key books since this assault. The 'dafault' positions adopted towards modernity and postmodernity.]

FOSTER, Charles R., Paying attention to youth culture, Christian Century {www.christiancentury.org}, December 9, 1998, pp. 1185-1187. [Perceptive discussion of the churches' task of engaging youth in the light of three books: Youth Leadership (Long & Fertman), Cold New World (Finnegan) and Virtual Faith (Beaudoin). 'Fashion, entertainment and possessions are identity markers for the youth in all these books'. Focus on North American youth culture, with resonances in the U.K.]

FOSTER, Michael B., Some Remarks on the Relations of Science and Religion, The Christian Newsletter, no. 299, 26th Nov. 1947, Supplement, pp.5-16 [Dangers arising from the growth of modern natural science, which differs from ancient science in '(1) putting nature under man and (2) taking man from under nature's tutelage'. Two responses to the abuse of natural science: a proper reverence for God's work, and reactionary paganism. Parallels in the social sciences and the reaction of pagan cultural archaisms. Contemporary issues engaged before their time!]

FOULKES, Francis & Marjorie, A biblical understanding of sexuality with special reference to Genesis 1-3, Stimulus, Vol. 11 No. 4, November 2003. [Whereas the bible describes patriarchy and polygamy, sexual abuse and marital unfaithfulness, it never prescribes them. Genesis 1-3 offers four prescriptions regarding marriage and sex leading to sexual exclusions. These principles are made a significant part of Jesus' teaching.]

FOX, Richard Wightman. Lasching Liberalism. The Christian Century. 109(9), 11 March 1992, pp.277-82. [Review article of The True and Only Heaven: Progress and its Critics, by Christopher Lasch, widely acclaimed for his The Culture of Narcissism. Analysis of U.S. and Western culture by one of its sharpest critics, showing a new seriousness about human limits]

FRANK, Arthur W., A Common Health: Redrawing the Moral Map, Christian Century, May 1, 1996, pp.486-490 [Review article of Health as Liberation: Medicine, Theology and the Quest for Justice by Alistair Campbell - a readable book on an urgent issue. Campbell challenges the individualistic ethics spreading in medical practice and health insurance. These ethics, says Frank, ignore the triple power structure of professional organisation, politics and technology, led by profit. The Gospel re-orders life's priorities in favour of 'the community of persons who share common vulnerabilities and resources']

FRANKS, Martha, Election, Pluralism, and the Missiology of Scripture in a Postmodern Age, Missiology, Vol. XXVI, No. 3, July 1998, pp. 329-343. [Traces views of biblical election from Carver (1909) through Von Rad to Senior & Stuhlmaster (1983) as increasingly open to diverse traditions in scripture. Missiologists must converse with postmodern understandings of diversity. Newbigin's affirmation of plurality is invoked, but his rejection of ideological pluralism is not considered.]

FREEBURY, Charles, Alpha ten years on: Success story or Papering over the Cracks?, Epworth Review, 30, no.3, July 2003, pp. 40-47. [Does Alpha 'grow churches'? The author's research leads him to conclude that (1) evangelistically-aware churches are more likely to adopt Alpha in the first place, (2) Alpha-related growth reflects less its content than the fostering of deeper fellowship, enlivened worship, more willing service and a more outward-looking focus, and (3) the Emmaus Course meets some of Alpha's shortcomings.]

FROHNEN, Bruce, T. S. Eliot on the Necessity of Christian Culture, Witherspoon Lecture, 2001 (unpublished - available at www.frc.org). [On T. S. Eliot's concern over the displacement of Christian-formed culture in England by non-Christian assumptions blind to the religious roots of culture and vulnerable to seduction by either the nihilistic escape from boredom or by totalitarianism.]

FRYLING, Bob, Being Faithful in This Generation: The Gospel and Student Culture at the End of the 20th Century. [Unpublished account of (1) cultural types affecting students' worldview: traditional, modern and postmodern; (2) worldwide characteristics of students today; (3) appropriate ministry responses. Very readable.]

GAILLARDETZ, Richard, Doing Liturgy in a Technological Age, Worship, Sept. 1997, pp.429-451 [Albert Borgmann's writings on the modern technological 'device' and its displacement of 'focal practices' in which we are personally immersed in our world. Liturgy as Christian 'focal practice' stands in tension with this]

GAISFORD, Sue, All in the family, The Tablet, 30 January 1999, pp.138-9. [Questions 'Hilary and Jackie' - the film of Jacqueline Du Pre - and the biography (recently made film) of Iris Murdoch by her husband. The blurring of truth and fiction; the slide from complex reality to stereotypes; the abandonment of personal restraint - from doubtful motives - to supply a society which 'takes a macabre pleasure in fingering untouchables'.]

GALLAGHER, Michael Paul, Inculturation: Some Theological Perspectives, International Review of Mission, Vol. LXXXV No. 337, 1996, pp.173-180 [A concern for inculturation has been visible in wise moments during centuries of mission, but a new historical consciousness has heightened sensitivity today. It may be seen as rooted theologically in the mysteries of creation, incarnation, redemption and Pentecost. Inculturation is not merely a preliminary to evangelisation but includes the call to conversion and cultural transformation.]

GALLAGHER, Michael Paul, S. J., The Tone of Culture: from Prometheus to Narcissus, in Gallagher, Struggles of Faith, Columba Press, 1990, pp.84-93. {www.columba.ie} [From the author of 'Clashing Symbols', a helpful survey of some perspectives on narcissism and its cultural concomitants, drawing on his literary background to reflect on this 'imprisonment of the imagination' and the question of a Christian response to it].

GALLI, Mark, Now What?: a response to religious terrorism, Christianity Today, October 22, 2001, pp. 24-27 [Lists instances of Islamic terrorism during the past decade, with quotations from militant Islamicists explaining their motives. Corrupt secularist Western culture must be destroyed, they say, in the name of devout religion. The author calls Christians to shun 'dualist revenge' on the one hand and ''cowardly compassion' on the other in favour of the path of 'tragic courage'.]

GAY, Craig M., Cash Value: Money and the Erosion of Meaning in Contemporary Society, Crux, Spring 2005, Vol 41, No. 1, p. 11-19. [While industrial capitalism has generated high standards of living for many, a side effect of capitalist culture has been the depletion of meaning. Drawing on Simmel, the author writes that money, as a means to indeterminate ends, becomes an absolute which displaces concrete ends and creates a blasé, cynical spirit towards them. This needs to be subverted by the Christian doctrine that life is a gift.]

GAY, Craig, An Ironic Cage: the rationalisation of modern economic life, in Sampson, Samuel and Sugden (eds), Faith and Modernity, Regnum Lynx, 1994, pp. 252-272 [Weber's account of rationality is recalled. Economic rationality is of a practical kind, pursued ion service to prior chosen ends; but it can become 'substantive', defining (and thus constraining) ends themselves. Origins in Calvinism's synthesis of substantive and practical rationality, which was intended to lift the secular world into sacred concerns but here ends up sacralising the secular. The resulting 'iron cage' can be broken open by renewing its origins in 'calling' and by promulgating a 'sabbath' attitude.]

GAY, Craig. Evangelicals And The Language Of Technology. Crux (Vancouver) 31 (1), March 1995, pp.32-40 [Powerful critique of current pragmatic, "modern", "relevant" methods and techniques as examples of a secularized Church, reductionist theologically, and counter-productive; especially use of "social-scientific" methods with implicit "scientism". Christian researchers and Church Growth-ers need this warning.]

GEFFRE, Claude. Christianity and Culture. International Review of Mission, no.332/333, vol.84, January/April 1995, pp.17-31 [The 'Christianity and culture' debate has been raging for the better part of this century yet despite this it is still complex and confusing. Here Geffre gives a solid account of the problem.]

GELWICK, Richard, (1) Christian Faith in a Pluralist Society, Tradition & Discovery, Vol.XXVII, No.2, 2000-2001, pp.39-45. (2) Heuristic Passion and Universal Intent: A Response to George R. Hunsberger, Tradition & Discovery, Vol.XXVIII, No.1, 2001-2002, pp.16-22. [(1) Criticises the use made of Polanyi by Newbigin and his interpreter Hunsberger to defend the objectivity of the Christian message: Polanyi leaves open choice in religious faith. (2) Resisting Hunsberger's response, the claim is pressed that Newbigin reverses key intentions in Polanyi's work. See also HUNSBERGER, and KETTLE]

GLANZER, Perry L., Christian Conversion and Culture in Russia: A Clash of Missionary Expectations and Cultural Pressures, Missiology, Vol. XXIX, No. 3, July 2001, pp. 319-329. [In the 1990's huge initiatives by U.S. mission agencies towards post-Soviet Russia were spearheaded by showings of the Jesus film. Over 40,000 ex-communist educators attended follow-up conventions. The author documents his research among converts, who usually testified however to their conversion as a slow process.]

GLASSER, Ida, Millennial Reverie: Muslims in Britain, Anvil {www.anvil-journal.co.uk}, Vol. 17 No. 3, 2000, pp.179-190. [Pre-September 11th reflections with new poignancy today. Written in conversation with Constance Padwick's 'North African Reverie' (1938), the author focuses on the challenge of Christian engagement with Muslims in the socio-political arena and in evangelism. The need for both penitent love and realism about the history of Christian-Muslim relations. The task of commending the Gospel without a counterproductive 'hardness of controversial spirit' requires thoughtful preparatory study of Islam. Valuable.]

GLEDHILL, Jane, Literature and Pastoral Psychology, Anvil, {www.anvil-journal.co.uk},Vol.13, No.3, 1996, pp.233-44 [drawing from Jane Austen, Bronte, Dickens, Murdoch, Sartre and Byatt, the author traces a change from a strong story line and a Christian moral understanding of humanity to the portrayal today of unstable consciousness resonating with firm footholds offered by the past.]

GOETZ, David, Suburban Spirituality, Christianity Today, July 2003, pp. 31-37. [Suburban life in the U.S. - organised 'arguably around the provision of safety and opportunities for children, and neat and tranquil environs for homeowners' - oxidises the Christian spirit as weather rusts a car. Missionaries returning to the suburbs lose their vitality like a tan. Christian suburban life requires constant minor acts of resistance, and perseverance with local frustrations rather than restless religious 'shopping around'.]

GOHEEN, Michael, Is Lesslie Newbigin's Model of Contextualization Anticultural?, Mission Studies, Vol. 19 No. 2-38, 2002, pp. 136-156. [Addresses the criticism of Newbigin as 'anticultural', showing that his emphasis on antithesis between Gospel and culture reflected strategically the contexts of his ministry as an evangelist in South India, an ecumenist surrounded by 'syncretistic' tendencies, and a returned missionary among culturally domesticated English churches. Newbigin's doctrine of 'challenging relevance' echoed Kraemer's doctrine of 'subversive fulfilment' in pronouncing both God's 'yes' and 'no' to culture; however in the author's view it lacks development in terms of the doctrine of creation.]

GOHEEN, Michael, Mission in Western Culture. Unpublished paper presented to St John's College, Nottingham, 2000 [Experience of mission to other cultures has prepared us to address the cultural captivity of Western churches. The history of this captivity traced through four periods: early church, Christendom, modern and postmodern. An agenda for overcoming cultural captivity. Draws on Newbigin, Bosch and others.]

GOHEEN, Michael, The Future of Mission in the World Council of Churches: The Dialogue between Lesslie Newbigin and Konrad Raiser, Mission Studies, 21.1, 2004, pp. 97-111. [Divergent views of Trinitarian mission led to the published exchanges between these two in 1994, affecting understanding of the missio dei, the church and the atoning work of Christ.]

GONZALEZ, Nelson, A Better Dream, Third Way, {thirdway.org.uk}, December 2001, pp. 14-20 [9/11 was a wake-up call to the U.S. to see itself as one among the global family of nations. President Bush had, in 8 moths, undone years of international cooperation. The U.S. 'is a project of ideas rather than a historical, cultural, racial or ethnic entity' - and must re-conceive itself incorporating greater humility in its international relations.]

GORONCY, Jason A., Bitter Tonic for our Times – Why the Church needs the World: Peter Taylor Forsyth on Henrik Ibsen, European Journal of Theology, Vol. 15 No. 2, 2006, pp. 105-118 [P. T. Forsyth’s engagement with Ibsen and other writers on tragedy illustrates the importance of theological engagement with the arts in general. “While critics with the judgement such as Ibsen and Nietzsche do not grasp the revealed answer to the questions that plague the human heart and conscience, the church with the revelation does not critically grasp the problem, nor duly attend those who do’. Solid article, with useful notes.]

GORRINGE, Timothy, Violence: Is There a Civilizing Process? Does the Gospel Play any Part in it?, Contact, 145, 2004, pp. 21-32. [Considers the thesis that civil-ization grants a monopoly of physical violence to the state and plays out restrained violence in e.g. sport. Causes of violence are surmised in structural injustice, mimesis, bad parenting and hormonal factors. Christians are called to serve a long-term civilizing process.]

GOUDZWAARD, Bob, Christianity and Economics, Signposts of God's Liberating Kingdom, Vol.1, Institute for Reformational Studies, Potchefstroom University, South Africa, 1997, pp.229-240. [from this well-known writer on faith and economics, a valuable framework for addressing the issues. A paper presented in Australia in 1996.]

GOUDZWAARD, Bob, Idols Of Our Time, (Dordt) 1984, pp.9-27 ('In The Shadows of Progress'; 'Ideology and Idolatry') [very clear and readable analysis of the how modernity breeds ideologies which then become idolatrous. Important for reflection on 'principalities and powers']

GRAY, John, Think Small…, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, June 2004, pp. 17-21 [wide-ranging and penetrating interview of this interesting contemporary writer by Nilgel Biggar. Secular liberal humanism is a hollowed-out version of Christianity, subject to pathologies not present in the latter - nor in classical paganism. Ethical life emerges 'naturally' in human beings without the need of 'big ideas', which have led to destructive ideologies and a false polarisation between universalisms and nihilism.]GRAYSTON, John, The Bible and Spirituality: the Decline in Biblical Literacy among Evangelicals and the Future of the Quiet Time, Anvil {www.anvil-journal.co.uk], Vol. 19 No. 2, 2002, pp.99-107. [A good readable discussion on declining biblical literacy which is briefly documented. Caused of decline include loss of credibility, authority and perceived relevance of scripture, a lifestyle indisposed to reading, and the influence of some elements in charismatic renewal. The place given to regular bible reading in Christian history; its importance for personal transformation, for relationship with God and for information. Ways of addressing the decline are suggested.]

GRENZ, Stanley J, 'Postmodern Canada: Characteristics of a Nation in Transition', Touchstone, Vol.18 No.1, January 2000, pp.21-35. ['In a sense, Canada stands at the leading edge of the postmodern wave'. In its Canadian form, postmodernism is (1) multicultural (2) focussed on relationships (3) consumerist (4) relativistic (5) 'glued to the screen' (6) nihilistic/negative (7) spiritual but unchurched (8) searching for identity.]

GRENZ, Stanley J. Star Trek And The Next Generation: Postmodernism and the future of evangelical theology. Crux (Vancouver) 30(1), March 1994, pp.24-32. [Theological professor outlines modernity and origins and nature of post-modernity; illustrated from TV series Star Trek; congruence of post-modern and Christian critiques of modernity. Theology must be post-individualist, post-rationalist, holistic and spiritual.]

GRENZ, Stanley J., The Doctrine of the Trinity: Luxuriant Meadow or Theological Terminus?, Crux, Vol. XXXIX No. 4, December 2003, pp. 15-18. [Presents two divergent approaches to the doctrine of the Trinity since the Enlightenment: (1) silence before that which defies constructive exploration or application (Kant, Schleiermacher) (2) adoption of this as the basic starting-point for theology (Barth, Pannenberg, Moltmann) and for anthropology. The author commends the second.

GROSSMAN, David, Trained to Kill, Christianity Today, August 10, 1998, pp.31-39 [A U.S. military expert on the psychology of killing in warfare argues that today's media condition children to kill people in the same way that soldiers are conditioned to do so in their training]

GUMMER, John, Fruits of Science, The Tablet, 20th February 1996, p. 254. [from this former Secretary of State for the Environment, brief reflections on GM foods and the wider issue of handling new knowledge. Genesis reminds us that 'human knowledge has always outrun human freedom. Painfully and slowly, the mechanisms of control have to catch up.']

GUNTON, Colin, Knowledge and culture: towards an epistemology of the concrete, in Hugh Montefiore (ed), The Gospel and Contemporary Culture, SPCK {spck@spck.org.uk}, 1992, pp.84-102 [Christian faith suggests a theory of knowledge different from those deriving from the Enlightenment: one which is personal and relational, and roots the meaning of these in God]

GUROIAN, Vigen, Friends and mentors: The message of children's stories, The Christian Century, June 3-10, 1998, pp. 574-578. [On the place of friendship in some much-loved children's stories, which reflects our social nature. Considers the exploration of friendship in The Wind in the Willows; of asymmetrical, mentorial friendship in Charlotte's Web; and of pure mentorship in Bambi. Ends with a plea for the place of mentorship to be recovered in our culture.]

GUSHEE, David P., A Crumbling Institution: how social revolutions cracked the pillars of marriage, Christianity Today, September 2004, pp. 42, 44,25 [Marriage as a social institution is like a huge building not easily brought down. Today, however, it has been weakened dramatically by cultural blows and the rotting of its spiritual foundations. Cultural blows have come from multiple revolutions documented here by the author: contraception and abortion; illegitimacy; cohabitation; reproductive technology; divorce; and gay rights.]

GUSHEE, David P., A Matter of Life and Death, Christianity Today, October 1, 2001, pp.34-40. [good popular survey of the ethical issues raised by the mapping of the human genome giving us 'power to seize control of our own evolutionary destiny'. Market forces and the contemporary impoverishment of shared moral discourse subvert the considerations raised by faith. 'Re-making' humanity; sources of stem-cells and embryos; therapeutic cloning, and germ-line intervention.]

HAFEN, Bruce C., & HAFEN, Jonathan O. Abandoning Chidren to their rights. First Things (New York) no.55, August-September 1995, pp.18-24. [Father and son lawyers. An important analysis of the U.N. new Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) — moving beyond protection to choice rights, based on misapplication of human anatomy model from adults to children, and confusion of state paternalism with parental paternalism or responsibility.]HAMILTON, Michael S., The Triumph of the Praise Songs, Christianity Today, 12 July 1999, pp.29-35 ['American churchgoers no longer sort themselves out by denomination so much as by music preference'. Music has become 'the new literacy of Western culture (George Steiner); since the baby-boomer generation it is at the centre of self-understanding. Compares the 'reformers' of traditional hymnody with the 'revolutionaries' who adopt secular musical trends. Many illustrations.]

HAMILTON, Michael S., A Higher Education, Christianity Today, June 2005, pp. 31-35. [In the past 50 years, U.S. Christian Colleges and universities have secularized to the point of being virtually indistinguishable from any other. Since the 1990’s, however, there has been a growing concern to explore a renewed integration of faith and learning which spans evangelical, catholic and protestant denominational educators. This has generated a series of books, here acknowledged. Influences at work include worldview thinking deriving from the Dutch Reformed tradition,  neo-romanticism, and postmodernism.]

HANCOCK, Maxine, Christian Perspectives on Gender and Sexuality, Crux, Vol. XXXV, No.2, pp. 2-10 [Recounts the experience of convening a multi-disciplinary winter school course on this topic, and the rationale for doing so. Definitions of terms; handling the themes of 'feminism' and 'patriarchy'; reasons for difficulty in discussing these issues]

HANCOCK, Maxine, To Be Fully Human, Crux, Vol. XXXVI, No. 4, December 2000, pp. 34-43 [Notes the variety of historical and contemporary answers to the question 'what is a human being?'. Contemporary views retain little sense of the majesty or dignity of humankind in creation. Biblical resources; Jesus as the model for true humanity. Becoming truly human lies in recognition and conversion towards human vulnerability, yearning, and sense of wonder, and brings freedom from enslavement to a panoply of gods.]

HANCOCK, Maxine. Dialogue, Declaration, And Dispute: Joining the discussion in the marketplace of ideas. Crux, June 1994, 30(2), pp.9-16. [English lecturer, Alberta University, and TV personality. The importance of ideas before practice; biblical images for engaging our culture; problems of truth claims in a pluralist society; necessity of dispute (and its biblical models) but without rejection of persons. A valuable practical survey.]

HANCOCK, Maxine. Some Reflections On The Use Of Language In The Stott-Spong Dialogue. Crux (Vancouver), 29(4), December 1993, pp.28-33. [University English teacher who chaired a John Stott - John Spong dialogue, reflects on Spong's managing an audience by rhetoric rather than by argument.]

HANSON, Ingrid, The Sweet Hell of Success, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, November 2004, pp. 12-14. [Towards a Christian perspective on envy of, and competition over, status in contemporary Western culture including in the church. Personal testimonies and theoretical resources including Bill McKibben's Enough.]

HARDY, Daniel. Rationality, the sciences and theology. Keeping the Faith. Essays to Mark the Centenary of Lux Mundi. (London: S.P.C.K., 1989), pp.274-309. {spck@spck.org.uk} [scholarly account of Christian faith as bringing a tradition of wisdom to the problem of knowledge and rationality in faith and science]

HARINK, Douglas, For or Against the Nations: Yoder and Hauerwas, What's the Difference?, Toronto Journal of Theology 17/1, 2001, pp.167-185 [Careful exploration of differences between these two influential authors, by comparing Hauerwas' Against the Nations (1985) with Yoder's For the Nations (1997). The former is concerned that the Church be faithful to its distinctive identity and resist cultural captivity by 'the nations' (signifying U.S. liberalism); the latter is concerned carefully to describe the Churches' nuanced engagements in mission with multiple principalities and powers.]

HARLAND, Gordon, Engaging the Issue Before us with Confidence and Hope, Touchstone, Vol.21 No.1, January 2003, pp.8-18. [Despite the decline in formal religious practice, a hunger for meaning persists. Loss of confidence in the framework of meaning offered by Christianity partly reflects confusion over relativism. The cultural diversity of Christianity, which neither reduces to subjective relativism nor allows a reduction to a fundamentalist framework, is prominent today as in the early church. A general articles drawing especially on Andrew Wall's work]

HARRIS, Peter, A Whole Gospel for a Whole World, Crux, Summer 2006/Vol. 42, No. 2, pp. 43-49. [From the International Director of A Rocha, reflections on the vision of relationship with God, humanity and wider creation as the proper context of Christian environmental concern. Human and environmental flourishing are interdependent. Paul’s sermon in Athens offers a reference point. Worship should inspire the necessary changes in human behaviour which cannot be secured by education or legislation alone.]

HARROWER, Scott, From Pride to Peace: An Augustinian Engagement with Pluralism and Postmodernism, Themelios 30/3, summer 2005, pp. 42-58. [Practical lessons from St Augustine for evangelistic engagement today, reflecting similarities between the age of St Augustine and our own. The author proposes five elements for a contemporary theological framework drawing from Augustine (they include using ‘pride’ to talk of ‘sin’, and ‘being real’ to talk of ‘confession’), followed by five elements in the manner and means appropriate to Christian engagement with the world. Some good leads, clearly presented, from this Australian scholar]

HART, David B., A Most Partial Historian, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 138, December 2003, pp. 34-41. [Fascinating introduction, by this Eastern Orthodox theologian, to Maurice Cowling's trilogy Religion and Public Doctrine in Modern England, following the publication of Vol. III. Cowling, who exemplifies conservatism as 'the negation of ideology', documents with invective the cultural shift historically away from Christian religion towards - not irreligion - but dogmatic 'secular religion'.]

HART, David B., Christ and Nothing, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, October 2003, pp. 47-57 [The first commandment originally opposed the worship of Gods other than the Lord; the very success of its opposition to this has led, in the West, to a far harder battle today, against the worship of 'nothing': of sheer human ill and choice. Such nihilism was hidden within older, pagan ways, but Christianity has brought it into the open. A fascinating, passionate but rather demanding presentation of this thesis.]

HART, David B., Freedom and Decency, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 144, June/July 2004, pp. 35-41. [Perceptive and eloquent exploration of the decline in standards of public decency in the U.S. and beyond. Arguments about censorship; prospects for the future. The root problem is the prevailing exaltation of freedom as choice: but 'we are not free because we can choose, but only when we have chosen well'.

HART, David, Daniel Dennett Hunts the Snark, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, January 2007 [A ‘Darwinian’ fundamentalist like Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett has recently authored Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon. Hart brings to bear his perceptiveness and passionate polemic in a sustained refutation of the book and of empirical ‘explanations’ of religion in general. Such accounts of religion invite us to poke fun, like Lewis Carroll, at authoritative discourse about an imagined quarry.]

HARTROPP, Andy, Just Prices Today, Anvil, Vol. 22 No. 2, 2005, pp. 113-118. [The principle of a ‘just price’, much discussed by medieval economic theorists and theologians, receives little attention from economists today. In place of its premise that economic practice should conform to moral norms, ‘market forces’ are taken as determinative. Unjust outcomes of this are briefly illustrated and explained, a theology of just price outlined, and practical remedies noted including the relevance of the Fairtrade Foundation.]

HEIDEMAN, Eugene, The Missiological Significance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Missiology, Vol. XXVIII, No. 2, April 2000, pp. 163 - 176. [The UDHR is a creed which Christians must work with creatively, setting it in a theological context. Issues raised in the course of this include Christian liberty and the relation of rights to duties. Churches are often in a position to advocate rights where the UDHR receives only cynical lip-service.]

HENRY, Patrick, Remembering the Rescuers, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, 102, April 2000, pp.13-16. [If we would resist injustice and oppression, we might learn from those who have risen to such resistance heroically in the past. Studies of those rescuing Jews from the Nazis find that they tend to have grown up in homes where they were taught particular principles, among them the basic unity of human beings beyond their differences. The stories of rescuers can still rescue people from cynicism and despair today.]

HESLAM, Peter, Architects of Evangelical Intellectual Thought: Abraham Kuyper and Benjamin Warfield, Themelios, Vol. 24.2, February 1999, pp.3-20 [Kuyper's lectures at Princeton; Kuyper's stance was antithetical to Enlightenment ideology, disparaging apologetics, and reflecting conflict in the Netherlands; Warfield reflected Christian participation in a more moderate version of Enlightenment in North America, in the tradition of Bacon, Newton etc.]

HIGGINS, Gareth, Celluloid Soul, Third Way, {thirdway.org.uk}, Vol. 26 No.7, Sept 2003, pp. 22-25. [Watching modern cinema the author avers 'there isn't a secular molecule in the universe'. Adopting this viewpoint, he offers a popular skate through many films pointing out religious metaphors and intimations of the transcendent. For the author, as for film director Scorsese, 'it is difficult to tell the difference between going to the cinema and going to church'.]

HILL, Monica, Today's Local Mission Field for Need-Oriented Evangelism, He@lthyChurch.mag.uk, 8, July-Sept 2005, pp. 22-25. [A brief, easy-to-read summary of social and cultural changes in Britain during the past century. 'Need-oriented evangelism' must reckon with 16 changes (here identified) in the broad areas of social change (especially for women, youth, family and education), liberalisation of the church, and erosion of family life as the core unity of social structure.]

HIMMELFARB, Gertrude, The Christian University: A Call to Counterrevolution, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, No.59, January 1996, pp.16-19 [On the revolution whereby universities once linked to churches first experienced the disestablishment of the church and more recently the active establishment of society in its place, turning a 'liberal' education into a socially relevant and useful one. 'Today race, class and gender are the holy trinity presiding over higher education in America'; pursuit of truth is disparaged as spurious. The mission task of a Christian university in this setting.]

HINLICKY, Sarah E., The End of Magic, First Things, {www.firstthings.com}, 120, February 2002, pp.45-50. [Perceptive study of popular fantasies (Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Dark is Rising, The Chronicles of Prydain, the Earthsea series, and His Dark Materials) asking: when the power of magic comes to and end, where are we left? The authors of fantasy often stumble at this point. The true answer lies in Christ and in his distinctive challenge to the conventions of power, in which the inner meaning of goodness is finally separated from that of worldly power.]

HITCHEN, John, Evangelism and Mission: What is the Gospel?, unpublished paper prepared for Mission and Message, a consultation of the Conference of Churches of Aotearoa New Zealand, June 1995 [the validity of mission questioned today; the inadequacy of its traditional motives; tensions from globalisation; Evangelicals, Catholics and Eastern Orthodox on mission; converging concerns; voices waiting to contribute. An excellent survey of the issues, followed by an attempt to frame the message of the Gospel as it engages these issues.]

HITCHEN, John, Exploring the Gospel's Transforming Impact on a New Testament City: Aspects of an Ephesian Case-Study, New Slant, April 2001, pp.6-10 [St Paul's conflict at Ephesus (Acts 18-20) provides insights into the process of Christian transformation of society in the first-century Roman province of Asia. Very readable reflections by this ex-Principal of the Bible College of New Zealand]

HODGKIN, Robin, Making Space for Meaning, Oxford Review of Education, Vol. 23, No.3, 1997. [The spiritual thresh-hold represented by 'the dawning of meaning' is obscured by the Cartesian visual model of knowing. It originates in symbol and play (widely understood) which is at once directional and an end in itself. This understanding is traced in the work of John MacMurray, Michael Polanyi, Suzanne Langer and Donald Winnicott, and is vital for understanding discovery, and for pursuing the deeper but less measurable goals of education.]

HODGKINSON, David, Unworkable?, Third Way {www.thirdway.org.uk}, November 2002, pp. 11-12. [A good brief popular account of changing employment practice and the personal, ethical and religious issues this raises. Organisational loyalty (on the side both of employer and employee) has lessened; the 'portfolio' lifestyle brings opportunities for choice and control but also insecurity and stress. In the Bible there appears ambivalence to work. The idea of being a 'Biblical freelancer']

HOLLENWEGER, Walter J., A Plea for a Theologically Responsible Syncretism, Missionalia, 25.1, April 1997, pp.5-18 [For 'syncretism' read 'inculturation'. Biblical instances of this, with special treatment of Colossians 1.15-20. A similar responsible engagement is demanded by the principalities and powers of our own age]

HOM, Mary Catherine, Girard for the Uninitiated: An Introduction to Girardian Theory and its Application to Biblical Interpretation, Crux, Vol. XXXIX No. 2, June 2003, pp. 2-12. [The title says it. The 'three great moments' in René Girard's theory are described: (1)mimetic desire and rivalry, (2) the scapegoat mechanism, widespread and archaic, (3) the unique biblical exposure of the scapegoat mechanism, addressed most radically in Jesus Christ. The limitations of Girard's theory for, and its positive contributions to, biblical interpretation are considered.]

HOUSTON, James, Who are the addicts?, Chapter Three of his The Hungry Soul: What we long for and why it matters, Lion {www.lion-publishing.co.uk} 1992, pp.28-50 [popular reflections on 'addictive' desire, richly illustrated from literature. An interesting perspective on one of sin's forms, of special relevance perhaps to modern Western culture.]

HOWARD, Agnes R., In Moral Labor, First Things {www.firstthings.com}, March 2006. [Pregnancy including childbirth is ‘labour’: a moral labour of hospitality and stewardship ‘in the context of a divine work, with husband and wife as co-workers alongside God in the creation of a unique human soul’. High-tech reproduction today relegates women to comparative bystanders, and can exploit them. A call to understand and honour better the unique role and dignity of the pregnant mother.]

HOYE, William J., The Religious Roots of Academic Freedom, Theological Studies, 58 (1977), pp.409-428. [argues that the roots of academic freedom lies not in the Enlightenment but in medieval Christianity and its universities, where freedom of theological thought was valued; the place of authority, reason and doubt in these. Numerous quotations from the time.]

HUGHES, Trystan Owain, Pop Music and the Church’s Mission, Anvil, Vol. 22 No. 1, 2005, pp. 41-53. [Pop music can express spiritual issues in a way which makes young people’s ‘spirits soar’ - in contrast to church music. A spiritual tsunami has hit ‘which will build without breaking for decades to come. The wave is this: people want to know God ‘ (Leonard Sweet). Insofar as the Church takes any notice of pop music it tends towards three responses, here discussed: prohibition (devotion to pop music and to Christ are seen as rival), appropriation (pop music is mirrored with Christian sentiments) and conversation (a receptive but critical engagement is pursued).]

HUME, Cardinal Basil, Sex and the self, The Tablet, 27 March 1999, pp.453-4 [Abridged version of a t